<p>Here’s a post of LB from a few months ago:</p>
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<p>Guys, I have been asked to be an AP grader, declined, but have been in room with many. Here is the procedure: Put hundreds of English teachers in a room from 9 am - 5 pm with lunch and breaks for a full week. Fly them to a horrible place, pay them $1500, and force them to grade same essay over and over again. Boredom and brain death set in after one hour. Then there are still 4 days, 6 hours to go. In my kids’ school the “smarter” kids often (not always, of course, got 4’s; those less stellar 5’s. 4’s were a badge of pride. Difference between 4 & 5 totally subjective. I have published many essays and often don’t agree w/other scorers.</p>
<p>About #of AP’s: S took 5 senior yr, and could easily have taken another one ot two. The only 3 he got (no 1’s or 2’s, and yes, 5 among them) was in Latin which I’m sure he would have received if it were his only AP.</p>
<p>laserbrother, remember that AP tests taken at the end of senior year have no relevance whatsoever to the college admissions process. So your daughter will be under much less pressure next year than she was this year. And she can take any test that she wants.</p>
<p>My daughter, who never took the AP English Language course, took the AP English Language test at the end of her senior year because her college allows kids who get a 5 on that test to skip one of the two semesters of required freshman writing. She got her 5. Heaven knows how. Obviously, an underclassman should not take a chance like this, but for a senior, who cares?</p>
<p>Senior year, my S took 4 AP classes, but only one AP test. I agree–why bother? He had reasons why each one woudln’t make a difference in his career at his school.</p>
<p>And, for which I believe reflects his teaching more than himself, he got, between that 1 class and two from junior year, 2 5’s and 1 2 (yes, a 2–junior year.) He’s at an Ivy now. </p>
<p>It’s just not that important–I think you know that, so why you persist in these posts is a continuing sense of puzzlement to me.</p>
<p>I feel a certain amount of sadness for this daughter who scored all 4’s and 5’s, yet whose dad was disappointed and who posted with the title “perfect-no more.”</p>
<p>^^^I agree, sunnyflorida.</p>
<p>I am glad you are not my parent. I think my parents will be happy with 4 or 5 on my AP exams.</p>
<p>laser- My son is at an Ivy and he got a 2 on one of his senior year AP tests. (he had a horrible teacher) His high school classmate is at the same Ivy and got a 1 on that test. AP scores are a nice addition to the application, but they really don’t matter at all in the admissions equation except as another little plus if you have the nice scores, which your daughter does.</p>
<p>I agree, Sunnyflorida. My 2nd s got a 2 on his AP Chem and was crushed. I knew how hard he studied, he got nothing but hugs from his dad and me. He tried his best and that was good enough for us. My kids’ “perfection” has absolutely nothing to do with gpas and test scores!!</p>
<p>Now had he fooled around and played video games and partied or whatever, that would have been a different story.</p>
<p>If you are taking 4 or 5 AP tests, then it means you are taking some in areas where you are not naturally amazing. No one really is going to be absolutely perfect at every subject. There is also not enough time really to study immense amounts of extra material on top of other schoolwork for that many tests. It’s overwhelming. No one expects anyone to get all 5s and very few people do. It is excellent that your daughter is stretching herself to take this many and attempting it in areas where she has to work harder rather than the concepts coming naturally. A former Duke admissions officer wrote a book and I believe they said reporting 4s and 5s is what they want, if it’s below that no point in reporting it. Getting all 4s and 5s is great then.</p>
<p>I think it’s a problem sometimes for people to hang around on cc and read “chances” posts from students who all say they’ve taken 16 AP courses and gotten 5s on everything. This is <em>probably</em> not true.</p>
<p>And, yes, I’ve come to feel we’re lucky to have fewer AP options here. The expectations become ridiculous.</p>
<p>xiggi, you go, poster person (can’t remember your gender…)</p>
<p>anyway, the OP needs to chill and we have been telling him that quite a lot</p>
<p>he wants perfection, and his D knows it, so was she sad for her score, or that she disappointed dad…</p>
<p>ps my D got a 2 on one AP test this year, she was suprised it was that high, after the teacher she had…eh, in the grand scheme of life, it is meaningless</p>
<p>I received a 2 on my AP Bio test senior year… didn’t really matter, considering Georgetown accepted only one of my AP tests (AP English Language… it took 5s from either AP English exam but I decided to take AP Lit for the hell of it… – the school subsidized all AP exams, so it all worked out well). </p>
<p>I agree with the majority of parents here – AP scores are a nice supplement to the admissions application, but by no means a major component in an admissions application. It’s only a piece of the academic puzzle that displays the academic strengths and weaknesses of an applicant – nothing more.</p>
<p>Possibly the biggest lesson I learned from CC and from the admissions cycle in general was that there are too many variables to try and lock it all down. I’m sure your D will get into a terrific school, regardless of whether she scored a 4 or a 5 on an AP Exam.</p>
<p>My son went to a prep boarding school and my daughter went to Interlochen Arts Academy for high school. At neither school do kids take a huge number of APs. The courses at both schools are very challenging and taking 1 or 2 junior year and maybe 3 tops senior year is the norm. It is required to take the exam if you take the course. It is not expected that a student will have an interest across all academic areas and want to take APs across the board.</p>
<p>First of all, happy 4th to everyone!!!</p>
<p>secondly, I start to wonder if any of you read my OP carefully before jumping on me - the poor Laosian immigrant. </p>
<p>It looks like I was under the wrong impreesion that AP scores would effect DD’ perfect GPA. It was rather emotional for me to see a perfect 4.0 gone after 11 years of hard working. Since there are things one could do about GPA but not those one time one shot test, I would expect both DD and DS to maintain an perfect A until college. </p>
<p>I am fine with 4 is AP and I has stated that way in one of the post in this thread. You all need to back off and chill. Jumping on a poor immigrant may be fun for you but not for me. O.k.?</p>
<p>Can you stop playing the poor immigrant card long enough to play with all your new toys (DSLR, etc) you keep posting about? It will take your mind off your CC oppression.</p>
<p>(I suspect this actually is fun for you, and you are somewhat playing the board. Whatever floats your boat!)</p>
<p>My son got a 2 in AP Calc AB his senior year in public school. He also got a B for the course. He repeated AP Calc AB during his PG year at prep school and got an A for the course and a 5 for the exam. Has more to do with teaching and testing than talent apparently.</p>
<p>Gee, I thought everyone knew that the only purpose of AP exams is as a revenue stream to College Board.</p>
<p>wow, garland, right on the money.</p>