Every year without fail, the question of enrolling in chemistry freshman year looms over rising 9th graders. But for current sophomore Frederica Geppner, the choice was a no-brainer. “Earth science was never an enticing topic to me, but chemistry was a perfect fit. I had fun in the class and learned a ton, while being appropriately challenged at a freshman level,” she said.
Last year, 15 freshmen who took Regents Living Environment during 8th grade, the accelerated course option, elected to skip earth science and jump ahead to Regents Chemistry. These numbers have grown significantly, as the graduating class of 2024 only had 2 freshmen take chemistry. Regents Chemistry is a difficult course, and only 60% of all students who took the Regents exam in 2022 passed, according to data.nysed.gov. Despite the Regents being intimidating, sophomore Henry Amadei had a great experience in chemistry as a freshman. Amadei said, “I wasn’t just doing the work to get a good grade, but because I was interested in the topics.” A similar consensus was shown by the rest of last year’s freshmen, as sophomore Diem Lee also said that he enjoyed chemistry.
The Haldane website guidance page dictates that after taking chemistry freshman year, students usually continue on their science path into Physics, either choosing to take AP Physics 1, or adhere to the state curriculum and enroll in a Regents-based physics course. But a select number of people choose to take regular physics before they take chemistry. Sophomore Kaiser-Sose Toribio took earth science in his freshman year and decided to take regular physics prior to chemistry. When asked about his motive to take the path less travelled, Toribio stated, “What drove me to take physics instead of chemistry is what I want my future to look like, and how I want to manage and look at my future classes,” continuing to detail that he is thoroughly enjoying physics and can see himself going into a related field of study. Toribio added that being in Algebra 2/Trigonometry and physics at the same time hasn’t proved cumbersome yet, but said that down the line, there may be things in physics that he might not yet have the algebra knowledge for.
Amelia Kaye, a current senior, took an entirely different course for her science classes. After taking chemistry freshman year and AP Physics 1 sophomore year, she decided to take AP Chemistry through online courses instead of AP Physics 2 her junior year. She expressed that she didn’t have strong enough math skills to be successful in physics. Although taking an AP outside of school had its ups and downs, Kaye stated that she doesn’t regret her choices.
Senior Louisa Schimming decided on the accelerated path from the get-go, beginning with chemistry, then AP Physics 1 and 2, and wrapping up this year with AP Biology. Schimming said her primary factor to sway her toward skipping earth science was “because I did well in biology and I was encouraged to skip to chemistry by my biology teacher [garrison teacher Naomi Cook] who was very adamant that I was ready for it”, and she had said she “enjoyed chemistry and honestly didn’t think it was very hard”. Schimming took chemistry under former Haldane Faculty member Michele Valenti, and not the current instructor, Leah Alper. Schimming detailed that her 2 years in AP Physics were eye-opening. “This may be an unpopular opinion, but I loved physics. It’s really interesting to me, and I think it pushed my math skills past what I needed to have at the time, so that A2/Trig wasn’t very hard for me…I actually liked physics so much that I might be majoring in it in college!” She added that so far, AP Biology is not as hard as the AP Physics classes.
As a sophomore myself, who took chemistry last year and is currently taking AP Physics 1 and Algebra 2/Trigonometry, I do not regret my decision. I’ve known since middle school that I didn’t enjoy geology, meteorology, and astronomy, and I haven’t encountered skills that I’m missing from earth science, just random tidbits and references that go over my head. When I took chemistry, it wasn’t very difficult. All of the school counselors and science teachers that I had discussed with before choosing chemistry told me that it would be a lot of math at a difficult level, but I didn’t find that to be true. As long as I knew how to manipulate a formula with variables and solve a proportion, the math in chemistry was extremely basic. I really enjoyed the class even though it wasn’t particularly challenging. Additionally, I had heard many horror stories about how difficult the Regents exam was, but instructor Leah Alper and her long-term maternity substitute, Marisa Listakatos, did a fantastic and extremely thorough job of preparing the class for the exam, and I felt fully equipped for success when it rolled around. I believe that if I had taken earth science, I wouldn’t have been challenged to the point that I needed, and I would’ve been very bored. AP Physics 1 is definitely no cakewalk, but so far, I feel I’ve been proficient, as long as I keep up my studies outside of class. Physics is 100% math, but it is math that was covered in geometry; the most difficult parts are the trigonometry aspects, which were all taught at the tail end of geometry, but are covered more in depth in A2/Trig. As opposed to chemistry, physics is more about needing to be good at math and being able to do it quickly and accurately, so you don’t fall behind. If I had doubled up and taken both A2/Trig and geometry in freshman year, physics would be easier, but my geometry skills are still conducive to success.
