Anonymous wrote:
Nothing is optional these days, imho. There are so many qualified applicants, that you need every little bit to get ahead. I am so glad we are done with this process
My DC just finished the process. She submitted a single ACT score (very good, but not stellar) to 7 schools and got into all of them. It's only as cutthroat as you want it to be. If OP's DC is taking AP Bio in 9th grade (our school requires regular Bio and Chem as prerequisites for this class), I'm guessing it's a cutthroat environment and the kid will feel like a failure if he doesn't go to a Top 10 university. Take all the tests!