My school recently added AP Capstone to our curriculum, and the class is terribly ran. Our teacher doesn’t know what she’s teaching and is unable to help us with anything. Whenever we ask her a question she just tells us to search it up online. We started working on our IRRs for Performance Task 1 halfway through March, and we only had a week to work on and complete it, and then we had a week to do TMPs, and now we have a week to start and finish our IWAs and next week to prepare and finish our individual presentations. Is this the normal pace of AP Capstone?
From my understanding we need around 25 sources for our IWAs, and at least 80% of those should be research papers. I doubt anyone could read through 20 research papers, summarize them, and then write a well-organized 2000 word essay using them in a week. Can someone who’s taken AP Capstone Seminar and scored high (preferably a 5) enlighten me on this subject please? Thanks!
@bopper We’ve talked to the guidance counselor about this already, and there wasn’t really anything she could do about it. We’re all signed up for the AP test and we’ve gotten some stuff done already. We can’t get a replacement teacher at this time either. We will be getting a new teacher for AP Capstone next year though, but I don’t know how that would go.
We’ve switched teachers twice for Capstone already. The first time we had it, the teacher was too strict and didn’t teach the necessary content, but almost everyone was able to get a 3, and a few got 4’s. This year the teacher is too loose and doesn’t really teach or know what to teach, and now we’re cramming everything into the last month.
Yea, it is tough being in the first class of something…It appears to me that the AP people are trying to have the equivelent of the IB Diploma but aren’t quite there yet.
I would to up the chain…maybe try VP or Principal…I would also say that my grades should not be impacted because of this teacher…I don’t know about AP scores though.
@bopper I’m just curious. Go up the chain to say what and to ask for what? The OP has given no indication as to what remedy is sought. It’s April 8th. All internal assessments must be complete by 5/2, and the external exam is 5/7. Those deadlines are set in stone. Although we are hearing just one side of the story, I would agree that the IWA should have been started 2 months ago (which would have been the time for the OP and classmates to have raised the issue). At this point, it is what it is. I suppose the OP could complain about a potential impact on the HS grade (an issue few administrators want to get involved in), but the AP score will almost certainly be impacted with no remedy available, except not taking the test.
I believe I’ve used the phrase “blatant rip-off” in the past.
@skieurope We were not given any information about the AP test, so no one in the class even knew the IWA existed. If we knew how far behind schedule we were, we definitely would’ve done something then.
We spent the whole first semester going over checking the credibility of sources and the various techniques for finding credible research sources. We were going to do a mock IRR first semester, but we never finished it.
In January and part of February, we went over the content on the external AP exam and did a practice test for it. No one was able to finish on time and we weren’t really given any feedback whatsoever. Towards the end of February, we started working on our IRRs, which was due in mid-March, along with our TMP presentations. However, not many people took this seriously since we had almost a whole month to work on the IRRs, so very few people were finished when the due date came, so we started pushing the deadline further and further back.
We only found out how far behind we were when we asked the seniors for help on our TMPs, and they told us they had finished their IRRs and TMPs first semester and had all of second semester to work on their IWAs.
I have emailed the teacher about this, and she’s pushing the IWA deadline to May 1st (the day before the actual CollegeBoard deadline). I’m hoping I could pull it together during Spring Break and finish my IWA and individual presentation by then.
File that one away under “Lessons Learned.” The good news is that you are a junior, so for next year (and in college) you would be well-advised to do research in advance.Yes, AP Capstone is new, but it is not brand-spanking new. Google is a marvelous resource; the CB offers sample syllabi, some of which have timing benchmarks. So not to beat a dead horse, but some advance planning might have helped you out. I’d suggest doing some due diligence on AP Research in advance of August. There should be no expectation that you will always have competent teachers or teachers who spoon-feed. The same can be said for later with professors and bosses. So you are the one who needs to take the reins. Good luck.
This is a great series of classes over two years that like changed by sons perspectives. His school introduced it like 3 - 4 years ago. It is very self taught with very little guidance but is set up that way by the AP board. The information is up on the links.
Your school has to follow the schedule. If they didn’t do this then talk to your principal or ask the AP board. I assume you had the time but maybe certain kids didn’t take advantage of their time in the library etc.
My sons first year at Michigan the English writing course was a breeze, he learned research techniques that he initially learned in AP research and put on a conference yesterday at college that had to do with his AP research paper. He even thanked his AP research teacher in his closing remarks that were video taped and will be sent to her later this week.
It’s the old" you get out what you put in ".
He wasn’t able to use any of the AP credits for these classes as not all colleges take them, but what he got out of the classes were almost life changing for him. Maybe a little over dramatic but it was. It’s amazing what a good teacher can do.
The research part for next year is almost all self driven but totally worth the effort.
@skieurope Well, it might not help this year, but at least they will know for next year.
If my child is complaining about not having enough work/time for work at school, I surely will make sure the administration knows.
One time my daughter was in a combined Ab Initio/Intermediate German class. She was given an easy work sheet, and then finished in 5 minutes and then had nothing to do for the rest of the period while the teacher taught the Intermediates. She complained to me and you bet I talked to the Principal and shortly another teacher was assigned.
My other daughter had a prof who was not grading anything in any kind of timely manner…she talked to the prof but nothing changed…she then went to the dept head where at least they knew how this professor was operating ( I think she was an adjunct) so they could either coach her or not renew her contract.
Oh, 1 more question for people who’ve taken/had experience with AP Capstone: Generally how many sources do you need for the IWA to score high? I asked my teacher and she said 10-15 is how much you should have, but the perfect scoring sample IWA she showed us had 26 sources.
10 is probably on the low side, but really, it’s quality over quantity. Also, look at the grading rubric. “Selecting the evidence” is but one of many components in the scoring. Don’t lose sight of the forest for the trees.
I just rechecked the CollegeBoard guidelines for the IWA and IMP part of the Capstone Seminar AP test, and it says “teachers must ensure that students will have at least 30 school days to complete this project upon distribution of the stimulus materials. Students must be given at least 30 school days to complete their research, compose their essays, and develop their presentations. Student presentations must be scheduled after the 30-day window.”
My stimulus materials packet is dated March 1st, so I’m going to assume we got them the Monday of that week, so February 25th. We have our AP Capstone class 3 times per week, and we had a week-long break since we got the material. That means we only had 24 school days to work on our IWA/IMP. We’re on Spring Break right now and we’re doing our IMP presentations the day we get back, so we won’t have any more school days to work on this. The deadline for IWA/IMP submissions to CollegeBoard is May 2nd, so we can’t push the presentations back without missing the deadline.
I don’t think I’ll have the time to finish my IWA/IMP before my presentation unless I stay up past midnight for the next 3 days, and I still have other things to do (Boy Scout merit badge prerequisites, SAT Chemistry study, etc), so this is impractical.
Should I inform CollegeBoard about this? It’s unfair for my class to be given only about 2/3rd the minimum number of days to work on this, and our teacher’s been very impatient and unhelpful during the process. What does CollegeBoard usually do in situations like these?
P.S. When our teacher showed us sample IMP presentations on her CollegeBoard account, it had a scoring test on the side of the video (where it tells her if she scored the student correctly or incorrectly), and it said 56% finished at the top, and I’m guessing that’s indicating that she hasn’t even completed the AP Capstone Seminar teacher training.
Update: I was able to finish my stuff, and I think I’ll be able to make the deadline. It’s not the best quality, but at least it’s done. Also, turns out we did meet the minimum days requirement since college-board’s definition of a school day is 1 hour of class time, so each of our school days counted as 2 college board school days.
Good. Your school has to follow the rules. Glad you figured it out. If you have one more look at it and make some adjustment… Make it great. Anyone can do "just ok " work.