AP, Advanced Placement, is a set of 33 classes students can take during their High School career. At the end of the year, students take a cumulative exam, which determines the ability to convert the high school course into college credit, which could show college readiness and skip basic level courses when the first college year comes. Since the entire point of the course is to prepare for the exam, many AP courses’ main goal is to prepare students for the exam. However, some teachers continue to assign course-related assignments weeks past the exam date, which doesn’t make sense. What is the point of assignments past the exam date when the exam is the whole point of the course? Why continue learning material if there are no more applications for said material? Debates on both sides argue that reinforcement and school policies still exist and are crucial for class stability; however, the lack of academic benefit and student burnout from preparation could cause the students to fall into a state of nihilism, a state of pointlessness and hopelessness, making all the information taught not be of use whatsoever. Thus, AP teachers should refrain from assigning course-related assignments post AP exam due to the risk of developing a feeling of meaninglessness towards the subject.
With the continued assigning of work even after accomplishing such a massive obstacle, such as the AP exam, burnout and lack of use for the material could develop, leading to meaninglessness for the subject. For example, according to a fellow AP exam taker, Rachel Arkis, featured on The Echo, “but since none of it is spent practicing for the exam, it doesn’t seem worthwhile to me.” This demonstrates the presence of burnout and meaninglessness post AP exam experienced by many AP students. Furthermore, an article written by Russel T Warnes et al in the Journal of Educational Research Volume 108, Issue 5, mentions that statistically, AP courses do not contribute to any academic benefits without the attached exam. This yields questions over the validity of coursework post-exam, since learning the course material without the exam brings little benefit. However, continuing to do coursework could help reinforce some ideas developed from the school year, as stated by Christian Fischer et al in the Journal of Research in Science Teaching Volume 60, Issue 2. This is a valid perspective; however, forcing students to continue doing work when there is no goal will continue to contribute to the established point of meaninglessness, which in the long run will be detrimental.
In the end, post-AP exam course material is nearly pointless. When all your students are completely burnt out from taking a beast of an exam, assigning work for no reason seems extremely evil. Assigning movies or simple tasks is perfectly fine, but continuing the learning after the application of said learning is truly fruitless. Let your students rest.
