An AP teacher sent me the following letter. I don’t know the answer. Can anyone answer her question? Maybe not, maybe we are all in the dark. It does not seem beyond belief that Pearson and the College Board are closely collaborating. Is there more afoot than collaboration? Shouldn’t they be competitors?

Here is the communication I received:

“Hi Diane,

Just wanted to bring this to your attention. As a member of the AP English listserv, er, college board-monitored discussion board, I received this message yesterday. When I logged in to follow the discussion thread, it had been removed. If true, it is important information that AP teachers have not yet been informed about. Several AP teachers, from AP Biology to AP Language, noted that their students reported “weird” questions on the exams, which are similar to the comments that have been made about the Pearson 3-8 exams in New York.

“I can’t find any proof written anywhere except that when I registered this year for the AP National Conference in Las Vegas, I called AP central about a question I had because Pearson was communicating with me about needing a code or something to complete my application and the young man on the phone said “Oh Pearson is handling AP now and GED so you’ll have to call this number. He said the website etc. would remain on College Board but that it was really “a separate entity” now. I am anxious to hear what they have to say at the National Conference. I fear we are going to see a major change in philosophy and more alignment with Common Core. It’s hard to pin them down. They are sneaky about things. Almost Everything our school does now is governed by Pearson. We are mostly government funded–Navajo school but it is a trickle down process. What happens with us will eventually worm its way into every school. We are the guinea pigs. They are updating our internet connections this summer so that we have more room for all these tests that will be taught online. 3rd graders will be taught to type on the computer all their work so they can do the tests, as well as everyone else. They are practicing because eventually the tests will become the determiner for passing the kid on. They say in 2 years but they keep moving it up.

“The above is from a recent conversation on a literary-minded thread on LinkedIn. Can anyone speak to this matter of Pearson and the CollegeBoard as bedfellows to the extent that things may be changing, and not for the better? Heck, I wonder if I am wrong for even posting this thread here…”