07.07.08
Watching the mail
It’s watch the mail time again in our household. Why? because Boy took the AP microeconomics exam last May and the grade should be coming any day.
Keep your fingers crossed. He needs a 4 or 5 for Trinity to count it.
We could pay Collegeboard and get the score over the phone, but we’ve already sent more money to them than I’m happy with. We’ll wait.
And it’s not fun waiting. After them losing Boy’s statistics test last year, I’m sitting on pins and needles waiting for it to happen again.
So, while I’m sitting here watching the days tick by, JoVE had to send me a link to an article by a guy that graded the AP US History test. (BTW, it’s the Chronicle and I don’t know how long there will be free access to it.) It’s interesting reading his tale of the experience.
But what caught my attention was a passage about AP courses in high schools.
I had always thought of AP as an honors program, so I’m mystified by how many dismal essays we endure. I ask around and get a range of answers. Some say that entire school districts now put all kids into AP classes. Others say that students elect to take AP classes for the extra point it adds to their GPA. Others blame No Child Left Behind. One describes the test as a “cash cow,” implying that fee revenues encourage the College Board to allow anyone to take it. …. Nevertheless, it’s clear that Advanced Placement no longer necessarily denotes academic excellence and that many students with very little aptitude take AP courses and tests.
It reminded me of our last exchange student. Part of the exchange program rules is that they have to take US History and English. They put poor Tochter into AP US History. Makes a lot of sense to me?
Anyway, she did alright - basically - until it came time to do the final. Note that this wasn’t the AP test, just the final for the course. She was feeling very lost and confused and so I told her that I’d help her study (figuring that since Boy and I had covered it the previous year, I should be alright to be able to answer her questions and direct her to what she needed.)
So we sit and she pulls out a sheet of paper.
“This is what’s going to be on the final.”
“okay, that will help us know what to study.”
“No, these are the essay questions that will be on the final.”
“So, you just need to know how to answer these 10 questions?”
“Actually we have to answer these first 3, but then we can choose any 3 of the remaining 7.”
But wait, that wasn’t the only thing (and btw, this wasn’t special instructions for her, it was for the entire class.) It turned out the they could bring in a 8.5 x 11 in. cheat sheet with whatever they wanted written on it.
AND THIS WAS AN AP CLASS!
I was floored. So, now reading this grader’s comments, I have to say I agree with him.
July 7, 2008 at 3:52 pm
You know it is just that kind of behaviour in high schools that makes kids (even smart kids) totally unprepared for university. They have no idea how to prepare for an exam; how to work out what the important themes of the course are; how to decide what books and articles they need to read in order to write an essay; the list goes on. I knew this sort of thing must be happening based on the anxieties of my students but having actual examples makes me really cross.
And that kind of thing is what comes of “accountability” measures for schools that treat student test scores as a measure of the quality of the school. In order to get into the tops of those rankings, this is what happens to education.