SUPERMAN1929
Senior Member
- Apr 18, 2015
- 1,356
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I think AP is good. Who cares about stress... They're in freaking high school. If they can't handle an AP class then they shouldn't take it. People need to learn to manage stress instead of treating 17/18 year olds like babies.Some schools have been questioning this for years. They would prefer to handle it differently and believe they can do better on their own. Usually, pressure from enough schools across the country bring about this kind of change. Same deal with Common Core.
"Eliminating AP courses would also allow more time for teaching and would reduce the workload of many courses. As it stands, AP courses have to cover all of the material by the end of April to prepare for exams during the first two weeks of May. Afterwards, AP classes (with a few exceptions) simply end. If we eliminated the AP designation from many of the courses, teachers would have up until the end of May to teach.
Courses would become more relaxed in pace as the material could be spread over a longer period of time, and students would be less stressed as a result.
Of course, eliminating AP courses would not be easy to do at first. Courses would have to be redesigned and the administration would likely have to deal with strong parent criticism.
But if the school has the courage to eliminate AP classes, the benefits will soon become apparent."
http://www.hwchronicle.com/get-rid-of-ap-classes/
"But now, some of the most elite schools in the country are opting out of the AP frenzy, saying they can design better and more rigorous courses on their own that won’t force them to adhere to someone else’s curriculum and timeline and force teachers to teach to the test. And, instead of replicating a college level course in high school, they say they can go one better – partnering with local colleges so their students get the real deal.
"Our major complaint with the AP courses was that it was a race for breadth against depth," explained Robert Vitalo, Head of School at Berkeley Carroll, a Brooklyn prep school that decided to completely do away with AP courses in the 2011-2012 school year. "We think the way of the world, the way to be teaching, the way that kids should be learning is to look at how subjects and questions and ideas are connected and related, and to take the time to make those connections and ask those questions and not to have it be a race to cover a lot of content.""
http://ww2.kqed.org/mindshift/2012/08/08/is-it-time-to-reconsider-ap-classes/
College courses while in high school are better though. My high school was partnered with a community college and I was able to take a college courses during high school through that program. I can see the reason to get rid of AP if they could offer the same thing but only through a college.