As the end of the year nears, the AP came and went as well. This year, the AP tests were mostly online, with some taking them in person, depending on the students grade level and the class that they are taking. The students taking the online test needed to download an app onto their laptops 1-3 days before beginning the test in order to take the test. They are also getting reverted back to the original format and will be taken as the full test, not a shortened version like the one that was used last year.
Amanda Ward 21’ who is taking AP Biology, AP Spanish, and AP AB Calculus states “As someone who isn’t a really good standardized test taker, the environment makes me nervous. Last year when we had the online format and for english, we just had two 45 minute essays, and that worked much better for me.” There is also a lot of concern about academic integrity, seeing as some students will be taking the test online. Cayden Liao 24’ who is taking the AP Statistics test comments “Being online and having your browser restricted, while that restricts one device, kids have many other devices… so I feel like the online kids do have a bit of an advantage”.
Lucky Lillygreen 23’ who is taking AP United States History also adds “[Teachers] explicitly told us this but they are going to prevent you from going back and forth between questions, so you only have a minute to do the multiple choice questions…online you really have to manage your time well. I understand that they want to prevent cheating but it does make it hard”. Another added challenge this year has been that there was limited class time for most of the school year. Lillygreen also expresses, “I don’t feel prepared enough for the exam.
I feel that it’s really hard to learn things on your own and you can review and study on your own…with the online and hybrid and remote model you weren’t able to get through all of the topics we need to get through and we weren’t able to be taught everything we needed to be taught.” Liao adds, “For me personally, I do not feel prepared as of now. If I was a senior and taking it (the AP exam) next week, but since I am taking it online as a freshman, I do have another month to prepare so I feel like I will be”.
David Graham ‘85 spoke about how he has been preparing his students for the exam and stating, “In the last couple of weeks we have been working with the format that they will use, and just getting them used to the format and giving them practice problems to do as well. I’ll give them a lot and they can do as many or as little as they want on their own since people are normally juggling a lot of different things.” The students however do seem to be grateful that they are able to have the current time to help them prepare. Ward adds, “My biology teacher says that we are doing so much better than other schools that have the AP courses because we have had a lot more lab time because we are such a small school”.
