As the world grows more and more in the digital direction, our school environments must adapt too. The newest instance of this is that AP testing will now be administered through digital means. This change is the product of an uprising of cheating instances and complaints from students. With this new model, one particularly enticing factor is that previously tedious tasks such as essays and filling bubbles, can now be done more efficiently and quickly. This new digital switch creates a solution to a long-lasting hatred among students, who were given a relatively short time frame to answer free-response questions.
Not only does this impact the perspective of students across the country, but also the adults who moderate these events. “Moderators will need to remember extra charging stations, be able to get around challenges with the College Board, and overall technical issues,” Mr. Giess stated. The school district and administrators of these tests will also not have to deal with excessive shipping of materials, saving time and resources. The graders may also lose the time it took to comprehend less legible handwriting.
Though not all students will be able to get the luxury of completely digital tests. Of the 28 participating in the switch, 16 will be completely virtual, while 12 are hybrids. Most hybrids consist of classes in math and science fields, which will need to graph and use notation on paper.
“Annotations and earning points for prewriting” are reasons some may oppose the switch as said by Mr. Giess. Circling, highlighting, and underlining will not necessarily remain the experience it is physically, and be ineffective. Students also used to be able to earn credit for the planning they did before writing their official responses, which may not be possible as their computers will direct to an immediate answer.
Overall, every student should walk into their AP Testing rooms with hope and a charged Chromebook. Exams that have been digitally administered in the past have had a mass positive reception, and the ability to limit cheating and streamline the process of test-taking will be a generosity to all those involved.