Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Schools that are smart with how they handle APs will arrange things so that the easier ones are the ones available in 9th. AP Econ, AP Human Geography, and AP Computer Science Principles are pretty easy for APs and should be in reach for any bright 9th grader. AP Government is the easiest of the AP History classes, so it should be the first one that kids take. AP math is easy if a kid has reached that level in their normal math track. AP Physics 1 is basically honors physics and covers the same material in a regular honors physics class, but for whatever reason has the AP label. It's dumb to have a blanket policy that forbids APs in 9th grade without looking at the specific student and the specific AP class.

did you have to fight with administration over prerequisites for your kid to take four in 9th?

Nope.

Kid went to a rigorous DMV private without AP's. Took as many honors/advanced classes (note advanced classes use the AP text books and often the teacher is just omitting partial content to go more deeply into a certain topic, or add one of their own). Took three AP tests (calc ab, english lang, foreign languate). Kid is getting 4.0 in college so well prepared.

Anonymous wrote:

Schools that are smart with how they handle APs will arrange things so that the easier ones are the ones available in 9th. AP Econ, AP Human Geography, and AP Computer Science Principles are pretty easy for APs and should be in reach for any bright 9th grader. AP Government is the easiest of the AP History classes, so it should be the first one that kids take. AP math is easy if a kid has reached that level in their normal math track. AP Physics 1 is basically honors physics and covers the same material in a regular honors physics class, but for whatever reason has the AP label. It's dumb to have a blanket policy that forbids APs in 9th grade without looking at the specific student and the specific AP class.

did you have to fight with administration over prerequisites for your kid to take four in 9th?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

My kid is the one taking 4 AP classes in 9th. If it makes you feel better, he took Algebra I in 4th grade and has always been way off the charts in math. With the exception of AP US Government, the other APs he's taking are trivial for a kid who is a math whiz. Colleges may not be impressed with a 5 in AP Calc in 9th grade. They will be impressed by the kid's USA(J)MO qualification.

Schools that are smart with how they handle APs will arrange things so that the easier ones are the ones available in 9th. AP Econ, AP Human Geography, and AP Computer Science Principles are pretty easy for APs and should be in reach for any bright 9th grader. AP Government is the easiest of the AP History classes, so it should be the first one that kids take. AP math is easy if a kid has reached that level in their normal math track. AP Physics 1 is basically honors physics and covers the same material in a regular honors physics class, but for whatever reason has the AP label. It's dumb to have a blanket policy that forbids APs in 9th grade without looking at the specific student and the specific AP class.

Anonymous wrote:In at HYPS, took 2+3+8+5 = 18 throughout high school. An additional 2 were self studied, for 20 in total.

Impressive. Fewer than 250 students a year graduate with taking 20 or more AP exams.

There are about 4 million US high school seniors graduating per year, plus hundreds of thousands of international students.

Your incredible child is in the .005555555 percentile.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

Yet, you both expect them to be impressed by your fancy private school. Most of these posters don't have that privilege, OK? They have a different set of rules to follow.

Seriously! Thank you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

Yet, you both expect them to be impressed by your fancy private school. Most of these posters don't have that privilege, OK? They have a different set of rules to follow.

Not the PP, but I don't think they were saying schools should be impressed by their private, but rather that they spared their child the AP rat race. My kid attends private as well and while there are APs, they are only offered in jr. and sr. year. It takes a lot of pressure off and a kid can take half the number of APs than a public school kid and be equally or more competitive.

APs are a standardized way to compare kids from diverse settings studying core subjects with grading that is independent of any school. Whenever I hear private school parents say their schools are too good for APs, I interpret this as their kid couldn't hack it at a public magnet or other school with rigorous coursework. But again, with the full-pay, and legacy benefits that many private school kids have, it all gets jumbled up anyway when you try to look at the "success" of their admissions.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Harvard REA admit, private with good history at Harvard, 4 AP, SAT 1600. No legacy, donor, athletic recruit, URM.

School is kind of anti AP, so even preparing for the ones he took was not trivial while doing everything else he was doing.

If the school has an already rigorous curriculum, how could it possibly be anything other than trivial to prepare for the equivalent AP exam?

There were broad chunks of content that were not covered in the spirit of going deeper on certain topics. For example, the us history teacher he had spent two days on the battle of midway, including fairly detailed analyses of naval tactics. But with that depth comes a coverage cost and that is what DS had to make sure he recovered on his own. I’m not arguing “depth” is inherently better than “coverage” but it was cool seeing him get excited at dinner about whatever might be happening in class.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

Yet, you both expect them to be impressed by your fancy private school. Most of these posters don't have that privilege, OK? They have a different set of rules to follow.

Not the PP, but I don't think they were saying schools should be impressed by their private, but rather that they spared their child the AP rat race. My kid attends private as well and while there are APs, they are only offered in jr. and sr. year. It takes a lot of pressure off and a kid can take half the number of APs than a public school kid and be equally or more competitive.

If it is only the AP label is missing, and the courses are otherwise rigorous and college level, how would it be less work and take pressure of?

Reading between the lines, the only thing that is different is that its private school

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

Yet, you both expect them to be impressed by your fancy private school. Most of these posters don't have that privilege, OK? They have a different set of rules to follow.

Not the PP, but I don't think they were saying schools should be impressed by their private, but rather that they spared their child the AP rat race. My kid attends private as well and while there are APs, they are only offered in jr. and sr. year. It takes a lot of pressure off and a kid can take half the number of APs than a public school kid and be equally or more competitive.

Anonymous wrote:Harvard REA admit, private with good history at Harvard, 4 AP, SAT 1600. No legacy, donor, athletic recruit, URM.

School is kind of anti AP, so even preparing for the ones he took was not trivial while doing everything else he was doing.

If the school has an already rigorous curriculum, how could it possibly be anything other than trivial to prepare for the equivalent AP exam?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

How do you know those kids who got 5s as freshmen aren't just smarter and harder working than you were?

Harvard REA admit, private with good history at Harvard, 4 AP, SAT 1600. No legacy, donor, athletic recruit, URM.

School is kind of anti AP, so even preparing for the ones he took was not trivial while doing everything else he was doing. I can’t speak to whether there is a generalizable conclusion about taking AP’s or not for every school out there, but CCO begs the students every year to not assume they have to do this to be competitive.

Mind was IB so had those but I think maybe 5 APs? Gov. Apush. Enviro, calc bc, Spanish, Java, comp prin. I guess that’s 7.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zero AP courses for my private school kid. Imo, the biggest perk and privlege of private school is the absence of the toxic expectation to take max AP courses. Many AP course curriculums are restrictive, fast paced and dont allow deeper dive into complex topics. Kids often have multiple test retakes which inflates grades. I don't think AP is a reasonable benchmark. We know so many public kids with 4.0 gpa and all AP. Lots of grade inflation so kids kill themselves to get top grades, but when so many have perfect grades, their value is diluted. All AP does not guarantee t20 college. The only AP curriculum winner is College Board that makes lots of $$$ selling the program and tests. Without AP mania, my kid took many advanced classes but not in every discipline. They were very focused and excelled in their academic area of interest both in school coursework and with their EC. My kid did very well with college acceptances, but top grades and rigor are only 1 part of the 'holistic' admission process these days

Same for mine. NYC privates don't do AP. Child was accepted to a top NYC SHSAT school and we opted for private. We are very privileged to have the means to pay for it. But I am so glad we did not deal with this.

The fact that kids are taking multiple APs as freshmen and getting straight fives says to me that they have been greatly diluted from the 90s when I took them. Are colleges really impressed by this? At some point I feel like it is gluttony.

Yet, you both expect them to be impressed by your fancy private school. Most of these posters don't have that privilege, OK? They have a different set of rules to follow.