As we head towards the final days of the third quarter and start to prepare for the last stretch of this school year, AP students find themselves in a frustrating situation: after months of grueling coursework, they take their high-stakes AP exam, and, after that, they still need to take a final exam for their AP classes. This policy is not only unnecessary, for seniors who have already been accepted into college and are ready to leave, but also for underclassmen who are already working hard to study for their various AP exams and only have a limited amount of exemptions.
AP classes help all year long to prepare students for the exams in May to show their mastery of the subjects. If students have already demonstrated their knowledge of the subject through a standardized College Board exam, what is the point of having a final?
For many seniors, the situation is seen as unreasonable. A great deal of them have already committed to colleges and are mentally preparing for the next stage of their academic careers. Making them take a final after they’ve completed their AP exams serves no real educational purpose.
“I’ve already turned in my deposit to my college, and my AP scores won’t even affect my career or acceptance at this point. This final is just more busywork,” senior Sara Riveros said, who’s taking three APs.
Juniors and sophomores who also take various AP classes now have to consider using their exemptions for their AP classes finals instead of being able to solely use them for their other finals. Due to the limited amount of exemptions, this limits the students’ options. In addition, if a student struggling to maintain their grade in the class now has to take another final that may worsen their grade if they make too many mistakes in their finals, which can affect students’ transcripts even after their AP exams and after they are essentially done learning and being tested on all the material they had to take in for the year.
“My grades for some of my AP classes are borderline A minus, so if I take the final and don’t do very well it might bring my semester grade down and I don’t want to risk that, so I have to use up my exemptions for that. I just don’t understand why we need to take basically another final exam, since we already will have done AP exams before our finals,” junior Aniya Melian said.
Some argue that since students already prepared so much for AP exams then they will be more than ready to take their finals; however, this is not necessarily true. As some seniors have already been accepted into college and know which AP credits their college will take may choose to simply not study for an exam as they might not receive any credit for it in college so their scores are not of importance. Thus, they would not be prepared for a final and would have to study unnecessarily for it.
It’s time to rethink the policy and consider changing the rules. If AP students have already endured months of rigorous coursework, sleepless nights and the pressure of the College Board exam, why should they be subjected to another round of testing?
Preparing for AP exams requires hours of studying, reviewing and practicing. After completing these long awaited exams, some students will still have to take final exams for these classes. (Photo/Nina Vieira)
