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Brown Deer Middle/High School administrators want to change Advanced Placement classes to a double-blocked schedule, so that these classes would meet every day for approximately 90 minutes, instead of every other day, during first semester.
BDSA representatives attended the March 7th School Board Teaching and Learning Committee meeting to discuss the 2017-18 master schedule. Our updates include:
It is our understanding that the teachers of three Advanced Placement classes (AP Macroeconomics/US Government and Politics, AP Calculus, and AP Chemistry) do not have enough time to cover the increasing amounts of material that the College Board requires for AP classes each year. Other AP teachers feel that this much extra time would be superfluous, or they would accept the modified schedule and additional time but do not believe it is necessary for their classes.
We agree that many classes at Brown Deer could benefit from having more time, especially those that require lab time (such as AP Chemistry) or have a notable excess of material (such as AP US History). However, we don’t think that this much extra time is necessary, especially for all AP classes, nor is this approach the best solution. However, school administration has proved reluctant to negotiate about this change, despite continual, strong feedback from students, teachers, and parents.
The biggest concern that teachers, parents, and students have with this schedule change is that by increasing the load of AP classes on student schedules, it will become nearly impossible for students to take more than one AP class per year and still fulfill core class requirements while also taking classes in other fields, such as fine arts, music, theatre, engineering, and foreign language.
This change would place stress on student schedules, encouraging or forcing many students to either take less AP classes, take less elective classes, or both.
With this schedule change, students would necessarily have to choose between taking Advanced Placement classes and exploring their passions and diversifying their knowledge through Brown Deer’s wide selection of electives.
While this change could potentially increase AP test scores, we believe that for students who are already performing at an AP level, it is far more beneficial to college admissions, lifelong learning, and their future careers for these students to be well rounded rather than to have what may amount to a one-point or less average increase in a few AP scores.
Administrators advertise this change as one which will benefit students through their college admissions process by improving their grades and AP scores. It is our belief that implementing this change as a perceived service to students would indicate a fundamental misunderstanding of selective and holistic admissions processes.
Selective and highly-selective colleges and universities, such as those to which many AP students intend to apply, use a holistic selection process. For an selection process based on, for example, GPA, and test scores, such a change may pose a minimal benefit, but a holistic process is one which, in short, evaluates the whole student rather than just their scores and performance.
At these institutions, admissions officers will be looking for students who have led meaningful high school careers, students who have demonstrated that they have explored and applied their passions throughout their education.
With this change, students will not be able to explore these passions while also maintaining the rigorous course load that these highly selective schools demand.
Schedule crowding would, of course, affect teachers just as it would students. Consider, for example, the schedule of Mr. Cywinski:
| Black | Gold | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | AP Econ/Gov | prep |
| 2 | US Government | AP Econ/Gov |
| 5 | prep | Economics |
| 6 | Economics | prep |
With two double-blocked AP classes, his schedule would likely be too full to manage.
| Black | Gold | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | AP Econ/Gov | |
| 2 | AP Econ/Gov | |
| 5 | US Government | Economics |
| 6 | Economics | prep |
Most AP teachers would be affected in this way. For more examples, refer to our Case Studies.
In short, most AP teachers are not reasonably able to take on these extra instruction periods without dropping other classes, and it could prove difficult to absorb the resulting shock of adding these extra periods into these departments without needing to hire more faculty.
Further, many teachers would be affected by the decrease in emphasis on electives such as fine arts, music, and theatre that would occur as a result of this change, as shrinking these programs decreases the stability of many of their jobs. As students, we care deeply about our teachers and their passion for their students and their subject, and we want to see them leading full, engaged classes of passionate learners.
We firmly believe these changes would be disastrous to students and teachers of Brown Deer.
View more examples of how this change would affect student and teacher schedules.