This year I’m taking AP Lang, and have only received D’s and C’s on my essays. When I talk to my teacher, she usually only tells me things like “You’re new to this school, you still have to learn the ropes” or “I don’t know what to tell you; each essay is different.” Sometimes she’ll point out specific problems with my essays, but they’re usually really small errors. For example, in one of my essays I said that school should’ teach students more current information like the contents of the constitution." Instead, I should have said “school should teach students more information we currently use, like the contents of the constitution.” My teacher told me that word choice was one of the main reasons she gave me a C-. She also told me that she wanted to give me a D but she was being nice.
I think the real issue is that she grades based on her opinion. She either agrees with your paper and gives you a good grade or dislikes it and gives you a bad grade. We have to read our papers aloud before turning them in, and each time I tell my classmates my grade for my essays they always tell me that I don’t deserve the grade I got. One guy told me that my essay was his favorite, another girl said it gave her goosebumps, and today, another girl said it was phenomenal.
So why does she give me the bad grades that she does? I’ve come to the conclusion that she’s a little biased toward new students, and I honestly think it’s unintentional. I talked to a Senior, who was new Junior year and took the same class, who said she had the same problem. She told me that she felt that our teacher gave her bad grades because she wanted to prove to her that her grades at her old school didn’t mean at much as this one. She said that when she told our teacher she never got anything below an A at her old school, her teacher replied that it was a new school and basically that she wasn’t at the same level as the students who’d already been there (which is basically what my teacher has told me).
Now that I’m aware of the problem, I’m not sure what to do. I’m thinking of going to another AP English teacher, asking them to read my essay and seeing what they have to say, but is that a good idea? Any advice would be really helpful.
Thanks!