High School; AP Classes

In high school, there are many types of classes you could take and each can vary in difficulty.  You could take regular, honors, or Advanced Placement (AP) biology class, for example.  However, in my small private high school, we only had the options of taking regular or AP.  AP classes were even more limited due to the small number of teachers available to teach AP in the first place.  Having strict parents, I, of course, had to enroll in as many AP classes available as early as the high school offered it.  Starting 10^th grade, I enrolled in AP Calculus AB and continued to take as many AP classes as reasonably possible until the end of my senior year.

There are pros and cons to taking AP classes while in high school, but let’s start off with the positives.

Pros:

1. AP classes count as college units.

In my first year of undergraduate college, I was able to collectively receive 32 college units due to the number of AP classes I took in high school.  Looking back at it, thirty-two incoming units as a freshman in college is a hefty number when you take into consideration that 16 units per quarter label you as a full-time student on-track to finish within four years at my university.  Those thirty-two units practically meant that I had completed 2/3 of a year of undergraduate.

2. Smaller class = Better relationship with your teachers

In a large classroom, especially through the eyes of a teacher, you are just one of many students, so getting the attention you need is difficult. However, in a smaller sized classroom, the teachers can get to know your personality, work ethics, and distinct needs.  The most memorable teachers I had in high school (and probably the only reason why I would ever go back to visit my high school) were the ones that taught my AP classes.  My AP Literature teacher and AP Calculus teacher taught me more than just their respective subjects; they taught me valuable life lessons and disciplined me well enough to be a successful college student.

3. Small class = Better comradery with classmates

This aspect follows the same principles as the one with the teachers.  I made new friends with people who I never thought I would ever speak with and strengthened my relationship with classmates who were originally just “acquaintances”.  Most of the new friends I made came from outside my nerdy clique.  As we suffered through the AP classes together, we deconstructed the clique wall that is typically associated with high school and saw the similarities between each other.

Cons:

1. Classes are EXTREMELY difficult

AP classes are meant to be challenging for high school students.  You may have been a straight-A student the year before and thought the stories and workload of AP classes were just myths.  How bad could AP calculus really be?  It is just another branch of math, and you know you’re good at math because your parents, previous math teachers, and friends have told you so.  You walk into your first day of calculus class and the materials quickly go over you, but you think to yourself “Hey if I read this again at home, it will make more sense.  The teacher is just explaining too fast.”  Later that night, you go over the lecture notes and read the textbook only to realize it still doesn’t make sense.  Where do you even begin at this point?  Welcome to AP.

2. A lot of time is required

You cannot do well on anything without spending a lot of time on it.  Reading a one-thousand-page history textbook, memorizing the unit circle, or calculating the confidence interval of winning the lottery all take time, and the amount of time spent doing any of those means less time hanging out with friends or catching up on your favorite TV show.  You will be envious of your classmates who had enough sleep during the weekdays or who were able to enjoy their weekends.  Even holiday breaks can be unenjoyable when taking AP classes so be prepared.

3. Teachers KNOW you

Even though small sized classrooms allow for your teachers to know your individual needs, that could be a bad thing.  They could call you out in front of the class to point out your lack of performance or (what happened to me every single time) choose a ‘random’ essay from the whole stack of essays and ask the class “What did this person do wrong in this essay” as they began to read my essay aloud to the classroom.

My thoughts:

There were so many times when I wanted to quit an AP course because I saw how easy my other classmates had it in the regular class.  They had time to have fun after school, talk about the latest high school gossip news, and hang out during the weekends while I was at home studying.  But when I look back, taking an AP course developed my critical thinking abilities, prepared me for undergraduate college, allowed me to meet extraordinary people, and provided me the opportunity to become close to my high school crush.

When you pass the AP exam, you will never regret its benefits.  You may be intimidated by the amount of time required to perform well in the class, but that amount of time is necessary to master just about anything.  The challenging journey towards passing an AP class demonstrates your dedication to the subject, enhances your mentality, and reveals your work ethics.  You may have even picked up some of your lifelong friends on your way.  My advice, embrace the suck because you will never know what hidden opportunities and experiences await you in and after the AP class.

Stay and finish strong.

High School; Prom Proposal, The Calculator

Back in my high school, we did not have the typical “prom” that most public schools have.  We had what was called “Jr/Sr” (Pronounced: Junior-Senior), which basically meant that only juniors and seniors of my high school could participate in this social event.  Our Jr/Sr involved traveling to a lavish place and eating a fancy dinner (which I later realized was NOT common for most public schools).  How the students acquired their dates was the same though.  Most students proposed to one another with cheesy flowers and letters as would be for any other ordinary high school prom proposal, but this one instance was a bit different.

Story time.

I was a senior back when this happened and was good friends with this one junior girl (let’s call her Christina).  She wanted to ask out one of my senior friends (let’s call him Brian) to Jr/Sr.  Both were the top students in their class and shared similar class schedules, so she thought why not.  This proposal stood out because she had the nerdiest way of asking him out and ran through the plan with me.

First, she would approach him after math class and explain to him that she was having trouble with her graphing calculator.  Brian, being the friendly math and tech whiz that he is, would attempt to do his best to fix the problem.  Unbeknownst to him, she put in an equation on her TI-84 graphing calculator that would graph out the word “PROM” if he pressed the ‘Graph’ button, which she will consistently urge him to do while she tries to explain her situation.  It was as simple as that, but things got complicated when she tried it.

(Prepare for awkward and cringe-worthy material.)

After AP Calculus, most of the students rushed to leave for the next class.  Brian, walking out of the classroom and talking to some of his friends, was just about to do the same when Christina stopped him and started to explain to him that her calculator was acting weird.  Everything seemed to be going as planned … until one of Brian’s friends (let’s name him Jon) stepped in offering to help.  Christina then had to explain to Jon that it may just be a simple solution that only needed one person to fix.  Brian, confused by Christina’s explanation, starts to tear apart at the calculator’s battery forcing it to reset and then starts messing with the Input functions where the original equation that spelled out the word “PROM” would be displayed.  (I felt her horror and dismay from where I was standing from.  And where was I when all this was happening?  In a little corner behind the lockers trying to record what was supposed to be a sweet proposal for her to look back on.  Guess I’m deleting that video.)

Things got worse as time progressed, so Christina eventually took back the calculator, input the original “PROM” function back, pressed the ‘Graph’ button herself, and gave the calculator back to Brian.  You can see Brian’s facial expression go from confused to completely shocked (with a sprinkle of happiness) after she gave him back the calculator.  I could hear from the distance Brian saying, “Are you serious?”  Then Christina said, “Yes!” as she pulled out a rose from her backpack.  “Will you go to Jr/Sr with me, Brian?”

That was a fun experience to observe.  Christina ended up asking for the video still despite what happened, and we all had a good laugh at it at the end of Jr/Sr.  So if you are ever unsure of asking out someone using your own unique style, just know the outcome will probably be better than this proposal.

Stay and finish strong.