Class Scheduling Time: APs, Electives, or Study Hall?

By Sarah Jett ’15

The arrival of spring semester means students must consider which classes to take during the next school year. Immaculate Heart offers a range of challenging, yet appealing AP classes, along with a variety of enriching electives, from Journalism to Creative Writing. Which classes should a student select? Here are a couple of possibilities.

AP Psychology

Many current juniors contemplate whether it is truly valuable to take an extra AP class or to simply sign up for study hall. As a student who is currently in AP Psychology, I feel it is more beneficial to challenge yourself with an additional AP class. I think it is smart to continue on the fast-paced and rigorous academic route that will better prepare you for college.

AP Psychology is definitely a challenging class, but it is also a very interesting course where you learn many new and exciting things. You get to explore in greater detail about why human beings do what they do. You get to examine what drives people both physically and biologically. You get to weigh the answer to the age-old question, does a person behave a certain way because of nature or nurture?

This class is very different from core classes in English and Math, and that difference made it more enticing for me to take. You get to have fun while at the same time be challenged and pushed. For example, in the development unit, you get to observe an actual child and learn about the different stages all children experience. Then there is the interesting project where you have to break a socially accepted norm and record how the people around you react. For these reasons and more, I believe AP Psychology is a worthwhile class, and it will help end your high school studies with a bang.

Discrete Math

Is it valuable to take an additional math class? For those who find math difficult and also think that difficulty is reason enough to avoid the subject, think again. Discrete Math is not like your ordinary x, y, z, math class. It is a math class dealing with math in a more real-world sense. It is definitely a fun class where you get to draw and learn in more detail about the symmetries of shapes. You get to analyze graphs and make processing schedules, where the goal is to create the best schedule for a project, in the most efficient amount of time. At this point in the class, students are starting to learn about game theory. If you want to continue to be challenged in math and have a blast, I recommend adding Discrete Math to your schedule stat!

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