The College Board offered 45-minute Advanced Placement tests online for 1 million students, but at least 10,000 of those students submitted their test answers and they were rejected. The College Board blamed the failure on the students’ browsers and said they were “only 1%” of all test-takers. Shrug. We have to take the College Board’s word that the technical failure was limited to 10,000 students, who must take the test again.
Aidin Vaziri of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote:
AP testing meltdown dismays high schoolers, who may have to retake tests
Michele Glazer Jones’ daughter, a junior at San Francisco’s Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts, spent months studying for her Advanced Placement calculus exam.
But with the high-stakes tests moving online for the first time ever due to the coronavirus pandemic, a widespread technical glitch may have wiped out all her effort.
The exams, which help determine whether students earn college credit for high school coursework, rolled out this week. After the first two days of testing, frustrated teenagers and their parents took to social media to vent about a glitchy system that prevented some students from submitting their finished work — and lack of support from the College Board, the non-profit organization that administers the exams.
“My daughter was absolutely hysterical,” Jones told The Chronicle, saying the AP website would not accept a digital image of the completed exam before timing her daughter out of the system. “I sat on hold waiting for them for 45 minutes before (her daughter) said, ‘Don’t bother, I’ll take it again.’
Ava Osborn, a senior at Oakland Tech who took her AP physics test on Tuesday, was also confounded by the online testing system and could not get answers when her answers failed to process correctly.
“We spent two hours on hold with the College Board and the woman on the phone basically said she couldn’t help me,” Osborn said. “I still haven’t been able to file for the makeup test.”
The College Board said on Tuesday that approximately 1% of the more than 1 million students who took the exams, given in 38 subjects, encountered technical difficulties.
That’s roughly 10,000 kids who prepared, paid $94 each and sat through the 45-minute online program.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Regardless of what the AP says, this exam is going to be as meaningless as a take home SAT/ACT. High Schools would be doing their students a HUGE service if the teachers just told the students — look, this is not going to count for anything and since scores don’t come out until summer, it has nothing to do with your class grades. Just treat it like you would treat any practice exam since the score isn’t going to matter anyway.
It is ridiculous that the AP didn’t just cancel the exams. But the kids taking it should be informed by all the adults around them that this test is meaningless but they might as well try to answer the questions and if it glitches up, don’t worry about it since it doesn’t matter.
It would be great if the presidents of universities and colleges had just announced that no AP score or class would count as college credit this year. They could have ended all of this in one fell swoop! Why aren’t those colleges and universities speaking out?
Sounds like College Board’s legal strategy is already in place.
The tried and true “blame it on the victim” works like a charm.
Supposed to be a response to Bob below.
WordPress has a mind of its own
I have taught AP World History for many years and my Husband teaches AP Language. Our daughter took 2 AP Tests this week, AP Physics C and Calculus. She completed the demo and everything worked fine. When she went to submit her physics answers, she kept getting an error saying unable to accept answers. She has to retake the test. She did the exact same things with her calculus test and that worked fine. It cannot be a browser issue or a conversion issue as College Board and Trevor Packer are implying. I am infuriated with their tone deaf tweets about how successful things are going. I am appreciative of the opportunity kids had to take the tests but do not understand why they simply refuse to accept any responsibility and act like everything has gone well.
“Why aren’t those colleges and universities speaking out?” As much as I dislike this system, I have students who need the college credit to save money on education expenses.
Right, good point. That’s the reason so many high schools are now participating.
Because colleges and uni’s know that the AP class and AP tests are a bunch of bunk. Now that school systems have “bought the product” in mass load and pushed an AP for all attitude, the curriculum has turned into nothing but test prep for the awful test. I will spare everyone here my story of the nephew (posted a few days ago) who IS currently living the college nightmare after getting a 5 on his AP physics exam when he had never taken the class because he had scored perfect on the math portion of the SAT. The colleges and uni’s aren’t offering the AP credits anymore since they are getting unprepared students and taking a hit when kids have to drop courses mid semester. The kids are LOSING scholarship money and having to pay MORE money to retake intro courses.
While certainly true in most cases, the “AP saves money” argument ain’t what it used to be.
A lot of colleges and universities no longer hand out credit like candy.
Some of the best ones like Dartmouth, Brown, Caltech, Williams, and Amherst don’t give credit for AP at all.
In cases like Caltech, its not because giving credit costs them money, but because they understand AP is not equivalent to their own courses.
Lots of others restrict the amount of AP credit given because giving credit would cost them money — a lot of money.
I’m not using the argument to justify a system I despise. I had a tutoring client, both of whose parents became ill this year, one of them very seriously. Getting that AP credit is very important to that student. Needless to say, I donated my services to that family for the entire year.
LisaM
While colleges and universities undoubtedly know that AP courses (eg, in science and math) are not equivalent to their college freshman counterparts in most csses, I think most would be willing to look the other way if not for the money issue.
Awarding AP credit costs them a HUGE amount of money and with drastic cuts in state and federal funding in recent times, cutting AP credit awards is an obvious place to make that up.
David
I know you have criticized the system, which is rigged.
David….I am not trying to sound demeaning of you, but you refer to yourself as a “tutor”. I’m assuming that you were a teacher at some point and this is your retirement gig? My question to you is why you are “tutoring” students when they should be getting this information in their AP class from the AP teacher in school? If students aren’t able to understand enough to do well on the exam, then this seems to be a problem with the entire system. The Common Core math curriculum is dreadful and from what I have experienced (and heard from HS teachers) is that the kids taking the higher maths don’t have the basics from Alg and Geometry in order to do well in Calculus. My point being….the AP curriculum is aligned to the test and not to what kids should be learning and teachers should be teaching. Here where I live the kids go to school all day and then head off to the tutoring centers after school….which I find absolutely ridiculous.
Lisa, you can see my bio at http://www.kristutoring.com/bio.html and read my opinion about the AP system at http://www.eduissues.com. I’ve answered those questions many times already there, and I agree with a lot of your complaints.
Regarding your story elsewhere about your son passing the AP Physics 1 test with a 5 without taking the class based on his good score on the SAT math exam, that is astounding to me as the types of questions asked on those two tests are starkly different. What are the details of that story? I assume that he must have taken some kind of physics class somewhere?!?
David….It is my nephew. He decided to pursue engineering late in HS and needed Physics to get into the college program. He had not taken a Physics class and his counselor instructed him to take the AP physics exam and if he scored well, it would count as his high school class. He had gotten a perfect score on the SAT math. He was given a packet of AP Physics info (1 week before the test) and was told to read and memorize the formulas and that he would be able to use his stellar math and test taking skills. He scored a perfect 5 without taking the physics class. Once he got into the engineering program, he had to drop a few classes because he didn’t have the background to take the higher classes. He wound up losing his scholarship and will now have a bill of $50,00-$60,000 after graduation. The boy is not dumb, but not a genius either. He went to an expensive private school that trained their kids on the art of test taking as part of the tuition……drop 2 answers right away and of the 2 remaining answers, there will be a math trick to quickly figure out the correct answer. Maybe AP had a purpose at some point, but I just don’t see it. There is no reason on earth that so many kids should be taking so many of these AP classes/tests.
I agree completely. That counselor should be fired for giving advice like that.
There are just too many people trying to beat the system through tricks instead of getting a real education, and people are not only willing to pay for expensive tutoring, some are also willing to do almost anything to get their kids into college as the recent college admissions scandal showed. I tutored during retirement because I was trying to get kids excited about math and science after I didn’t see a lot of this happening in schools. Instead, I found out that I was being sucked into a massive test prep money-making scheme.
My daughter graduates this year and she took some AP classes and even took 1 test (against my wishes….but OK, that’s what they do!!). She found out that it was plain memorization and test taking skills during classes. “Will this be on the test?” was the question most students asked in these classes and it really annoyed her. To me, that’s not an education. Unfortunately, if she sat in regular classes, she was bored to tears and behavior problems were an issue….this seems to be the problem with pushing AP for all. What % of a HS student body is really capable of handling college level work?…..not many! Parents here push for their kids to take 3 or 4 AP classes per year. It seems like where I live (suburbs outside of DC in MD) the parents think there is something added to the water supply that makes their children smarter than the rest. Education around here is a competition…..a competition to nowhere IMHO!
Some AP courses, on the other hand, are worth taking. It may also depend on the teacher. My daughter reported that some, like European history, art history, statistics were much more than test prep.
I have started a facebook group for parents, educators and students. It is not the first time College Board has not taken responsibility. The solution is not acceptable. There needs to be accountability for a multi
billion dollar company that is a non for profit.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/2682673822057510/
Your opinion that these tests don’t matter and should have been cancelled is ridiculous. I have a daughter in college who will be graduating early, saving THOUSANDS of dollars because she took AP classes in high school.
I bet that once higher ed is free, very few kids will take AP courses.
Meaningless? I don’t think so. Multiple colleges have said they will still accept the scores. Here’s a good list with sourcing included: http://pages.prompt.com/colleges-that-accept-2020-ap-credit
Maybe scores won’t be an accurate reflection of how much the student knows about the course but they are still important for me because multiple good scores will allow me to graduate faster and save money.
My daughter definitely needs the college credit. She worked hard all year preparing. It would NOT be great if her college decided that all that AP preparation was thrown out the window.
College Board blamed the failure on the students browsers”
Can’t they at least come up with a more creative excuse than “Browser ate your homework”?
Sounds like a typical excuse from Microsoft support, doesn’t it?
Máté, I have investigated this problem further in the following article:
http://eduissues.com/2020/05/16/update-on-ap-exam-uploading-issues
Yes, thanks, David, I read it and some more you had related to the AP exams. It has been scandalous for years. I wonder what solution will be offered. Maybe the whole AP system will change?
Unfortunately I think most parents anger will simply be directed at the unfair scoring. I’ve had a hard time convincing parents otherwise as long as colleges still accept these tests for admissions purposes. Real change has to come from the admissions offices.
SomeDAM, I have investigated this problem further in the following article:
http://eduissues.com/2020/05/16/update-on-ap-exam-uploading-issues
Good stuff, David. Apparently, you have been investigating AP exams for a while now.
The time limit is a huge problem, and in an unprecedented situation using an untried method (online) there shouldn’t be any time limit.
Imagine that Einstein had been given a 45 minute time limit.
David Colemsn: Sorry, Albert, but times up!
Albert Einstein: But I…but …
David Coleman: No buts. Life is about “fast”: fast cars, fast foods, fast computers, fast talkers, fast thinkers. If it takes more than 45 minutes for you to explain your Genital* Theory of Relativity, it means you don’t know it”
*Editor’s note: David Coleman has confused Einstein with Freud
I hope all these parents successfully sue the College Board and take this corrupt organization down.
Sounds like College Board’s legal strategy is already in place.
The tried and true “blame it on the victim” works like a charm.
My sentiments exactly. I hate everything to do with college board
Bob, I have investigated this problem further in the following article:
http://eduissues.com/2020/05/16/update-on-ap-exam-uploading-issues
David, this is superb!!!
Diane, please note this.
Thanks, it’s hot off the press. I’ve been working on this for some time.
Meredith Schneider has also done a great job collecting Twitter and other feedback. I posted that link at the end of the Comments section here.
This happened to my son on his calculus exam. He downloaded his work, but it would not upload to the program. It finally timed him out and kept saying no file uploaded. He has not heard back yet as to whether he can retake the test, but to say he was extremely disappointed and defeated would be an understatement.
I had three students take the Calculus BC exam yesterday. They all said they felt well prepared and did fine, but one, who said that he thought that he would have scored a 5, lost his connection and was not able to upload the answer to his last question. He has no choice but to request a make-up exam on June 1st.
Maybe my students were phenomenally unlucky, but 1 out of three was disconnected!
If the College Board was really on the ball, there should have been a fall back method to submit answers, such as emailing in pictures of the answers.
My opinion on this whole system is well known: http://eduissues.com/2017/04/29/its-ap-exscam-time-again
Amen, David.
I hope that many readers of this blog will take the time to read your thoughtful, illuminating essay, David.
Thanks, Bob. Diane actually featured that article several years back.
Indeed, it is worth reading.
I don’t know where this goes from here, Bob, this entire MESS….
The phrase that popped into my mind when first reading this post was, “Creepy, creepier and creepiest.” I guess Trump and DeVos are somewhere in the “creepiest” category…the college board somewhat lower in that formulation.
Then there is this whole other world, kind of symbolized by this blog. Something that can be better, far better than what so many people are settling for now.
God, I hope we can go in the better direction, for the sake of our kids.
Their browser/photo format answer is weak and exhibits a lack responsibility. If uploading worked during the trial pre-test, and then the upload did not work during the test then those excuses simply do not apply. More galling is that they have no interest in even trying to troubleshoot. They did not invest in the infrastructure to support the thousand of students all submitting in the same 5-10 minutes. College Board and AP’s you have passed your sell by date. They have their $, and no care about students. Another disgusted parent.
The uploading didn’t work in the demo test, either. At least it didn’t for me. I did it so I could help my students through it, and I never could get my camera to upload a handwritten document.
2 of my 32 students have to do the retake. One never got in at all. She was hysterical. The other did both questions and the second one wouldn’t upload.
Just posted this
http://eduissues.com/2020/05/13/ap-exam-takers-lost-network-connectivity-in-some-cases
and am getting more feedback from students.
It is beginning to look like the problem might have arisen, not from outdated browsers, but from too many people uploading answers to CB’s servers at the end of the exam.
I just talked to my student who had the problem and was told that their final answer upload went slowly and then the exam timer went off and cut off the upload. They felt that they were going to score a 5 on the exam, but now have to retake it on June 1st. Another comment that just came in from a reader of my blog indicates that her daughter had a similar issue.
!!!!
The only sane thing for the CB to do is to accept partially completed exams for these administrations of the tests and to adjust the scoring accordingly. Kids should not suffer because the CB didn’t have sufficient server capacity, and they certainly shouldn’t have to go through the emotional trauma of having to sit for the exam again, and they certainly shouldn’t have to shell out $$$ to do so.
A lot of kids are applying for the June 1st make-up exam. My concern is that this problem will recur for the remaining exams. I had a Physics C student on Monday who had no problems, but few students take Physics C. I had Calculus AB and BC students yesterday and then heard that one person had a problem. Tomorrow I have AP Physics 1 and Chemistry students. The exams have been shortened this year but it appears that the shortened time also includes the upload time! A student that I just talked to said that they were warned about that but the trial upload went quickly, so they were not worried. One student who submitted at the 5 minute warning had their answer accepted. The one who didn’t went past that warning and was then screwed when the system bogged down.
If they are using a major cloud provider like Amazon or Microsoft, they should be able to add additional capacity at a cost. If they are hosting this themselves (God I hope not!) then this debacle will snowball!
!!!!
AP U.S. History is tomorrow. There are over 500,000 kids who take that test. It’s going to be a joke.
The College Board tech has been deficient for YEARS, and they have never put money into fixing it.
The kids are now paying for that lack of funding and foresight.
College Board would obviously prefer to “convert” the profits on their billion dollar revenue into salary increases and bonuses for their execs rather than into infrastructure upgrades.
I have IMed all of my students with this info and suggest that others do likewise as I wonder if they will be able to add more server/network bandwidth capacity by tomorrow.
I sent the following a few hours ago to the Chronicle reporter who broke the story:
Dear Mr. Vaziri,
I tutor a number of students in AP Physics, Calculus and Chemistry. Reports that I am getting back indicate that the College Board may not have had sufficient bandwidth or server capacity for the last minute upload of answers. One student who uploaded at the 5 minute warning completed the process. Another who went past that had their upload cut off when it bogged down. Two people told me that they did a practice upload earlier in preparation for the exam which went quickly, but then the system bogged down at the end.
I think that it is likely that the 1% number underestimates the extent of the problem. The national press should hold the College Board’s feet to the fire, and do it quickly. This problem might recur tomorrow if they can not add computing/network capacity quickly!!
Dr. David Kristofferson
https://www.eduissues.com
David Coleman is to education as Clorox is to Corona Virus.
Umm. . . NO!
Coleman is nowhere near that effective. Maybe something to the effect that DC is to education as the tRump is for the Corona Virus.
He meant Clorox as enemy of the virus. Coleman: enemy of education. Effective enemy.
Even the coronavirus prolly runs away when it sees David Coleman
As a matter of principle, when I think of the word “integrity,” the College Board does not spring to mind as the personification of that abstract noun.
My son had same issue with his AP AB Calc exam and has to retake on June 1. A couple of students who had issues as well with their AP exams started a petition. I have been sharing in hopes that College Board would let these students submit time stamped work so they don’t have to retake the exam. http://chng.it/mds8dWwCPN
“Martin West
ProfMartyWest
·Thanks to
JebBush
for joining me on this week’s
EducationNext
podcast, our 200th episode. We discuss what he learned from managing crises as governor of Florida and how schools can adjust to distance learning during (and after) the pandemic”
The entire ed reform “debate” around the pandemic excludes 1. public schools, and 2. supporters/users of public schools.
They really could save time by just interviewing Jeb Bush over and over- he’s the original source of all of it and it’s all the same.
To be fair, they told us upfront this could happen and prepared an in-depth checklist to help students update browsers, tell them what to do if copy-paste options didn’t work, etc. It’s still hugely frustrating to those students, but I do understand CB’s position. This article makes it sound like CB didn’t prepare students to avoid this outcome.
They DIDN’T prepare the students for this, because my students did everything right and still had major problems.
Jeb Bush regularly denigrates and sneers at every public school in the country- refers to our schools as “government schools”, insists they are run by labor unions.
Why would a public school supporter or family want him setting policy for public schools? How is that fair to public school students? He opposes the existence of my son’s school and I’m supposed to take direction from him on how to run it?
Charter and voucher schools get advocates – there are tens of ed reform orgs that work on behalf of those students and families. Why don’t public school students?
For some reason our students are stuck with a bunch of adults who are ideologically opposed to the existence of their schools, but charter and voucher students get cheerleaders who push for more funding and more government support.
Is it any wonder our kids come out on the short end of the stick in every ed reform deal? They don’t have any advocates in elite policy circles.
Imagine anyone in ed reform issuing a blanket statement about public schools that is this glowing:
“Secretary Betsy DeVos
“During National Charter Schools Week, and every week, let us celebrate the extraordinary work of public charter schools in advancing #EducationFreedom, excellence, and innovative approaches to learning.” –
Blatantly pro-charter schools and blatantly anti-public schools.
I could post what DeVos says about public schools as a comparison, but you’ve all heard the same over and over from the echo chamber. As you know, it begins with the sneering “government schools” and must include “failing” as a predicate to every mention of all public schools. My personal favorite is “factory” schools. Like any of these people have ever been anywhere NEAR a “factory” 🙂
I do not buy the 1%. 3 of my 9 couldn’t upload their work. That’s 33%, folks! Talking with many AP Calculus teachers from all over the world, not a single one said all of their exams were accepted. This was no fault of the students and they were devistated! So frustrating!!
I’m surprised that the N.Y. Times has not picked up on this story by now!! I’ve searched in vain.
I’ll know later today if this train wreck continued into the AP physics 1 and Chemistry exams. I didn’t have any students taking AP exams on Wednesday.
College Board has more than one train so when one wrecks another can continue the wrecking where the first left off.
My hope is that someone at CB was frantically working overnight with what I hope is a major cloud computing provider to add more server capacity and network bandwidth to prevent a recurrence. We’ll know later today…
David Coleman is prolly working on it 24/7
As we know, he’s an expert on everything.
I received this response last night to a post I made locally on Nextdoor:
“I am a college counselor and a school counselor. There is a huge disconnect between what College Board is reporting and what we are hearing from our students. Many students throughout the country and the world were not able to finish/upload their exams or faced other technical issues. The college counseling listserv is on fire today and high school counselors and college admissions deans are pushing back against College Board’s reports and demanding proof of their 1% claim. This is a terribly frustrating and miserable situation for our hardworking students who did everything right. The college counseling community (College admissions officers and high school counselors) know it’s not fair and we are doing everything to advocate for students. Colleges know that this is a crazy time and students have no control over many testing and grading issues relating to their college applications this year. I am so sorry our students have to go through this…ugh”
A class action suit would be an opportunity to compile an official record of those who had their tests rejected.
If enough people signed on to the suit, it might prove College Board is lying about the % affected, which certainly would not be something in their favor for winning the suit.
For College Board’s winning, that is
Caught in their own spider web
and surely a necessary action now to show how future testing will be NOT valid
The 1% should just get the highest grade.
Diane, do you have any contacts at the N.Y. Times who might jump on this story???
Or do any other readers in the NY area have contacts at the Times???
Yep, my kid got taken to the cleaners too. Trevor Packer, the individual at College Board that oversees AP provided a disingenuous response that was forwarded on to me. Oh by the way, this “nonprofit” company spends over $2 million on lobbyists and their top 20 executives all are in the $400-$600k range annually.
Is it time to get the Justice Department involved?
It’s a billion dollar “non-profit”.
That’s the very definition of oxymoron.
And the only way they keep their nonprofit status is by plowing the profits back into the salaries and bonuses of David Coleman and the others, while obviously skimping on server bandwidth and security.
NYT-Contact Us/Help…
“If you are in the United States, call us at 800-NYTIMES (800-698-4637). Our hours are 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. E.T. Monday – Friday, and 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. E.T. Saturday – Sunday.”
New York Times Head Office Address: The New York Times Building 620 Eighth Avenue. New York City, 10018. New York Times Head Office Phone number: (800) 753-7795. New York Times Head Office Email ID: corporate@nytimes.com.
Note: I’m not a reader or user of NYT, as I don’t have a bird, or a need for a bird cage liner…
Ha ha ha
It also works to cover the floor if you need to do painting and you don’t have a dropcloth.
If 1% of people surveyed is enough to make us take it, then 1% of problems is enough for it to be their problem.
As a minimum, they shouldn’t have to pay for retaking the exam.
I don’t believe they will have to. They built a “failure rate” into this process. They probably expected a 2-5% failure in students being able to upload and they are fine with that.
Bottom line number is dollars and they were willing to take the hit on those that do retakes. Way, way less expensive than building into the system, the creation of new accounts for those that got taken from behind and letting them upload pictures of their work. That work by the way would have a date and time on it. Totally reasonable, but more expensive of a process.
They don’t have to pay to retake. That’s part of the original fee. Not that it makes it any better. The retake tests are THREE WEEKS after the original tests; in many cases after school has already gotten out. I now have to work with my 2 students who have to do the retake test so that they are ready for the retake. I’m worried that they will stress out even more than they already have.
blaming the students’ browsers. There’s the future….
David Coleman is on record saying nobody gives a %*&# (least of all David Coleman)
Is his comment about this latest incident or something else?
No that’s just his general opinion
Coleman has quite a way with words for someone who went to Take and Oxford .
It’s no wonder he is in charge of SAT and Common Core.
Yale and Oxford
And I find it hilarious that his mother, who is a Dean of an exclusive college, decided to be in the first round of colleges that wouldn’t be using SAT scores for admission. Even his mother knows her son and the College Board are frauds. Time for it ALL to go!!
Lisa, great point about Bennington, where Coleman’s mother president and ditched the SAT
And his father is a psychiatrist.
Prolly still trying to figure out where he went wrong.
They must have had some fascinating conversations around the dinner table.
Oh it’s WAY more than 1% of kids who had problems. The AP Human Geography test was particularly fraught. That’s a test geared to freshmen, and it was a catastrophe. Teachers, parents, and students are FURIOUS! And College Board is trying make it sound like students’ and teachers’ faults. It’s sickening.
As I feared the upload problem is recurring today. They have clearly not added enough extra capacity over night. This was just posted to my blog 23 minutes ago:
“This just happened an hour ago to my son for the AP Chemistry exam (5/15/2020). Hopefully the volume of uploads for the makeup test will be below the threshold capacity of the CollegeBoard system for the June test.”
Yeah, I worry about that, too. The retakes will be two subjects at a time. I’m worried that the volume to 2 retakes at the same time will crash their system again, and then the kids are out of money and out of luck.
The sad thing about the retakes is if they don’t work either, the kids are out the money. College Board will STILL charge them for the test, even if they can’t successfully finish it.
Since this is a National exam, the college board needs to prove that they didn’t have a bandwidth problem on their end, and that the kids really had a browser problem. These things can be checked and proved. The data, the logs are all there, and if not, who made the contract that allowed the CB not to provide a transparent process?
I bet David Coleman himself came up with the browser excuse.
Undoubtedly very proud of the fact that he knew what a browser is.
What about all the students who couldn’t take the test at home because their family lacked the internet connection or computer?
What about the students who lacked a quiet room to take the test in and had all sorts of commotion to deal with?
These folks should be included in the inevitable class action suit.
To be fair, the College Board sent out computer and Wifi hotspots to kids who requested them. I’m not saying that I’m a fan of the College Board, but they did do that.
As far as a quiet room, I had a student who had to take her test outside because of construction in her house.
I even have college students who don’t have Internet, don’t have laptop, don’t even have smart phone.
No I have not been reading my emails because I took today off and have been busy. That is ridiculous
Michelle Tenam-Zemach Ed. D. Sent from my iPhone
>
In essence, at the very being of the subject being discussed are so many onto-epistemological invalidities that it is almost risible, except that it is the students who pay the price for this exercise in mental masturbation. And all of the wailing after the fact just continues that mental masturbation taking it to a new level of absurdity and inanity.
My son just took his AP Physics exam today with mixed results. Question one uploaded but question two failed to upload, despite the fact that the same process was used and four minutes remained. Needless to say he was extremely annoyed although he was given the option to take it again on June 2nd.
I just spoke with one of my AP Physics 1 students who completed the test this afternoon.
The test had two questions, each with multiple parts. There were 30 minutes total allotted for the first question and 20 minutes for the second question. After 25 minutes into the first question a warning popped up telling students to upload now and that they would not be able to go back to the first question after the deadline. My student worked for two additional minutes and was still able to upload before the deadline. The student learned afterwards that friends who waited longer than that had problems.
Students had 15 minutes to work on the second problem before the 5 minute warning.
In my understanding of arithmetic, 25 + 15 = 40, and they were told it would be a 45 minute test. As it was they were given 50 minutes total with 10 minutes for uploading unless they wanted to gamble on losing points for an entire question.
Students had earlier done a practice upload which went more quickly and that appears to have lulled some of them into thinking that they didn’t need to upload at the 5 minute warning.
Based on the above, the College Board will probably argue that the students “were given fair warning.” High school students get fairly abrupt introductions to the adult world these days…
There is nothing more encouraging when in the middle of trying to think through a problem, warnings pop up on your screen.
My daughter and two other kids in her class had their AP exams disappear after hitting “Submit”. The computer my daughter used was brand NEW with updated browsers. I don’t believe it was the browsers. I think the server crashed when 100,000 + kids hit their Submit buttons
And really….all of this frustration when so many colleges and uni’s have said that they aren’t looking at SAT, ACT and AP scores for the next couple years due to the shortened school year? And how many decided before this pandemic mess that the scores weren’t/aren’t worth the paper that they’re printed on?…lots! This is to appease over zealous, lawn mower and helicopter parents using their children as competition fodder. Scores on tests that mean absolutely nothing and do nothing to improve the education of children. Waste of time, waste of money, and a waste of a good mind.
But as a wise deformer (Arne Duncan?) once said
“A test is a terrible thing to waste”
Lisa, do you teach students who are taking AP courses? If you did, you would know that they and AP classes are not all the same. I teach many students who are from rural and impoverished communities. They take AP courses from our state’s program because often their schools cannot offer them and because they hope to have exposure to college-level work and skills in high school. Yes, many students take the course with the hope that they will earn college credit, and while there are colleges and universities which are not accepting AP scores for credit, I’ve encouraged my students to check with the schools to which they are applying because many non-elitist colleges are accepting the scores for credit, even this year. This is a lifesaver for many students in regards to cost. Admittedly, some AP classes are test-prep mills, but you can’t paint all of them, the teachers who teach them, or the students who take them with the same brush. I teach an AP English course, and my sole goal is to help my students become better communicators for life; if they score high on the AP exam and earn college credit, great, but ultimately, the skills they learn in some of these classes are not ones which they would have learned or even been exposed to in a standard high school course. Is that a sad reality about our college prep courses? Of course, but at least some have an alternative that is free to them.
There are various reasons why a student would choose to take an AP class. It is not for me to judge that choice, however, I can add my voice to the complaints against the CB who have botched this whole process (not a surprise) and refused to rectify the situation (or even admit there is a problem) in a reasonable manner.
This happened to my daughter today. We waited on hold with college board for over two hours and the person said they could not help us. This happened to numerous people in my daughters class today in Jacksonville Florida and we are very upset and are going to do something about it.
As one of the high schoolers who actually took these exams, I can say that the College Board did not do their best to ensure student success this year. We either had to copy and paste or upload submissions as they didn’t even provide an in-test text box to write directly into, as would’ve been provided in the paper booklet. What this means is that if you didn’t upload or cut paste on time, your answers just disappeared into thin air and a year’s worth of AP work goes down the drain because apparently kids who didn’t submit on time due to non-technical issues cannot retake… when on the paper test you’d just close your book and whatever you had written would still be there and count for some amount of points. This loss of work could’ve been avoided with a textbox that auto submits after time is out…to at least give us a fair chance, but they couldn’t even do that for us! I’m sure I will be retaking one of my test because my screen froze and we were instructed not to reload the page…so I watched my chance to submit dwindle away as time ran out and my screen wouldn’t move. Even after you press submit, you have to reconfirm submission for a second time…while time ticks on!
They told us the test was open book but at the start of the exam we had to type a statement saying that we wouldn’t receive aid… doesn’t reading over notes while testing count as aid?!
And they didn’t, in any way, inform us that certain browsers or browser versions are not compatible with the test! I have friends who finished their questions on time only to be given an error message when they tried to submit because apparently it’s only compatible with Chrome.
I wouldn’t even care about the test if my college didn’t accept the credits but mine does…and to me the AP exam credits are like dollars saved from courses I’ll no longer have to take if my AP score meets the credit transfer requirements.
J.H…..you may want to rethink skipping those intro college classes to save some money. College level course work is different than high school AP work especially in the maths and sciences. If you want to get a history credit out of the way and you aren’t pursuing a degree in history, then go for it! Beware and think it through because sometimes you may think this will save you money and then it could wind up costing you more in the long run due to a bad decision. I feel bad for your situation and how you are getting jerked around by a business. Yes, College Board is a business and they are in the business of selling curriculum and tests aligned to that curriculum without giving any thought of what kids need to succeed in college or life. Just remember, you are worth way more than the number that will be assigned to their test.
“J.H…..you may want to rethink skipping those intro college classes to save some money. ”
Students usually use AP courses to satisfy gened requirements. I think the HS AP math courses are as good as a college course. Why not? In HS, you take the course in a small class, and the teacher answers all your questions, and knows you inside and out, plus often the best teachers are teaching these AP courses. In college, you may be sitting in a huge lecture room with 200 other students, feeling all intimidated, and never ever speaking to the lecturer. (So yes, gened courses at big state universities may not be glamorous enough to satisfy the term “liberal arts education”)
The “some money” is in the thousands (in my daughter’s case, $12K) and they also save time. For example, you can spend your senior year in Paris, studying abroad, taking any course you want since you are done with all the mandatory course work.
The “only” downside of this is that kids may have to work their butts off in high school.
This is a maddening story. I hope there will be a class action lawsuit against the CB.
I just looked at the College Board Facebook page….boy are they taking a hit! Parents and students are pretty steamed and venting. The College Board is posting canned responses.
Online tests don’t allow fir the crash and burn which is common when thousands are using the same site at the same time.
There is nothing more frustrating then trying to submit your work and have it disappear into the ether world, never to be seen again.
Unless you are trying to make contact with God, you are SOL.
(It’s happened to me more than once in this blog.)
This just happened to me today when I took my AP chemistry exam. I’m so stressed now and out of everyone in my class this only happened to me.
In the world of “remote learning” that Gates and all his paid Mini Me minions are trying to foist upon us, this fiasco will become the new moment-by-moment reality in U.S. education. Take this and multiply it by billions.
Eventually the bots will give and take tests, which will make it much easier for everyone.
“Pearsonalized Learning Aids”
When teachers are all gone
The bots will teach the children
Shock them when they’re wrong
Like Dr. Stanley Milgram
“Pearsonal Test-taking Assistant”
When robots take the test
Our problems will be gone
Cuz robots are the best
And never ever wrong
These. Are. Wonderful. Wow, SomeDAM. Really good.
I took 3 AP classes for the purpose of getting college credit. I put myself through tuns of stress for this test just to be unable to even turn in 1 question. Months of hard work down the drain cause of tech errors beyond my control. I don’t know what college board should’ve done during this pandemic, but this, THIS was not it.
Tips from College Board (A Billion Dollar Nonprofit)
Before their AP exams, AP students should be sure to
1) try the damn demo
2) complete the damn checklist
3) confirm their email address
4) locate their e-ticket
5) check in 30 minutes early
6) kiss their test goodbye (cuz chances are better than even that it will vanish without a trace)
7) plan on taking the June test
Troubleshooting tips from College Board
1) make sure your browser is not eating tree branches in your yard
2) panic
3) kiss your test goodbye
The college board acts like a bunch of Nazis. This organization needs to be dibanded.
My students practiced uploading and had no trouble with the demo upload. They used the suggested browser given by the CB CEO at the webinar I attended. Fast forward to the actual test and 7/67 students had problems with the AP Chemistry upload, question 2 especially. Commentary on the AP Chem Teachers FB group indicates problems, especially with Q2, were much more common than CB suggests. It’s so discouraging when you aren’t worried about whether your students have mastered the subject, but are concerned that CB will fix the tech issues. Why not accept time stamped answers for those that had issues?
7/67 ?
That’s 1% right?
“1%, right”
About.
1% – thats the common core math
Glad I still remember some of my grade school math.
2+2=5 if you can give an answer why…..so yeah, most definitely 1% (at least is the justification). it’s all in the crooked wording/word play.
This person obviously drank the College Board Coolaid
When are we going to trust the integrity of the AP instructors of these courses and let them determine whether or not a student should get college credit? These high stakes exams are a blight on development and growth. How does a kid spend a year working hard (those that give diligent and honest effort) in their AP content area for its worth to come down to one test, with a time limit that’s may not work once they’re done?
“When are we going to trust the integrity of the AP instructors of these courses and let them determine whether or not a student should get college credit?”
This would be the best practical solution, imo.
But then the College Board would not get any money for tests.
As Hamlet said, “There’s the rub.”
Or, in this case, “There’s the rob.“
I took AP Literature and Composition the other day at 4AM (FYI: We had to fight for a reasonable time but CB said that all students have to take it at the same time to avoid “cheating”, so that was already a BIG disadvantage for students who don’t live in the states) and College Board said “we did not get a response.” Bonkers.
My son was in the 1% who’s test failed to submit. This is not okay nor is it fair to him. He did literally everything as instructed. Each student is his class who used a school issued iPad had submission failure. How can his score accurately reflect his knowledge three weeks later while those who used personal devices and successfully submitted will be scored on knowledge fresh from class. If this was an error caused by our home technology failure, I would not be upset. He has his test with time stamps and it should be allowed to submit. This is completely unfair and someone needs to advocate for these kids.
I really wish the reliance on the College Board would finally come to an end. I was blocked from taking my AP this year. I was scheduled to take it at a private school campus. They decided to close their campus to outsiders due to Covid. They released my registration because at that time they thought I might have a chance to re-register elsewhere. Then the virus situation worsened in my state and all the school closed. When they College Board announced the online alternative they would not allow me to register unless I registered via a school. I explained that schools were closed and that when we were able to get in contact with anyone no one was willing or able to spend hours calling the CB to register me. Supervisor at the CB was not apologetic or understanding and I was told deadlines are deadlines and it didn’t matter that I had been registered before the deadline or that my testing site was closed due to Covid. I don’t think these parents will have any success with their complaints unfortunately as the CB know that they will continue to collect fees because parents have few options. We are looking into the Classical Learning Test instead of the SAT after our own experience and reading the CB’s response to the online issue.
Along with nursing formulas instead of breastfeeding, the Lie (= nonsense) Detector, the Scholastic Aptitude Test is one of the most prominent “scientistIc” scams to come out of the period between the two Great Wars. Let’s for a moment examine the justification for the test—there is nothing better—and ask ourselves what the “it” is that this damnable thing is measuring. It used to be said that there was no way to prepare for the SAT. By some secret VooDoo known and understood by the psychometricians (Zombies) at the ETS, they were able to devise a bunch of party-game questions or problems. Or convoluted mathematical gobbledegook or how many dots will fit on the back of a horse if it is mated with a spotted leopard type questions that taken together can Devine one’s scholastic aptitude. What is scholastic aptitude? It is the ability to endure a seemingly endless number of years of paralyzing boredom that will earn you a piece of paper that serves nothing it the permission for you to become one of those, replete with a fancy title, to bore the shot out of more people. For some reason, everything in American must be ultra serious, terminally boring, and b basically useless to society to be of any use. Scholastic is an absolute meaning omnibus word to disguise the wads of money and the deceptive marketing behind the SAT. Scholastic in the sense the ETS uses it means an attempt to show how well a given individual will fit into a highly flawed system, not how smart he is, how creative he is, how analytical (a terrible disadvantage for some) but, to put its on its lowest level, how much of a kiss ass, how much of a blind conformist he is. I could use the worn example of Einstein, but the American non-thought has a way of disguising the influence of non-conformists with something to say—it tufmnhim other into a clown: Einstein,Feynman, Franklin. I could go on. But there are, in the end, only two things that can be said in its favor: it saves time of admissions officers who can rely on these bogus scores instead of reading looking at the people and it is a perfect example of why we should not rely on bogus scores derived from a bogus test to determine who should go to Rider and be indoctrinated into a lot of phony ideas about what scholastic is.
Now, tell us how you really feel! Good for you for figuring this out. It’s a shame that so many kids don’t see the absurdity of it, that parents won’t see the reality of it and that school systems push this bunk on students for ratings. IMHO you scored a perfect 5 on the AP exam of College Board and perfect scores on the SAT of College Board fraud. You will do well in college.
This happened to my daughter during the AP chem exam yesterday and 4 other kids from her class. They all had the same issue, the photo from question #2 would not submit. They still have their photos. Instead of accepting the photos due to THEIR error, the only remedy the kids are offered is to retake the test in early June. This is obscene. We have excellent WiFi and she completed her APUSH exam with no issue today.
auston Parker it happened to me..my mom waited on Tuesday for almost 2 hrs and was told I would be given a make-up test ..i should know by 25th
College Board needs to wake the hell up and take some ownership. My son was on his 3rd test and it decided to not accept his answers. A 2% failure rate of their system is not acceptable.
Also you lovely people bashing AP in general. Get over yourselves.
I have investigated this problem further in the following article:
http://eduissues.com/2020/05/16/update-on-ap-exam-uploading-issues
And Meredith Schneider has also posted the following:
https://deutsch29.wordpress.com/2020/05/15/the-college-board-covid-era-ap-exam-another-botch-job/