Biology

The best way to achieve recognition from a college admission office for work done in this course is to take a universally recognized standardized test. The two major examinations are the SAT II Biology test and the Advanced Placement Biology test. Which one you take depends on your level of preparation, your academic goals, and the policy of the colleges to which you may want to apply. In most cases, the SAT is used as part of your college admission packet, and should be taken at the end of your Junior year or the beginning of your Senior year. The AP exam is used to determine placement and establish grounds for granting credit, and is often taken in the senior year.

SAT II Biology Examination

The College Board Online Website has information for parents and students on the PSAT/NMSQT, SAT, AP, and CLEP examinations, test dates, how to sign up to take the exams, etc. There are also special pages for homeschoolers -- search around for them.

The SAT II Biology test is used to assess whether you have mastered the content of a typical high school one-year introductory biology course. If you are interested in majoring in life sciences or medicine, you need to enter college with such a course behind you. Many college admissions offices also look for experience in a laboratory science course, and expect you to have taken one, regardless of your intended college major. Fulfilling this requirement now may free you to take other classes in college, especially if you are not interested in a science major.

The College Board's SAT II Biology E/M contains 60 core questions plus 20 ecology OR 20 molecular biology questions. You choose the concentration you wish to take on the day of the test; you cannot take both on the same day. We spend much of the fall semester on molecular biology, and finish the spring semester with a unit on ecology, so you should be prepared for the content of either exam. Many students find the ecology section easier, but remember that you have very little time to review for it prior to the exam date in June, and none at all if you take the May exam!

Check the Subject Tests Calendar for dates for this year's tests. If you are taking the biology course this year as a junior and need the SAT II for admission consideration, you should plan to take the exam in May, June, or in the fall of next year. I recommend that you plan to take the exam in June, since it occurs after the completion of our course. We will have a special review session for the exam during the week before the exam.

The Scholars Online biology course is fairly rigorous compared to the standard high school biology course. We use a college-level but non-major biology text which contains more material than a typical high school text. My online quiz questions are phrased like or based on similar questions from past published SAT Biology II exams. Consequently, completing this course satisfactorily should prepare you adequately for the SAT exam. Conversely, taking and doing well on the exam will establish your credibility as a biology student for your college application.

Biology Advanced Placement Test

The Advanced Placement program provides high school students the chance to do college-level study and get credit for their work from many colleges and universities. Colleges in other countries recognize the AP examination as an indicator of advanced work beyond high school, and some US and Canadian colleges will award you sophomore standing if you meet their requirements through outstanding AP exam performance. Several scholarships are awarded on the basis of AP scores. Check the College Board Advanced Placement website for more information on the AP program.

Be forewarned, though: a number of US colleges and universities will not grant you college credit for AP work, regardless of your score on the exam, and some departments refuse credit while others at the same college may grant credit. Be sure to verify the AP credit policy in biology at each of the colleges that interest you; do not automatically assume that a particular college department will grant you college credit for this course on the basis of your AP score.

Typically, the biology AP course is based on a text written for an introductory biology course for biology majors. Such a text assumes that the student has already taken biology at the high school level—and most high schools that offer AP courses require the student to have completed the general high school level introduction first. Moreover, AP biology requires you to perform experiments in specific areas.

Since the Scholars Online course is an introduction to biology for high school students, even though it is written at the college level, our text is not a biology-majors text. We are also limited in what we can do for experiments, since we do not have access to the equipment and materials available in a well-equipped college biology lab.

In order to legitimately claim that you have done college-level work, and to prepare for the AP exam, you will need to do work beyond that required to simply pass the Scholars Online course and prepare for the SAT II Biology exam. In the AP option (a separate add-on course to the primary biology course), I will ask you to write a lot of essays, do all--or at least most-- of the student guide exercises and all of the online quizzes, attend regularly-scheduled review sessions with increasing frequency in the spring, in addition to regular class periods, and perform some version of each of the AP-required labs [which will mean buying the AP Biology Lab Manual for Students]. This is a considerable commitment on your time [5-10 hours a week in addition to the work required to pass the Scholars Online biology course] so think carefully about how much you want to do this! Be sure to visit the College Board AP Biology web site (free registration required).

---

This course is offered through Scholars Online, a non-profit organization supporting classical Christian education through Internet-based courses. Permission to copy course content (lessons and labs) for personal study is granted to students currently enrolled in this course for the Academic Year 2007/2008 or Summer 2007. Reproduction for any other purpose, without the express written consent of the author, is prohibited.