[Potironette]

A semi-long while ago I made a post asking what the point of college was. I walked away with an idea that yes, college would be something good to experience..but I sort of became apathetic to the whole idea of going to college again :/. Why spend a year of my life learning college related things when I could spend a year learning other things?

Hence, while choosing my classes this year I've only put thought into the semi-short-term: "Oh, these are the courses I'm interested in...and these are the ones I qualify/don't qualify for, so I'll just take courses I'm interested in and qualify for!"

Unfortunately, this means a woeful lack of English and history courses (and science because the one I'm more interested in I won't qualify for if I don't take a math course that will move too fast for me to be comfortable with). Apparently colleges want people to love English, because yes, of course communication is extremely important! But..ah, I can't bring myself to take them, and especially not just for college! Granted, I did list some English things as back-ups in case I didn't get the classes I chose.

I dunno exactly why I'm posting this. Maybe for me to consider why exactly I'm choosing an extremely unbalanced set of classes? It's going to be due in April 1st, with teacher approvals and all.

At my high-school, we get to select courses for 12th grade in 11th grade. I happen to have put these as my main choices:
Fall: AP Computer Science / Math Problem Solving I / AP Calculus AB / Advanced Public Speaking / AP Statistics

Spring: AP Computer Science / Math Problem Solving II / AP Calculus AB / (Advanced Studio Art) Computer Assisted Design / AP Statistics
---
And then my back-ups:
Fall: (Advanced Studio Art) Computer Imaging and Web Design / (Advanced Studio Art) 3D Problem Solving: Sculpture and Structure / AP Micro-economics / AP Psychology / Advanced Essay Writing
Spring: (Advanced Studio Art) Ceramics - Form and Function / AP Macro-Economics / Creative Writing: Poetry / The Art of the Memoir / AP Psychology

My counselor tells people they should choose English classes for college. But that "for college" really hits a nerve. I took AP French "for college" and that turned into endless regret--since we never learned French and only prepared for the AP exam by sort of following an AP textbook. This year, I went in deciding to take classes that I wouldn't regret working hard for. I wonder how badly I'm screwing myself over o~o?


...woops, I hadn't intended this to be a rant
/rant

[Tiva]

So, it seems like you are interested in Computer Science…. Or Engineering or Drafting. All of which you could work at with Community College. Only big issue I know is if you can graduate with the 'college bound' diploma (IDK if you do this NC does) if you don't take 4 years of English. I hated English in high school due to bad teachers, and horribly boring sources. But in college I had to at least learn to like them, and I did if i liked the sources.

There is nothing wrong with sticking with what you like but just don't cut of your own leg doing it.

[Coda]

I would agree with your counselor that AP English is a better choice than taking English 101 in college. AP-level teachers in high school are usually way better instructors than college professors, and the class sizes are smaller so you'll get more individual attention.

In fact, I would consider AP English Literature and AP English Language and Composition to be my two favorite high school classes I ever took. And thanks to those, I didn't have to take ANY English classes in college.

Meanwhile, I took Japanese for three years in college, and I would say THOSE were among my favorite college classes. I didn't actually need the credits for my degree program after the first year, but I was considering a Japanese minor, and I only missed out on it by one course because the sensei took a sabbatical my senior year. :/

[Potironette]

It's interesting how I don't trust my counselor but trust other opinions x'D.
Cutting my own leg is a problem '~'

Going through the courses again, I'm kind of surprised there isn't a single AP English class--granted, I'd be incredibly hesitant to take any due to my history of struggling with writing.
I wouldn't mind replacing the art thing in spring with something else. Sadly most of the more interesting English classes are in fall :/.

There's a class in poetry and a class in memoirs I'd consider taking. For some reason my counselor looked at the class in memoirs and decided I wouldn't like it--I don't know why though. Poetry class might be an excellent way for me to dislike poetry, or not, I'm not sure. Cultural studies and specific genres take up the majority of the spring courses. As interesting as other people's cultures might be, having mandatory in-class discussions about it sounds painful (for me). I'm not overly interested in reading the bible as a book, nor in reading sci-fi. There's a class about theater in New York which sounds interesting, but also sounds like a lot of work (one would need to see 10-12 performances at night, write reports every two weeks, write up a research paper at the end, and do a group project).

[Coda]

It's not wholly unwise to be skeptical of advice from someone whose job it is to give advice. You don't know how up-to-date their information is and their own personal experiences are now YEARS in the past. (Admittedly, so is my own experience -- I graduated from high school before you were even born. And that feels weird.)

One of the classes is a language-study course (like French). The other is a literature course that happens to focus on works written in English.

If you struggle with writing that's all the MORE reason to take care of it while you're in high school. You will get less help in college. And one of those AP English classes is going to be heavily structured around TEACHING you composition. It made a big difference for me.

Given how expensive college is compared to the cost of an AP test, I do recommend getting out of high school with as many AP credits as you can. I was technically a sophomore on my first day of college, and I STILL ended up having to take a ninth semester thanks to my counselor giving me bad advice and screwing up my prerequisite chain. :/

[Tiva]

…. I am a bad advice giver on this idea alone right here. That Culture class sounds awesome, I would take it so damn hard. But I was an anthropology major and those kinds of things interested me.

I am also in direct opposition to Coda on AP credits, because I remember taking AP Calc, acing it and then having to retake it because my college wouldn't apply it as Calc 1 in college.

[Coda]

I had the same problem with physics, because my physics class was taught as the non-calculus version and my degree program in college required the calculus version. The credits would have still counted as my required physics prerequisites if I hadn't been pursuing a science degree.

But even in light of that, AP tests are POCKET CHANGE compared to five credit-hours of college tuition. It's worth the gamble, in my opinion. That said, ask questions -- find out which specific test the class is working towards so you can try to avoid that problem. If you're intending to pursue a science degree (like computer science) then make sure you're going to be taking Calculus BC (which I did take) and Physics C (I unfortunately took Physics B).

Tiva, I'm guessing you didn't take precalculus before you took AP Calculus?

[Tiva]

Coda I took Precalc and AP Calc in high school. Then had to retake Calc 1 in college, I slept through the class and passed with a B+. I remember waking up from a nap one day in class looking at the board as she was teaching and realizing she had missed a step in the equation. Corrected her, said the answer and went back to sleep.

And depends on what college you go to. My old college is now on this 'low track cost' program, so you pay $100 per credit hour plus 50 dollars in fees a semester and 200 for book rental which includes all of your textbooks a semester.

[Coda]

It doesn't depend on what college you go to at all. At $100/credit-hour, AP Calculus BC is worth $1000 but only costs $93, and the books are provided by the school. The deal only gets better as the cost of college goes up.

[Potironette]

Hmmm, computer science sounds fun to take in college. I have to admit that I don't know anything about the college process. I only found out recently there were required classes :/. How does everyone know how college works? Me searching online ends up with a hodgepodge of information that goes through my head.

..That means it's a good idea to take BC Calculus? My school does offer the physics course that requires BC Calculus but I was worried about taking it because I'm not confident I can keep up with the class. Granted, following the logic of if it's going to be hard, then take it to get better at it, I guess I should take BC Calculus to take physics? Don't worry about grades and just worry about learning?
(I am interested in taking physics...I dunno how well I'll handle BC math. I do match the requirements, but it's not like anything comes easy to me)

I'm meeting with my English teacher to talk about classes tomorrow. Maybe I'll take poetry? Or memoirs? I'm not sure yet.

[Coda]

I would say that Calculus BC is almost certainly a good idea. Virtually EVERY degree program has a year of math as a general-education requirement, and any science degree is going to require more.

Calculus is actually not all that bad. Trigonometry is, in my opinion, harder, and most high school programs have you take trig before you take calculus. Calculus is basically just algebra but more so. I've seen you manipulate expressions without a problem; calculus just introduces a couple new manipulations: the derivative and the antiderivative. You'll get a long way with identities like "the derivative of x² is 2x".

One thing I'll point out is that you have me as a tutor. ;)

If your school offers Physics C, then you might end up taking them at the same time, but that shouldn't be a problem -- the calculus class should keep well ahead of the physics class in terms of what skills you need; I didn't use anything fancier than a double integral in all of the college physics courses I took. (It WOULD have gotten crazy if I had gone on into something like fluid dynamics.)

[Potironette]

Having you as a tutor helps a lot!

I'll get another form when I get to school tomorrow and refill out the things. I still have tomorrow and the day after to change things and get teacher approvals again.

Also, thank-you both very much. I think I'll replace the art class with an English one, change AB to BC, then replace statistics with Physics...well, I'm not that certain about what to replace with physics. Problem solving sounds incredibly fun, statistics sounds incredibly useful, and computer science sounds like it's on around the same level of work as problem solving (a lot).
(Although school allows students to take six classes, I'd rather not ruin my health and sanity trying to take more than five classes that will take a lot of work.)

[Coda]

I never took statistics. More empirically-oriented sciences require statistics credits, but I just sort of picked up statistics knowledge incidentally during other more general math courses. I'm not sure if I could meaningfully advise on it; my intuition says it's something you could skip, but I don't want to state that authoritatively.

I've never heard of an AP problem solving class. That DOES sound interesting.

AP Computer Science is... actually rather bland. The content is important, to be sure, but it's very mechanical. And unless they've changed how the class is taught since I took it, you're going to be scrambling to keep up at the beginning if you don't already know how to write some simple programs. (When I took it, there were two other programming classes as prerequisites.) The advantage to taking AP CS is more that it lets you take the more interesting CS courses sooner. I will say I'm GLAD that I took the class, because even though I'd been programming for ten years by the time I took it and the programs I wrote were way below my level, learning and understanding the formalisms really helped. But I wouldn't go so far as to call it "fun." Then again, someone with less experience than I had going in might not be put off by the simplicity.

I took 23 hours my freshman year. ("Full time" is 12 hours minimum; most students that aren't also working a job take 15-18. I think degree programs are usually balanced so you have to take 15 every semester in order to graduate in 4 years.) It took special permission to go over the usual limit, but I THRIVED on that load. It meant I stayed engaged instead of falling into the usual freshman trap of learning time management the hard way. I wish I could have kept up that pace in subsequent years, but prerequisite requirements limited what classes I could take and I couldn't justify paying for random elective courses that wouldn't contribute to my degree.

[Potironette]

It's not an AP class, though apparently according to my school it counts as "rigorous" and "difficult." ...I don't know what that means, but I guess it has something to do with transcripts.

Going into it for the first time it'll probably be "fun" x'D. I sort of need to find a way to actually focus on things, and I'm hoping that taking a class will help me do that (kind of the way history class having me write term papers makes me put off work and not sleep because of it). If it's anything like my sister's mandatory class where they have a worksheet and speed through whatever's on it, I'm pretty sure I'm going to be confused. It's more fun that way though.

Time management hmm. It's good you're able to thrive on that. I dunno if I'd just burn myself out on more classes because even now, when I should be able to manage my time, I find myself nearly constantly sleepy. And doing other things (like filling out forms for my counselor's recommendation, which I'm doing right now and just realizing I should wait for the weekend to do), puts off my sleep even further. My time management skills are likely horrendous. What do you mean by "engaged" though?

[Coda]

Which class isn't an AP class? Going into what for the first time will be "fun"?

When I say "engaged" I mean interested and paying attention.

[Potironette]

Problem solving isn't an AP class.
Not knowing much about computer science or programming makes the class sound fun.

For me, I feel like the more free time I have, the more time I have to be interested in class xD.