I shouldn’t be almost getting a 4 on AP Physics C for only getting 19/35 right on the multiple choice and 12/45 points on the free response. I remember last year as a senior when we did a practice test and that’s what I got. I did not study at all and I came in with like 3 hours of sleep and took it with a defeatist attitude and I still ended up getting a high 3. On the actual exam, I got a 4, and I still left more than half of the free response blank because I didn’t know anything about rotation (didn’t pay attention that unit and never bothered to learn). What is this garbage policy that if you get roughly 5/9 of the points, you get a 5, ~45% you get a 4, and 35% you still likely get a 3? These are all failing grades.
80% should be a 5
70% should be a 4
60% should be a 3
At least. “But they’re so hard.” Yeah? Well that’s the point. You shouldn’t be getting college credit for a course when you don’t actually know the material well. This is why many universities are becoming more and more hesitant to take AP credit.
That’s some serious crap right there - the fact that someone can come in and leave more than half of the free response blank and still get a 4, possibly even a 5.
AP exam grades aren’t by how much material you know, it’s by how much material you know compared to your peers. The top 20% get a 5, 21%-40 a 4 and so on. The College Board doesn’t expect you to memorize every detail, but they want you to be proficient if you’re getting a top score. So if you got a 4 that means you have more knowledge than at leat 60% of the people who took the test. Maybe you didn’t leave as many as you think blank. Maybe you’re better ay physics than you think. It’s not bs. In college a lot of the time the curve can be what saves people’s grades. Even people majoring in physics might not know all the details. The exams are graded on a curve like college exams may be. I would bet less than 10%, maybe even 5% would end up getting 5’s if the exams are graded how you insist they should be.
It’s college level material for high schoolers. I am sure they have the system pretty well worked out after fifty years give or take. For a different perspective, my foreign husband said when he was in high school, it was very rare for anyone to ever score 90% or above on a test. A really good grade was anything above 80, and students were happy with 70s. He thinks our kids have it easy at high school. If the material on AP tests was easier, what would the point be? It’s supposed to be difficult, and not only that, literally a few students on any given test will attain a perfect score. I am talking single-digits, and when it happens, it makes headlines. The tests are fair.
The tests have to be hard enough to be able to distinguish the top students(5) and the next level (4) etc. If the test is too easy it is impossible to see who the top students really are. When my oldest started college he asked his advisor about whether he should take Calc 1 over even though he got a 5 on the exam. His thinking was the same as yours. He thought that since the % he was getting on the practice exams was low he should retake it. His advisor told him that the school’s experience was that students who get a 5 on the exam are well prepared for Calc 2.
The way this problem with a 3 not meaning what the AP claims is taken care of by university policies at most schools.
If you get a 3 on AP Physics C and are going into engineering, physics or a major that requires calculus based physics as a pre-requisite you should absolutely, positively, repeat that class. You’ll find many colleges tell you the same thing. In fact, you’ll find you are forced to do so. Some schools will simply not give credit for a 3-- no matter what the AP leads you to believe.
Other schools will give credit for a 3-- but perhaps not in the way you think. For example, the state of Illinois mandated that state universities always give some amount of college credit for 3-5 on AP tests.
But the way the U of I gets around the problem caused by being required to give some kind of credit for students who earn a 3 while knowing that a 3 on the AP Phys C is NOT enough to prepare you for follow on courses is they give that student credit for algebra/trig based physics (AP Phys 1). That means that to graduate in engineering, a student who got a 3 on the test is forced to retake calculus based physics. For all practical purposes, the AP Physics credit with a score of 3 is then in name only-- it does nothing toward graduation.
For what it’s worth: I would tend to advise students who got a 4 on the AP Physics C test to strongly consider retaking that section. But I don’t really have much data to back that opinion up. To test whether my opinion is valid I would need more data on who kids who got a 4 did when they skip retaking, but my sense is a 4 is the equivalent of a C or lower in the course if you take it at University. A good student may be able to overcome the fact that they are moving into a course with their understanding of the prerequisite at the “C” or lower level, but it’s dicey.
*The top 20% get a 5, 21%-40 a 4 and so on. *
No. The tests are intended as a competency tests. Only 4.6% students taking the AP Physics 1 test get a 5. The percent getting 5 down to 1 is:
FWIW, I almost always advise students to never retake an AP test. Since the exams are only offered once a year, it’s a lot of material to review, particularly if the student is planning on other AP tests. Additionally, since 85%+ of Physics C students are seniors, retaking is not an option for the vast majority of students.
I wouldn’t recommend retaking the AP test itself for the reasons you state. I mean if the class is a pre-requisite for follow on courses, they should retake the course when they get to university even if the school will give them credit for the course. Otherwise, they are at serious risk of doing quite poorly in the followon courses because, at best, their level of preparation is C. I don’t mean C+.