Walking into my first hour class in my sophomore year, nothing could prepare me for the beast that was AP United States History (APUSH).
The first problem that day was not knowing where the actual classroom was. I showed up to my APUSH class a few minutes late, albeit fashionably so. (This set up a bad habit for the rest of the year. My condolences to APUSH teacher Trevor Riley.)
But the worst was yet to come. I had not yet taken an Advanced Placement (AP) course, and didn’t understand the gravity of taking this class. The date May 9 (at 8 AM) imprinted itself into my brain and is now just as recognizable to me as July 4 or Sept. 11. Soon enough, it was two weeks before the exam, and I had no idea how to study for it.
I turned to a variety of study sources—mostly just taking extensive notes on Heimler’s History videos, practicing vocab terms, and taking practice exams.
Interestingly, it seemed almost everything I used to study was trying to sell me something. Even Heimler, in all his AP history veneration, marketed his APUSH review guide at the end of his videos for a whopping sum of $29.99. I did not buy it.
Now that I am taking four AP courses, I can’t devote all my time to one or two subjects, nor can I spend an arm and a leg on flashcards, study guides, and tutors throughout the year. While starting my exam preparation (much earlier this year, thank goodness), I have stumbled upon numerous problems within the AP exam culture, not just the prevalence of expensive review guides.
For one thing, many schools offer free tutoring. FHC, for example, upholds a student tutoring program through the National Honor Society (NHS). Students can go to the Academic Success Center, currently stationed in the cafeteria, after school on Tuesdays and Thursdays to receive the instruction they need. However, according to NHS supervisor Patricia Richardson, the program rarely has enough tutors to staff it adequately. Many students go to the cafeteria seeking counsel and find nothing but FHC’s emotional support dog, Bingo, to console them.
Another facet to consider is the relationship between district affluence and resource availability. Districts that have higher tax rates or higher ratios of such going towards the public school system would naturally have more resources available to students. This could include simple items like classroom supplies and library books, but it also extends to the variety of AP courses offered and the quality of instruction for those courses. Students who are born with more favorable circumstances are more likely to have these opportunities available to them; in contrast, students who attend a high school with fewer AP options have to be more ambitious with their schedules, possibly taking multiple independent studies for AP classes. It is worth noting that colleges take into consideration the amount of AP courses offered at high schools and a student’s relative competitiveness compared to their classmates. Still, at face value, students who attend more well-off high schools will have a stronger application.
Another aspect of college applications is the obvious cost a student will incur throughout the entire process. An approximate $65 may not seem like much for a college application; however, when combined with the cost of taking an AP exam, College Board’s official AP score report, taking an SAT or ACT, both of which often are required to have reports that also need to be paid for, and multiplied by the amount of schools applied to, this number adds up quickly. For an average student who took four AP exams ($392-$516 depending on the exam), purchased one official AP score report ($15-$25), took the SAT two times ($68 each), sent six SAT score reports (students can send SAT scores to four colleges for free, additional colleges cost an extra $14), created a College Scholarship Service (CSS) Profile for two private schools (a cost of $25 + $16 per school), and, of course, paid the base fee for applying to, say, eight colleges (averages at $65 per application), this student could spend over $1000 on college applications alone.
Of course, there are numerous benefits that someone who can’t afford this can take advantage of. Many students who qualify for FAFSA-based fee waivers would only have to pay the reduced cost of AP exams ($60, though schools sometimes cover the rest) and application fees for colleges that don’t honor fee waivers. For the imaginary student above, FAFSA would make it so that the student would only pay $240-$370 on AP exams and college applications. However, there is still a wide margin of students who aren’t wealthy enough to pay ten grand on college applications and AP exams, but are also “too wealthy” to qualify for these benefits.
Something to remember about the College Board is that, while they are technically a non-profit organization, they hold monopoly-like power over the US education system. Legally speaking, the College Board isn’t a monopoly, as it has numerous competitors in several areas. For example, ACT, Inc. competes with the College Board’s SAT in the standardized testing business, and the International Baccalaureate (IB) and Cambridge A-levels both compete with AP exams. Regardless, the College Board’s extensive dominion over standardized testing in the United States still makes it feel like an oppressive monopoly. Even though it’s a non-profit, the college board consistently raises fees for different services, and students who have virtually no other options for standardized testing and AP exams are essentially forced to pay them.
So, is there a relationship between an individual’s family income and the competitiveness of their application? While the line is considerably blurry due to FAFSA, district resources, and other factors, the balance seems to lean toward high-income families.
