The worst time of the year – crunch time – is finally past us. After weeks, days, or even for some of us, hours of studying hard, we all got to finally rip the plastic from our exam packets and indulge in hours-long tests.
To recap everyone’s experience, let’s examine how each grade representative felt during the exam, starting with the freshmen.
Freshmen, how did you feel about your first ever AP exam?
“AP Human Geography was alright, Mrs. Roisman prepared me well,” freshman Tim Du said. “We got to learn a lot of specific examples which were helpful on the FRQs.”
“For my first AP exam, Human Geography, I thought it went okay,” freshman Anagha Iyer explained. “Everyone said it was super easy; however, I found it pretty challenging because a lot of the questions looked like there were two correct answers, not just one. I was glad to see very few questions about language and religion, since that’s the unit I struggle with most. Overall, though, it was a good starting point for my APs throughout high school since I’ll know what to expect next time.”
For our more seasoned AP examiners (a.k.a sophomores), how did your second go-around go?
“I felt good about the AP World History exam,” sophomore Chloe Zuckerman said. “Mr. Tavernia gave us lots of resources to go over and since we finished the curriculum a month early we had plenty of time to review.”
“I found the AP biology class pretty easy because Mrs. Joykutty was such a great teacher,” he said. “She really got into detail about all the processes we had to know. Just try to be on your A-game during the exam. I had to take AP Spanish Lang in the morning so I was already pretty tired of thinking and bubbling questions,” sophomore Sebastian Estrada said.
For those going above and beyond, taking classes often reserved for upperclassmen… How did your AP exams go?
“AP Physics C class was probably my most difficult because the concepts such as rotation and torque of objects plus gravitation,were foreign to me. However, as a math comp student the math was manageable,” junior Harshith Kakumani said.
“I came into [the AP Chemistry] class halfway through the year, so I was a bit behind on how FRQs work, but I quickly caught up being in the Chemistry Olympiad club,” sophomore Samuil Petrov explained. “AP Chemistry wasn’t that hard, the most challenging part was remembering the earlier units.”
For those taking AP foreign language classes, how did you feel about your exams?
“I found AP French Language and Culture to be the most difficult,” junior Taina Joseph explained. “The reading comprehension stumped me, but the conversational part was pretty smooth.”
Junior Daniela Zaghlul took the AP Spanish Literature Exam. “I felt good about it,” she said. “I was able to incorporate my favorite story we read in class, ‘La Casa de Bernarda Alba’ – which was about women’s roles in society in the age of purity – into my essay. We had to analyze ‘Nuestra America’ which was challenging because of the audio and images since they weren’t super clear.”
Finally, for the most seasoned veterans of AP exams (that are still on campus), juniors. What scores can we expect to see in the summer?
“Mr. Gruskin prepared us well for the AP Comparative Government exam,” junior Zoe Weissman said. “The easiest part was learning about the UK because we spent a lot of time learning about their parliament. So, just off of confidence, I think I got a five.”
“I liked AP stats. Mrs. Alfonso made the class really fun and interactive,” junior Sydney Lee said. “The exam went pretty well, since we did a lot of FRQ practice so we were familiar with the format. I think I got either a four or a five.”
“The AP Calculus AB test was pretty good, I felt confident about my answers,” junior Liwen Cao said. “Dr. Pena-Lopez was super nice and always encouraging. There was a lot of homework throughout the year, so hopefully all the hard work paid off for a five.”
