“A Rigorous High School Curriculum”- What Exactly Does That Mean?

Last Updated on March 18, 2024 by Jill Schwitzgebel

If you’ve spent any time learning about college admissions, by now you’ve read that colleges will evaluate the “rigor of the curriculum” when they look at students’ transcripts.  But the meaning of that phrase is kind of mysterious to most families.  What exactly does a rigorous high school curriculum look like?

Context

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This is the first thing to know about academic rigor:  it is going to depend on your student’s individual high school.  Academic rigor at one high school may actually be different than the high school across town, due to their course offerings.  At a high school that has twenty Advanced Placement course offerings, the most rigorous curriculum may include taking eight different AP classes throughout high school (Note:  This is only an EXAMPLE.  It does not mean taking 8/20 courses is necessary OR that it is automatically rigorous!)  At a high school that only offers three Advanced Placement classes, taking all three of them would likely demonstrate highest academic rigor.

Beyond the high school itself, in some regions, the norm is for all students to be on track to take Calculus during their senior year of high school. (This seems to surprise many families.)   The students who choose to enroll in AP Calculus are then considered to be making an academically rigorous choice.  In other places, most students are only expected to achieve Pre-Calculus by their senior year, and the students who are taking Calculus are the ones considered to be taking the most rigorous of courses.  Admissions departments understand the differing expectations.

Colleges will receive a high school profile to help them understand the full context of a student’s transcript.  And, that context matters.

See also:  AP vs IB vs AICE; Which One is Best?

Course Sequence

Beyond the context of  your high school, fortunately, colleges also will consider your child’s schedule in the context of itself.  Not every student has to be taking the highest level courses that are offered, to be able to get into college.  The idea is that they need to take the courses that are challenging to them personally.  So admissions counselors are going to analyze each student’s course progression.  A college may have questions if a student suddenly switches from taking all Honors courses to all regular courses.  There are plenty of good reasons that can happen and could be a smart decision for your student.  But, if a student appears to be on a path of taking all the highest level classes, and then suddenly during their junior year opts not to, it may raise a red flag about academic rigor that should probably be addressed in the application.  However, a student that has been taking regular classes that switches into Honors may show that they are willing to challenge themselves.

Think about scheduling each year in a way that will make the most sense for college.  Maybe your student is tempted to skip taking a science course their junior year to take an elective that they would prefer.  They then plan to double up on science during their senior year.  But remember, students will be applying to colleges early in their senior year.  Sure, colleges will see that they are taking those sciences during senior year, but since it’s early in the year, the student won’t have those science grades on their transcripts yet.  So, the college will not know if a student was able to be successful in those science courses or not.

Additionally, the question I am most asked is whether a student really needs to take math during their senior year, if they have already completed their high school’s math requirement.  The answer is YES.  As someone who does not love math, I fully appreciate why a student wants to skip it during their last year.  But, it’s not a good idea at college application time when admissions teams are evaluating the rigor of a student’s curriculum to help with their decision.   Additionally, now is not the time to pull back in course progression – take the next level class, rather than trying to switch to a math class that may appear to be “easier.”  And if your student is actually a math whiz who has completed AP Calculus as a junior, then they probably still need to take a math during their senior year.  It could be the next level of calculus at a community college, or it could be a statistics class offered by the high school.

Start Early

Understanding academic rigor early in high school, or even in middle school is important in the application process.  Very often, impactful decisions about high school curriculum end up being made at the end of eighth grade, when students schedule for high school.  Sometimes, what I see happen is that students inadvertently choose a science or a math track in eighth grade that closes them out of an opportunity to take those higher level classes later in high school.  Too often, the school actually decides on that path for them.  I have seen students that love science and are successful, get placed into a math track that does not allow them to take those high level science courses later on. Or, an aspiring writer gets placed into a “regular” English class, rather than an Honors class.  That’s fine, unless it turns out that the school will not allow them to move from a regular English class into an AP English class later in high school.

Sometimes, you will have to advocate for your child in these situations, if you feel that your student is up to the challenge.

School Counselors

As part of the application process, school counselors must also give feedback.  Among other things, they are asked to check a box about students’ course selections.

In comparison with other college preparatory students at your school, the applicant’s course selection is:

• less demanding
• average demanding
• very demanding
• most demanding
• prefer not to respond

For a student planning to apply to any of the most selective colleges in the country, it is very important that the counselor check the box for “most demanding.”  This is partly how colleges will view your student’s application in context.  One issue that comes up here is that this category can be somewhat subjective.  At one high school, I know a counselor who refused to check the “Most demanding” box, because though the student had taken several Advanced Placement Science and Calculus classes, the student had chosen not to take AP Physics.  She said that since AP was offered, and the student had opted to take regular Physics, she couldn’t check the box.  A different counselor at the same high school may even have made a different judgment.  Some counselors may not fully appreciate the importance of which box they check.

So, I urge students to ask their counselors which box they plan to check if they are applying to those highly competitive colleges.  In the above example with Physics, it was good information to have, as the student could then use  “Additional Information” to explain their scheduling decision.

Finally,

I am often asked whether colleges prefer that a student take a regular class and get an A or an Honors class, where they may get a B?  Obviously, an A will look better.  But from a standpoint of taking an academically rigorous high school schedule, the more challenging course is better.