Is there such a thing as too much acceleration?

[Anonymous]

It's not bad, it's just not good by itself.

If your kid is the top math student in their school, that will be noted in recommendations. If not, than being overaccelerated whike falling behind in ability/achievement is a missalocation of effort.

Compare going to community college for a limited quality version (compared to the elite school or honor college programs this kid will be interested in) of Linear Algebra or Complex Analysis or Number Theory or Algebra, as online classes or an extra commute, with college students classmates who don't have the same mathematical aptitude, and then going to university and meeting a bunch of classmates who know each other from HS and are better prepared for the university courses,

vs the alternative of being on the more common (but still rare) highly accelerated pace on the regular school honors ladder, but going much deeper every year with "contest math", which in practice is a really a nice preview of that same college level material, while also being more social and fun for math-loving kids doing math with their peers. Or doing a research project with a mentor or a online yearlong EC program with a cohort.

The kids and parents who think they are hyper elite because no one else in town is as advanced in school math, and school math is all they do, have a rude awakening when they get to college and realize how much education they missed.

Now, all this is for math people. On the other hand, if your kid doesn't care that much about math but wants to bang out requirements for CS or engineering and graduate early or double major and not need much math for career, sure, play the credits game. But the credits won't help with admissions.

[Anonymous]

My kid is a math major at an Elite school. In HS they stopped at BC and instead took AP stats for "fun". They haven't had any trouble keeping up to date. Let your kids be themselves.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Anecdotal, but every kid I’ve known who took calc in 9th either dropped math forever before senior year or wound up doing an engineering degree at a state school.

Anecdotal, but my kid took high level math and by senior year had to travel to George Mason for his Linear Algebra class. He indeed does go to a state school (UVA) and is a double major in math and another subject and wants to go into quant finance. He already has an internship this summer as a rising sophomore and no doubt it is his math accomplishments that has made him stand out. In addition to his accelerated math he has won a good amount of math competitions.

He has always been surrounded by top math students and his anecdotal experience has been the complete opposite of yours. These kids are insanely competitive.

Your kid is also at a state school, so I don’t see how that experience is “the complete opposite” of mine. There are some great engineering programs at state schools. But some people on here seem to think that extreme math acceleration, by itself, makes a student a shoo-in for Ivy plus schools, or even HYPSM, and my point (and yours too) is that many accelerated math students wind up at their state flagship.

I don’t think anyone has implied the above in bold, certainly not me. OP asked if math acceleration would be *detrimental* to one’s application, and all I’ve been saying is that in my DC’s case it wasn’t.

How do you know? It still could’ve been a mark against their application, but they got in. No one’s application is perfect.

If you truly think the AO reviewed DC’s app and decided “well, it sucks that this kid excelled at math beyond grade level, but I guess I’ll admit them anyway since HYPSM is so hard up for applicants,” then I don’t know what to tell you.

Ha!

[Anonymous]

For those of you who have kids who love math (unfortunately, not my kids), there's a program called PROMYS and it basically allows your child to do college level math and be part of an extraordinary cohort of math people. There are other math summer programs well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was talking with a friend who also has a kid in 9th. DS is taking Calc AB and her kid is in Geometry. She said that too much acceleration is a bad thing, and that we should be careful because it can make kids seem like overachievers and/or gunners. At first I thought it's just jealousy and that she is mad my kid is so advanced, but then I thought there may be some truth to what she is saying. It seems these days, colleges aren't looking for excellence so much as quirkiness and that kids who do well in subjects like math, aren't valued at all. It doesn't help that we're Asian. Anyway. I'm wondering what other people think.

PS. My younger child is in 7th and is not on an accelerated track. Both kids are happy and love school.

Too much acceleration? Depends on the kid and what they want to do.
As long as they are getting A's it's not going to hurt them but it's not clear how much it will help them either.
Once you can check the box for high rigor. I think you can probably do this by taking AP calculus in high school, your friend's kid is on track for this their senior year. However, it would be nice to have it done by junior year so it is in your transcript, so I would try to be on track to take calculus by junior year.
But after that, colleges don't really see linear algebra or multivariable much differently than APUSH or other rigorous AP classes.

If you want to lean into the math in a way that colleges care about, then I think the baseline is qualifying for AIME.
There are like 3000 kids that are qualify to take that test so it's very nice but it's not a very high bar.
From there you want to qualify for the USAMO
That's like 500 kids and that is a small enough number that it can get you into a very selective school if you have otherwise great stats and ECs.
From there you want to qualify for the math olympiad summer program at carnegie mellon
That's like 100 kids and this will usually get you into pretty much any school you want.
After that you are in very rare company and you can write your own ticket.

Your numbers are off by 2X (250 make it to USAMO and 50-60 make it to MOP (Olympiad summer program). But the overall point is correct. This does make the kid "unique" or at least one of a select few. But I think OP said that her kid wasn't that interested in competition math. In any case, as long as the kid is doing well, has avenues to take challenging and advanced math courses or even basic linear algebra, it can't be a drawback. For those suggesting that somehow acceleration will diminish development in other subjects, the kid has to take some math course if not accelerated in any case. So how does taking, say MVC/Linear Algebra not leave room for APLANG/AP Lit/APUSH etc on their schedule.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's not bad, it's just not good by itself.

If your kid is the top math student in their school, that will be noted in recommendations. If not, than being overaccelerated whike falling behind in ability/achievement is a missalocation of effort.

Compare going to community college for a limited quality version (compared to the elite school or honor college programs this kid will be interested in) of Linear Algebra or Complex Analysis or Number Theory or Algebra, as online classes or an extra commute, with college students classmates who don't have the same mathematical aptitude, and then going to university and meeting a bunch of classmates who know each other from HS and are better prepared for the university courses,

vs the alternative of being on the more common (but still rare) highly accelerated pace on the regular school honors ladder, but going much deeper every year with "contest math", which in practice is a really a nice preview of that same college level material, while also being more social and fun for math-loving kids doing math with their peers. Or doing a research project with a mentor or a online yearlong EC program with a cohort.

The kids and parents who think they are hyper elite because no one else in town is as advanced in school math, and school math is all they do, have a rude awakening when they get to college and realize how much education they missed.

Now, all this is for math people. On the other hand, if your kid doesn't care that much about math but wants to bang out requirements for CS or engineering and graduate early or double major and not need much math for career, sure, play the credits game. But the credits won't help with admissions.

Well, yeah. But school math is super different from competition math. The problems on the AMC, AIME, USAMO, are just very very difficult versions of things on the high school syllabus (algebra, geometry, etc). Whereas these accelerated kids are learning entirely new topics that don't show up in competition math. Competition math also prioritizes tricks, logic, seeing patterns and puzzles, etc (plus speed, obviously). It's like comparing apples to oranges. And I don't think that kids who excel at competition math necessarily do well in school math, and vice versa.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Is your child a math prodigy? If yes, and you have other evidence for it, it will help your admission. If not, I would say that calculus AB in 9th grade is too much acceleration resulting in superficial grasp of the material.

I'm not sure what "evidence" you mean- DS doesn't do math competitions because it's not his thing. but he does many problems a day for fun. he likes experimenting with topics outside of class. also, he has an A in class and aces every test, so I think he has a prety strong grasp of the material.

this means nothing, sorry.
do you have any math background? it's hard for parents with no background to judge how good their kid is in math.

Your comment means nothing because you have no basis from which to judge the parents qualifications.

actually i do. i very much doubt OP would even ask this question publicly if she had significant math background. our own kid is highly accelerated and we constantly quiz her to make sure there are no gaps and her foundation is rock solid.

Yeah. That sounds healthy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's not bad, it's just not good by itself.

If your kid is the top math student in their school, that will be noted in recommendations. If not, than being overaccelerated whike falling behind in ability/achievement is a missalocation of effort.

Compare going to community college for a limited quality version (compared to the elite school or honor college programs this kid will be interested in) of Linear Algebra or Complex Analysis or Number Theory or Algebra, as online classes or an extra commute, with college students classmates who don't have the same mathematical aptitude, and then going to university and meeting a bunch of classmates who know each other from HS and are better prepared for the university courses,

vs the alternative of being on the more common (but still rare) highly accelerated pace on the regular school honors ladder, but going much deeper every year with "contest math", which in practice is a really a nice preview of that same college level material, while also being more social and fun for math-loving kids doing math with their peers. Or doing a research project with a mentor or a online yearlong EC program with a cohort.

The kids and parents who think they are hyper elite because no one else in town is as advanced in school math, and school math is all they do, have a rude awakening when they get to college and realize how much education they missed.

Now, all this is for math people. On the other hand, if your kid doesn't care that much about math but wants to bang out requirements for CS or engineering and graduate early or double major and not need much math for career, sure, play the credits game. But the credits won't help with admissions.

Complex analysis? You don’t reach that until Calc 1-3, Linear Algebra, typically an intro to proof course, and real analysis 1- sometimes 2.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is your child a math prodigy? If yes, and you have other evidence for it, it will help your admission. If not, I would say that calculus AB in 9th grade is too much acceleration resulting in superficial grasp of the material.

I'm not sure what "evidence" you mean- DS doesn't do math competitions because it's not his thing. but he does many problems a day for fun. he likes experimenting with topics outside of class. also, he has an A in class and aces every test, so I think he has a prety strong grasp of the material.

this means nothing, sorry.
do you have any math background? it's hard for parents with no background to judge how good their kid is in math.

Your comment means nothing because you have no basis from which to judge the parents qualifications.

actually i do. i very much doubt OP would even ask this question publicly if she had significant math background. our own kid is highly accelerated and we constantly quiz her to make sure there are no gaps and her foundation is rock solid.

Yeah. That sounds healthy.

Sounds like good parenting. School standards have dropped. Highly educated parents who aren’t educating their children are negligent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those who claim math acceleration is detrimental to admission into highly selective colleges are off their rocker so long as the student does well in the classes. It's this simple: a student taking linear or diff equations or elements of numbers or field theory or whatever, will have a stronger applicant file than a student who doesn't have that on their app. That's true if the student comes from a high resource school where everyone is taking calc bc their senior year. It is also true for the student in some underresourced school who went into their local college system.

I think a lot of parents who have children on the "regular" sequence of Calc BC by junior or senior year are bitter that there are students more capable than theirs.

Calc BC your junior or senior year is NOT "Regular". Normal is Percalc senior year, but for "good schools" it's becoming Calculus by senior year. Taking AP/College leveled courses in HS is NOT "regular".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those who claim math acceleration is detrimental to admission into highly selective colleges are off their rocker so long as the student does well in the classes. It's this simple: a student taking linear or diff equations or elements of numbers or field theory or whatever, will have a stronger applicant file than a student who doesn't have that on their app. That's true if the student comes from a high resource school where everyone is taking calc bc their senior year. It is also true for the student in some underresourced school who went into their local college system.

I think a lot of parents who have children on the "regular" sequence of Calc BC by junior or senior year are bitter that there are students more capable than theirs.

Calc BC your junior or senior year is NOT "Regular". Normal is Percalc senior year, but for "good schools" it's becoming Calculus by senior year. Taking AP/College leveled courses in HS is NOT "regular".

DP, for the most part, conversations on DCUM are elite schools and elite standards. Not a single person DD has met at her Ivy hasn’t done Calc 1 at least.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's not bad, it's just not good by itself.

If your kid is the top math student in their school, that will be noted in recommendations. If not, than being overaccelerated whike falling behind in ability/achievement is a missalocation of effort.

Compare going to community college for a limited quality version (compared to the elite school or honor college programs this kid will be interested in) of Linear Algebra or Complex Analysis or Number Theory or Algebra, as online classes or an extra commute, with college students classmates who don't have the same mathematical aptitude, and then going to university and meeting a bunch of classmates who know each other from HS and are better prepared for the university courses,

vs the alternative of being on the more common (but still rare) highly accelerated pace on the regular school honors ladder, but going much deeper every year with "contest math", which in practice is a really a nice preview of that same college level material, while also being more social and fun for math-loving kids doing math with their peers. Or doing a research project with a mentor or a online yearlong EC program with a cohort.

The kids and parents who think they are hyper elite because no one else in town is as advanced in school math, and school math is all they do, have a rude awakening when they get to college and realize how much education they missed.

Now, all this is for math people. On the other hand, if your kid doesn't care that much about math but wants to bang out requirements for CS or engineering and graduate early or double major and not need much math for career, sure, play the credits game. But the credits won't help with admissions.

Well, yeah. But school math is super different from competition math. The problems on the AMC, AIME, USAMO, are just very very difficult versions of things on the high school syllabus (algebra, geometry, etc). Whereas these accelerated kids are learning entirely new topics that don't show up in competition math. Competition math also prioritizes tricks, logic, seeing patterns and puzzles, etc (plus speed, obviously). It's like comparing apples to oranges. And I don't think that kids who excel at competition math necessarily do well in school math, and vice versa.

Unless you call knowledge of theorems "tricks", there are no tricks in USAMO (or AIME), not to mention the TSTST/TST/APMO and other IMO qualifying exams. And most of my MOPper kid's friends are excellent at school and advanced math. One is tops (in all subjects) at a top East coast private boarding, one got into MIT as a junior, one took undergraduate topology and real analysis at his state flagship as a senior, one did differential equations in 9th (NoVA) etc etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is your child a math prodigy? If yes, and you have other evidence for it, it will help your admission. If not, I would say that calculus AB in 9th grade is too much acceleration resulting in superficial grasp of the material.

I'm not sure what "evidence" you mean- DS doesn't do math competitions because it's not his thing. but he does many problems a day for fun. he likes experimenting with topics outside of class. also, he has an A in class and aces every test, so I think he has a prety strong grasp of the material.

this means nothing, sorry.
do you have any math background? it's hard for parents with no background to judge how good their kid is in math.

Your comment means nothing because you have no basis from which to judge the parents qualifications.

actually i do. i very much doubt OP would even ask this question publicly if she had significant math background. our own kid is highly accelerated and we constantly quiz her to make sure there are no gaps and her foundation is rock solid.

Yeah. That sounds healthy.

Sounds like good parenting. School standards have dropped. Highly educated parents who aren’t educating their children are negligent.

Sounds like abuse Karen

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid is a math major at an Elite school. In HS they stopped at BC and instead took AP stats for "fun". They haven't had any trouble keeping up to date. Let your kids be themselves.

Had you taken Calculus BC freshman year of HS could you see that 4 years later that might had been to much of a gap in time to apply that to otter classes?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is your child a math prodigy? If yes, and you have other evidence for it, it will help your admission. If not, I would say that calculus AB in 9th grade is too much acceleration resulting in superficial grasp of the material.

I'm not sure what "evidence" you mean- DS doesn't do math competitions because it's not his thing. but he does many problems a day for fun. he likes experimenting with topics outside of class. also, he has an A in class and aces every test, so I think he has a prety strong grasp of the material.

this means nothing, sorry.
do you have any math background? it's hard for parents with no background to judge how good their kid is in math.

Your comment means nothing because you have no basis from which to judge the parents qualifications.

actually i do. i very much doubt OP would even ask this question publicly if she had significant math background. our own kid is highly accelerated and we constantly quiz her to make sure there are no gaps and her foundation is rock solid.

Yeah. That sounds healthy.

Sounds like good parenting. School standards have dropped. Highly educated parents who aren’t educating their children are negligent.

Sounds like abuse Karen

Cry me a damn river. “Abuse” isn’t calculus Jane. Get a grip, some people have real problems.