:I would wager she didn't take it because she was hoping the extra honors class, and the related grade bonus, would help her GPA."
Taking an AP course in HS means you don't have to take the equivalent course in college. Nothing to do with GPA.
In many high schools, including the one from which I graduated, AP classes also had the same extra weight on the GPA that an "honors" course did. While an "A" in most classes was a 4.0, an "A" in an AP or honors class was a 5.0.
Many schools give bonus points towards GPA. At my school it was one full point on the 4.0 scale. And other cases have had students become Valedictorian solely because a waiver kept them from being forced to take PE classes.
Not entirely true. Yes, it gives college credit, but it also is generally higly rated in the calculations for class rank. An A in AP Calculus is worth a lot more than an A in gym class. Thus, there are those who used tricks like this to up their class rank percentage.
Maybe not anymore, but my AP classes were worth *6* points if I got an A. Very worthwhile.
Actually, in many high schools, especially suburban high schools in wealthy towns, AP classes and honors classes are weighted. In my daughters' high school, AP and honors courses were weighted a full grade point higher than the earned grade. It just reflects what most elite private colleges say they want to see: they'd rather see a student earn a B+ in very rigorous courses such as AP Calculus, Chemistry, Biology, History or English, than A+s in 'average' courses. When I was in high school in California some 40 years ago, we didn't have formalized 'honors' courses. It was pretty funny when half of the "top ten" students in the class were taking a secretarial course rather than the 'college prep' course. In fact, the school did informally track students, and there were select sections of all college prep courses in which the brightest students were enrolled. For those of us applying to selective colleges, special letters were sent explaining we had been tracked into honors sections where the standards were much higher.