18 year old with Mopar project NEED ADVICE!!!

With talking to my auto shop teacher and some hard thinking, I'm going to go with a 360. Easy, simple, fun to run. Just like our school car's, jump in it and go. Already able to run a 11.58 and only starting in second, im sure ill be able to pull low 11s if I started in first. If I do the same thing just add some more high performace parts. Still going to be a lot of work with chassis and body. Would it be okay to run a 8 3/4 with say a 450-500hp motor? Obviosly not stock axles but just a brace in the back for support.