And my sense is that most of these courses are actually more rigorous when they are actually taken in college.

I hate how AP leads to teaching to the test. That high schools and teachers brag about their kids' scores (so it becomes self-serving, rather than student-centered).

Also, kids lose a month of education if the schools requires no real content/teaching after the AP test. I wish the whole system would go away.

Anonymous wrote:My very smart but not absolute genius child took the following classes her senior year (while also doing marching band and ballet after school). She got all As and mostly 4s and 5s:

AP Calc AB
AP Economics (1st semester)/AP Government (2nd semester)
AP English Literature
AP Environmental Science
AP French
AP Art History
Band

It honestly wasn't insane.

Just because something is possible does not mean it is necessary.

Did your kid get good sleep? Did they exercise, develop other sides of themselves (art skills? hobbies that they will enjoy for a lifetime?). Did they spend time hanging out with friends in the waning days of their childhoods?

DMV parents/kids look around, in their already stressed mood, and think such a schedule is NECESSARY to get into a good college. IT ABSOLUTELY IS NOT.

Opt for health balance people.

Anonymous wrote:I guess they aren't that much work if kids take so many of them. I know many private schools limit the number of APs because of the big workload.

What are you saying? It is not too much work but it has a big workload? Were you educated in a private school?

Anonymous wrote:My very smart but not absolute genius child took the following classes her senior year (while also doing marching band and ballet after school). She got all As and mostly 4s and 5s:

AP Calc AB
AP Economics (1st semester)/AP Government (2nd semester)
AP English Literature
AP Environmental Science
AP French
AP Art History
Band

It honestly wasn't insane.

It is fine in senior year and really most of it were not considered hard APs in the 4th year of HS. So what exactly did she take the first 3 years?

Anonymous wrote:Doesn't a kid takng > 3 kinda make the school look bad? Like if they were able to take 5 AP classes and get As in all of them, the class load must not be too demanding and they're probably giving out As to everybody. I wonder how the number of AP classes correlates to the scores on AP exams.

I think it is more to do with the fact that loading up on APs in one year shows that the kid does not know how to balance workload, cannot plan in advance and is not organized. Not good traits for excelling in college.

Also, depends on if you have taken hard APs like Calc BC, Foreign Language or easy fludd APs like envio or psych. If your AP exam scores does not match your grade in the class then it is a problem.

My rising Junior is registered to take 4 APs, one of which is AP Calc AB. He'll be going into Humaties so I wish he could focus more on other APs but there are no other viable Math options that aren't AP.

My kid took 1, 3, 4 and 4. He had 8 APs with scores in 4s and 5s, under his belt BEFORE he applied to colleges, and he had at least 1 from each of the core subject areas.

Anonymous wrote:My daughter told me that her friend’s parents hired a college planner who told them that most kids shouldn’t take more than three AP’s per year.
Is this true? I was under the impression that there were many kids who took all AP’s.

Voice of reason. Some of us have been TRYING to talk sense into DCUM parents.

You DO NOT need to max out AP coursework. Take those that match your kid's career interest. Or if they have exhausted other offerings.

Colleges want to see that you are capable of higher level coursework, and are not taking lower courses than you can handle to get a good GPA.

Beyond that, DON'T buy into the pressure/rumors that you have to keep up with the strivers.

Anonymous wrote:The private school my older DD attended did not offer APs. The head of school thought they were all about rote learning and didn't teach kids to think critically. My older DD took three AP tests and got 5s and a 4, so got college credit without suffering through the awful AP classes.
My younger DD attends public school where she's taking 5 APs junior year. She took 2 APs sophomore year. Half the kids in the AP classes are not that smart, DD claims.
I'm unimpressed with the AP curriculum. The classes have so much work, most of which seems to emphasize volume over quality. DD plows through all of it with no interest or enthusiasm. My older DD loved her private school classes, which were all about thinking and learning how to use and analyze information, not rote memorization and regurgitation, which seems to be the focus of most of younger DD's AP classes.
Older DD went to HYPSM, so did fine without taking a single AP class in high school.

Really? Your older daughter went to all of those schools?

My very smart but not absolute genius child took the following classes her senior year (while also doing marching band and ballet after school). She got all As and mostly 4s and 5s:

AP Calc AB
AP Economics (1st semester)/AP Government (2nd semester)
AP English Literature
AP Environmental Science
AP French
AP Art History
Band

It honestly wasn't insane.

OP this is why I would never hire a private college counselor- so much bad advice. I can come to this website and get both good and bad advice for free.

it depends on the school your child attends, and your child. Our oldest who graduated from mcps, took two freshman year, three sophomore year, 4 or 5 Junior and Senior year. All As, no problem. My second, in private, they only allow one per year and we had to sign a form allowing him to take I mix of for AP and honors courses his junior year. He also has Straight A's.

When applying for colleges, your child is not competing with kids across your county for spots, they are competing with their peers at their high school. If many at your high school take four or five APs, and your child is a top student, they should as well.

The private school my older DD attended did not offer APs. The head of school thought they were all about rote learning and didn't teach kids to think critically. My older DD took three AP tests and got 5s and a 4, so got college credit without suffering through the awful AP classes.
My younger DD attends public school where she's taking 5 APs junior year. She took 2 APs sophomore year. Half the kids in the AP classes are not that smart, DD claims.
I'm unimpressed with the AP curriculum. The classes have so much work, most of which seems to emphasize volume over quality. DD plows through all of it with no interest or enthusiasm. My older DD loved her private school classes, which were all about thinking and learning how to use and analyze information, not rote memorization and regurgitation, which seems to be the focus of most of younger DD's AP classes.
Older DD went to HYPSM, so did fine without taking a single AP class in high school.

Doesn't a kid takng > 3 kinda make the school look bad? Like if they were able to take 5 AP classes and get As in all of them, the class load must not be too demanding and they're probably giving out As to everybody. I wonder how the number of AP classes correlates to the scores on AP exams.