Posts
AP Scholars
Below you will see a recent Charles County Public Schools Press Release. I guess it's "okay and NOT emabrassing" to release some students names. Very interesting though. Let me know if you notice anything about this list.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
County students named AP Scholars
County students named AP Scholars
More than 170 Charles County Public Schools students have been named AP Scholars by the College Board in recognition of their exceptional achievement on the college level Advanced Placement Program exams.
The College Board's Advanced Placement Program offers students the opportunity to take challenging college level courses while still in high school, to receive college credit, advanced placement, or both for successful performance on the AP exams. About 17 percent of more than one million high school students in more than 15,000 secondary schools worldwide who took AP exams performed at a sufficiently high level to merit the recognition of AP Scholar.
Students took AP exams in May 2007 after completing challenging college-level courses at their high schools. The College Board recognizes several levels of achievement based on student's performance on AP exams.
One student, Ashin Shah of Thomas Stone High School, qualified for the National AP Scholar Award. Shah qualified for the highest AP honor awarded for earning an average grade of 4 or higher on a 5-point scale on all AP exams taken and grades of 4 or higher on eight or more of these exams.
Twenty students qualified for the AP Scholar with Distinction award by earning an average grade of at least 3.5 on all AP exams taken and grades of 3 or higher on five or more of these exams. They are:
Abe Massad, La Plata High School;
Jena Brinjak, La Plata;
William Flerlage, La Plata;
Kristin Preuss, La Plata;
Andrew Szoch, La Plata;
Shijie Shen, La Plata;
Erin Toczek, La Plata;
Eric Leadbetter, Maurice J. McDonough High School;
Daniel Lubey, McDonough;
Patrick Tillman, McDonough;
Timothy Van Blarcom, McDonough;
Kathleen Ford, Stone;
Sarah Hutton, Stone;
William Le, Stone;
Marla Rhem, Stone;
Ashin Shah, Stone;
Barrett Johnson, Westlake High School;
Hyun Koh, Westlake;
Allison Ripley, Westlake; and
Elisabeth Stevens, Westlake
Nineteen students qualified for the AP Scholar with Honor award by earning an average grade of at least 3.25 on all AP exams taken and grades of 3 or higher on four or more of these exams. They are:
Jennifer Cusick, La Plata;
Andrew Gill, La Plata;
Matthew Grimes, McDonough;
Andrew Merki, McDonough;
Caitlin Floyd, Stone;
Christina Langley, Stone;
Joseph Langley, Stone;
Carol Partonen, Stone;
Angela Rueda, Stone;
Eric Schnitzler, Stone;
Mary Stillwaggon, Stone;
Michael Wallio, Stone;
Kaitlyn Gallant, Westlake;
Asya Jones, Westlake;
Amy Mapes, Westlake;
Samantha Monk, Westlake;
Jacob Overfield, Westlake;
Catherine Rappole, Westlake; and
Paul Skym, Westlake
One Hundred and Twenty-two students qualified for the AP Scholar award by completing three or more AP exams with grades of 3 or higher.
They are, from Henry E. Lackey High School: Rebecca Abell, Eric Ashby, Danielle Bailey, Christopher Markomanolakis, Mitchell Mismash, Kira Mohler, Irene Posey, Kelly Richards, Samantha Skinger, Laura Snow, Lacy Thomas, Lorin Willett and Alysa Younger.
From La Plata they are: Zachary Andrews, Lauren Armstrong, Brynn Bales, Patrick Barock, William Bingham, John Bowling, Leslie Clower, William Crozier, Rachel Eaby, Kyara Fisher, Jessica Garner, Emily Gore, James Gregor, Annalyse Hamill, Theresa Kummerer, Monica Laidley, James Lassahn, Melissa Loeper, Jordan McGraner, Scott Moore, Alexandra Peters, Nicholas Potter, Kevin Qualters, Jamie Quinn, Xyan Rose, Heather Runyon, Paul Shaffer, Amanda Slack, Svetlozara Stoytcheva, Brandon Thomas, Whitney Underwood, Heather Valvert, Jennifer Van Deven, Samantha Welniak, Mary Wilson and Adam Young.
From McDonough they are: Angela Brockunier, Kristen Chen, Benjamin Coghan, Amy Coker, Matthew Donohue, Lauren Friedrich, Peter Garvey, Carey Hill, Amanda Langston, Kevin McCormick, Katherine Rice, Renita Riddick, Helen Shin, Ellen Slobodnik, Jasmin Watson, and Aleida Young.
From Stone they are: Taryn Alverson, Kristen Brown, Natalia Ceaicovscaia, Mariama Cox, Tiara Cunningham, Sean Daley, Kristine Deprey, Michael Gioia, Lisa Grimes, Ashlie Grimsley, Matthew Hanson, Michelle Hardesty, Lauren Hume, Bryant Jackson-Green, Lauren Kellough, Maris Mosley, Rebecca Parker, Nicholas Pennington, Caitlin Quinn, George Rawlings, Caitlin Rizzo, Joshua Sanders, Renee Saulsbury, Amanda Sparrow, Justin Tavares, Kelliann Wachrathit, Miles Wallio, Justin Walters and Michael Ward.
From Westlake they are: Maryam Aftab, Charmagne Arengo, Jessica Bader, Lindsey Bannister, James Butters, Chanel Celestine, Najee Clancy, Jeffrey Crouse, Karen Fletcher, Kevin Gerrity, Weston Harlan, Mathew Hoffman, Joyce Hones, Colleen Jarrett, Brandon Kaufmann, Katelynn Levanduski, Simon Liu, Ashley-Mae Mangalindan, Angela Maki, Katera Marshall, Nicholas Montes, Djuan Nash, Ayanna Osborne, Stephen Palma, Zachary Rahm, Ian Ray, Abigail Remo, Julia Steinsberger, Matthew Thompson, Erin Watson, Victoria Weavill, Brooke Wehausen, Nicole Willis, and David Wilson.
Most of the nations' colleges and universities award credit, advanced placement, or both based on successful performance on the AP exams. Thirty-seven AP courses and exams are offered in a wide variety of subject areas, each consisting of multiple-choice and free-response (essay or problem-solving) questions except for the Studio Art Exam, which evaluates students' original artwork.
The College Board is a nonprofit membership association dedicated to preparing, inspiring, and connecting students to college and opportunity. The association is composed of more than 5,200 schools, colleges, universities, and other educational organizations. Each year, the College Board serves 7 million students and their parents, 23,000 high schools, and 3,500 colleges through major programs and services in college admissions, guidance, assessment, financial aid, enrollment and teaching and learning.
9 comments:
Well, jeez let's figure this one out.
These students would succeed no matter what jack arse would be teaching the class. They could teach themselves. I find it offensive and repugnant that the CCPS publishes a listing of students (Come on Schwartz, why publish these, but you can't publish the slackers (teachers and students combined)? Bunch of pompous hippocrites.
As students, they should have their name removed from this list.
I say publish the GPA's of the administrators of the schools and over at the central office. Publish their degree and where they got it from. Some of them may be very embarrassed but if they have the balls to publish all these students (do you REALLY think that your skill helped them pass the AP exam?)
I'm sure these students could have been handed a textbook and earned the scores they did on the exam with no assistance from teachers. Right.
By the way I graduated from the University of Maryland with a 3.9 GPA.
Oh, and I know how to spell hypocrite too.
Mrs. Abell,
I'm surprised no one else commented or answered your question "Let me know if you notice anything about this list".
It is blatantly obvious...Lackey and McDonough are grossly misrepresented as top achievers in these scores. Maybe if your able to get the AP scores released by school and subject, everyone will be able to see how both of these schools' scores are lagging.
Where does the comment about Lackey and McDonough being misrepresented come from?
I believe the writer meant "under-represented." For example, Henry E. Lackey H.S. had no students announced as "AP Scholar with Distinction" or "AP Scholar with Honor."
I disagreed with the former Board of Education member Kathy Levanduski many years ago when she stated in session that all CCPS high schools are the same. They were not then, and are not now.
Questions about course offerings and course quality are fair for students and parents to pose. It should be the responsibility of the schools and the Board of Education to answer them.
I know this post is old (I just found it by having a competition with someone to see who had more results when googling their name), but I do have some comments about the comments above.
Several of the students on the list could have earned a score of a 3 or better on an AP test if they studied on their own. Some of the students on the list took online classes where they basically had to read a chapter and do some homework (my brother did this for one of the tests he took, and I believe Ashin Shaw did this as well).
So in a few cases, the students could get those scores on their own (depending on the type of student and the subject). I can't say for other schools, but I do know that Thomas Stone had great teachers (some which have sadly left). I took several classes that I had no interest in and still earned scores of 4's on those tests. Mr. Lindsay, Mr. Sollohub, Mr. Nasso, Ms. Muncie, Ms. Roche, Ms. Bondelid and several other teachers at Thomas Stone were great and helped students to understand and learn the concepts (but this requires the student to be willing to learn). I also talked to other students from other schools, and when we compared work loads and discussed the differences between teachers, we deemed Thomas Stone stricter with the quality of education on the students.
As for the "AP Scholar" awards itself, I believe it to be a bit biased (mainly for the "with honors" part). If a person takes 8 exams, and gets 4's on 5 of them and 1's on the rest (they pay for the exam they know they'll pass, and CCPS pays for the rest so they try) then they get a standard AP Scholar award. Someone else could take 4 exams and get 3's on 3 of them and one 4 and receive an AP Scholar with Honors award. The title of the award is much cooler, but it doesn't accurately describe the student.
All I can say is "sad for whom"?
The teachers left as they knew the school system is going down the toilet.
The spin is devious, and there is no true information being disseminated
about AP scores, a blockhead policy of visitation of parents in the classrooms, not allowing professionals in their fields to visit classrooms and evaluate a teacher's knowledge of the subject in which they teach.
Let's have all the administrators and principals publish their degrees and universities from which they've received these degrees.
This will give us a little insight as to why the system is failing.
Miles,
Thank you for your comments and your insight on the AP Scholars with Honors. In addition, I too have heard about the variances of system-wide rigor in the AP courses.
Please come back and comment again.
I think the changes in rigor are based upon the mindset of the teacher. Some teachers truly believe that the course is a college level course and treat it as such. I don't think it fully relies on the GPA or where the teacher graduated. What makes a great teacher is one who knows the subject and has the experience to be able to teach people from different backgrounds and having different learning styles. Sometimes this will take a while, and it makes a teacher look bad. Teachers have a tough job because they have to learn how to teach well, which only comes with practice.
Certain teachers know that since an AP course is a college level course, they have to push the students to succeed. Other teachers try to find a middle ground and try not to put too much on the students shoulders. There's a large gap between honors courses and AP courses. Teachers have to find a way to present the material so students can grasp it. Some teachers find a way to do it, and others still need to work on it. But it doesn't all depend on the teachers; most of the students don't have the right mindset for an AP level course.
I believe this is because the school system sets the standards for non-AP courses. How the teacher presents the material is different from case to case. The standards don’t limit teachers from pushing students further, but the standards might cause a teacher not to push the students. If the teachers don’t push the students early on, the students won’t be able to handle the rigor of an AP course. Some teachers who teach the AP courses realize that the students aren’t ready to handle the college level material and they dumb-down the material to a level the students will be able to handle. Other AP teachers are afraid to challenge the students since it will reflect badly on their report cards. A select few actually push the students. No one likes to see someone struggling, but a person learns the most when they overcome the struggling. AP courses are supposed to make people think. The standards need to change in order to push the students and force them to truly think and analyze. There shouldn’t be such a large gap between an honors course and an AP course.
If we just look at the AP scores and base judgment on that, then one can only assume it’s the change in rigor from teacher to teacher, but we also have to take into consideration how the students were prepared for the AP course. Many students avoid AP courses due to the challenges that come with it. We should not be afraid to challenge the students, but this is always easier said than done. If students were challenged from the start, they would do better later on.
The teachers know what they’re teaching; the problem is most teachers are worried about what can the student handle.
I hope this all makes sense... I was typing this, then went to hang out with friends, and then continued (with a slightly different mindset).
Post a Comment