Many students take APs senior year, so they can't have taken the test before admission deadlines, let alone commitment dates. But admissions offices do like to see that you are taking/have taken the courses. In this particular class, however, he will have taken the course, it will show as one semester regular, one semester audit, and 2 AP scores will come out of it.
If nothing else, it gives him something to mention in his essay. And his counselor will know him well enough to write a knowledgable recommendation letter for him. The counselor is new this year and I'm pretty sure knows DS better than many of the other juniors on the roster.
