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Advanced placement exams present challenge for seniors
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| By: Anita Zimmerman |
August 05, 2009 |
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Of the 17 Chetek High School students who took advanced placement classes last year, only six passed exams at courses' end.
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Tests scored from one to five. To receive college credits for their coursework, students must pass with a three, four or five.
Eleven of 17 students scored a one or two on the test.
"It's the most difficult test a high school student can take," says Principal Larry Zeman. "They're the most challenging courses they've ever taken."
By way of explanation, Zeman points to students' lack of continued effort throughout the senior year. To pass exams, individuals must have a strong work ethic and a level of commitment exceeding that of the average student, he says.
Zeman is proud of the school's breadth of college-preparation options. AP courses in U.S. government, U.S. history, world history, English, calculus, chemistry and psychology are available; classes are online, face-to-face or a combination of styles.
For a high school with 290 students, "we have more AP offerings than most neighbors except Eau Claire," he comments.
But more classes doesn't equal better classes, and if the 35-percent success rate is any indication, some of Chetek High School's top students are struggling with college-level aptitude.
It's complicated, Zeman says. Since Chetek doesn't have weighted grades-meaning marks from easy and difficult classes have the same effect on grade-point average-some students prefer to play it safe at scheduling time.
"We have a lot of top-level students. Some of our top students are not taking top classes," he comments.
While the school tries to involve parents in the scheduling process-relying on parents' ambition for their children to trump "senioritis"-Zeman admits most teens on the cusp of adulthood aren't enthusiastic about being managed.
Arguably, parents themselves might prefer to see their child make the top 10 than let them take classes potentially damaging to their GPAs, even though colleges now take ACT scores, activities and AP classes into greater consideration during the admittance process.
"Personally, I would love to do away with GPAs," Zeman says. "I would rather have a student get a C in an AP course [than an A in an easier class]."
While "top" students may avoid AP classes to keep their ranking, students who do take the classes are undoubtedly planning to attend college. The discrepancy, then, is not the number of students who take the classes, but the level of competency all university-bound students are achieving.
It's not that the AP classes aren't hard enough, so students aren't prepared for the exam, Zeman says; the AP English course, conducted in partnership with the University of North Carolina, was incredibly rigorous.
If the rigor of AP classes isn't the issue, is the school's curriculum not challenging enough? Are AP classes disproportionately difficult?
Zeman theorizes that Chetek's secondary curriculum, in line with other rural schools, may not always prepare students to compete with their big-city counterparts. The district has far less money to spend on each student, and that's one of their challenges, he says.
As the district prepares for another school year, Zeman believes administrators have two goals for AP participants. First, they'd like to see more students take the classes. Then, they want to increase the number of students who are successful.
And, he adds, if parents look at exam scores from area schools with AP programs, "I think we'll compare very favorably."
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©The Chetek Alert 2009
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