<p>This film brings an important perspective to the demands placed on students in U.S. schools and the toll it can take.</p>
<p>I’m sorry, but that movie was kinda stupid. There was one instance where the mom was like “my son’s 3rd grade math is so hard that i can’t even do it”. Like honestly, what math do they give in 3rd grade that parents can’t even do? And lol, some of the complaints that were made i’m just like “this is my normal high school life, grow a pair and man up”</p>
<p>Did PBS give airtime to “Waiting for Superman?”</p>
<p>Haven’t seen the movie, and I may try to check it out (when does it air?). But I did read some detailed reviews and commentary on it some time ago, and if I recall, my feeling about it at the time was, this is what happens when too many people aren’t willing to be honest with themselves. Because some students are super-stressed by taking X number of APs doesn’t mean that it’s a bad thing to offer them. The problem arises when the merely good students (or their parents) feel they somehow should be able to keep up with the great ones and stress themselves out trying to do so. To then complain that it’s harmful to offer all of these opportunities because some kids cannot do them all is completely missing the point.</p>
<p>My kids can’t keep up with super athletes, but that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be top level athletic training and competitions available to those who qualify. If my kid decides to enter a top level race, knowing full well that the other kids are faster and then has a heart attack trying to race with the best, whose fault is that, really? Shall we put weights on the kids who run faster so no one feels bad that they can’t do as well? Or just cancel those races?</p>
<p>I think the AP classes are pretty good. Of course, that doesn’t mean they couldn’t be better. I think some should up the rigor to be more comparable to a real college class. And I am unhappy that ours are not more writing-intensive–though that’s a teaching decision made at the school and teacher level, and I think some schools do manage to incorporate much more writing. (I think it’s partly because of the 8 block schedule our school runs on. In a school where kids take only 6 or 7 classes, students will have more time for big writing projects, and teachers have fewer students overall and can give more attention to them). Overall, my daughter was quite relieved to get into mostly AP classes, and she felt they were better than the other classes she’d been taking. So bashing AP as being somehow a bad class doesn’t make sense to me. Our school is an above average large public school and if they aren’t doing better-than-AP in their non-AP classes, why would we expect most typical schools to do so if we eliminated AP?</p>
<p>This must be on your local PBS station, it is not on here in LA. Maybe at a later date.</p>
<p>This film should be required viewing for HS kids and parents. While it is not a perfect documentary, it is hardly “stupid,” as a poster above suggests, nor is High School today “normal.” The film shows dysfunctions caused by homework loads and the distorted quest for elite schools that simply were not there in earlier generations. It shows specific problems that have increased such as depression, sleep issues, suicide. It makes reflective and common sense suggestions, such as asking teachers to experiment with less homework, or for students to limit APs to subjects that actually interest them. Race to Nowhere starts discussions that should be happening between teachers, parents, and students. My favorite line is a student quoted after taking the French AP exam, “now I never have to speak French again.” That summarizes what education has become for many kids today, a mad race to a finish line that never appears, being miserable all the way, no love of learning or developing true interests or curiosity.</p>
<p>I haven’t seen the film, just the trailer, but it seems really out of touch. Most high schoolers don’t take AP classes, participate in extracurriculars (outside of maybe a part-time job), or do 6 hours of homework a day. I took 4+ AP classes my junior and senior years and didn’t do 6 hours of homework a day. The problems described in the film only apply to a subset of students at a subset of schools. Which is fine, but the way things were portrayed, it seemed as if it was a national issue, which it is not.</p>
<p>"My favorite line is a student quoted after taking the French AP exam, “now I never have to speak French again.” That summarizes what education has become for many kids today, a mad race to a finish line that never appears, being miserable all the way, no love of learning or developing true interests or curiosity. " If the kid hates French they shouldn’t have taken AP French. It’s that simple. If they think that jeopardizes their chances of getting in to elite college X, well, that may or may not be true, probably not, and again, they should just be honest with themselves and say, if elite college X is looking for kids who love French enough to take AP French, then maybe I should accept that I am not the kind of scholar that elite college X is looking for. I’ll do great at wonderful U if elite college X turns their nose up at me because of this. </p>
<p>It IS possible to opt out of the race. Students CAN choose lighter course loads and fewer ECs and still go to fine colleges and become productive members of society. The pressure is self-inflicted; just because everyone else is doing it, doesn’t mean your child has to. I agree with @snarlatron that it is “the distorted quest for elite schools” that fuels the madness. If students/parents would stop chasing perceived prestige and finding validation in a college name, I believe all of this would stop.</p>
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This is absolutely true. It is possible, though, that an AP class can destroy one’s interest in a subject that might have been nurtured if taught differently and without the rat race element.
I see a chain of wrong-thinking that is driving many kids into unhappy high school obsessions. They think that a successful life is measured in dollars, that the best way to that is an elite school, and that the best way to that is a mercenary and careerist approach in high school. Grades and prestige of college become more important than happiness, health, friends, family, and interests. Self-discovery and learning for its own sake are eclipsed. This sets up a life and world view that continues into the chase for grad school, career, promotions.</p>
<p>^^^THIS. When we stop pursuing the life of the mind for its own sake, we are lost.</p>
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<p>I have let my youngest child, a 16-year-old junior, take that route, and it is working well. She is a “good” jazz pianist, a “good” runner, and a “good” student. Not “excellent” at anything, but well-rounded and happy. I occasionally slip up and say something like, “Didn’t your coach say you were supposed to run this weekend?” but those comments are few and far between. The other day, she actually THANKED me for not nagging her constantly! She said she has several friends whose parents ride them constantly, check their grades daily, etc. Blech!</p>
<p>I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I probably will this year because the PTSA is showing it soon. Last year and this year they’ve held meetings looking for possible solutions to how time-consuming homework is and how stressed the students are. </p>
<p>Actually, compared to a lot of what I see here on CC, I think the local (highly-ranked) HS is already doing a fairly good job. Most kids take 6 classes rather than the 8 I see on CC schedule comparison threads. Minuses and pluses don’t affect GPA, and I think that takes a lot of pressure off compared to reporting 100% based grades or counting an A- as a 3.7. AP classes don’t give summer homework and still have higher pass rates than nationwide averages. There is an school-wide study hall two days a week with longer class periods and only 3 classes on those days. Teachers are supposed to give a small number of “turn my homework in a day late” passes per semester. There are support groups for stressed kids and kids having trouble in various subjects. Most club activity is at lunch, and a lot of them are non-academic sounding.</p>
<p>I think one problem we have here is that the district got rid of the honors tier for classes where an AP exists. For example, for 10th grade World History, you can take “college prep” (CP) World History or AP World History, but there is no more Honors World History. So, kids have the choice of the huge amount of work in APWH as 10th graders or the unweighted college prep class where the teachers have mostly given up expecting kids to do any homework.</p>
<p>Kids who took CP classes a previous year and want to move up have to move to an AP class. That’s a <em>big</em> jump. Kids who are reasonably bright but don’t really need or belong in a “college” class yet don’t have much of an option, because they really don’t like the environment in CP classes and don’t want to take the GPA hit. I think there needs to be more appropriate supports for kids in the middle or upper-middle. </p>
<p>My DS17 is actually doing the less-common option of taking World History at the local community college in the evening. The course seems to be less work overall than the AP, but the fewer papers are longer and seem to be on more interesting topics. I think he will still enjoy history after this class, and I’m not so sure his classmates taking the AP version will. (He’s still taking 2-3 other APs this year, but they are in subjects relevant to his STEM interests.)</p>
<p>“just because everyone else is doing it,” except that everyone else is not. I think it’s part of the package of lies these kids (and their parents) tell themselves, that they must push themselves to their physical and emotional limits doing things they hate because “everyone else does”. </p>
<p>I’m surprised that people seem to have missed the overall message of the film, which isn’t only about homework or AP overload, but about the trend toward racking up courses that don’t add any meaningful value to the student’s life or education. It’s not that Sarah took 12 AP courses and now she’s burned out, it’s that Sarah took those AP courses, got all 5s and still wasn’t prepared for college level critical thinking. It has been a few years since I’ve seen the movie, but I recall that the UC system had to add more remedial courses on its campuses because so many of these AP-taking top students were not ready for college work. </p>
<p>And it’s not just California that has this trouble. Many of us here have seen posts by students who are taking multiple honors and AP courses, yet cannot string together an English sentence or recognize the difference between formal and informal writing. Our educational system has gone towards fast and shallow achievement rather than slow and deep learning, and that is a problem.</p>
<p>Simply taking an AP class doesn’t mean that much. If you look at the statistics on the AP test scores, a large fraction of the kids taking the classes are flunking the AP exams. The bar isn’t that high on many of these exams (perhaps in the 60-80% range to score a 5) so either a lot of AP teachers are incompetent, or a lot of kids had no business being in the AP class to begin with. I suspect it’s more the latter as high schools seem to feel pressure to increase AP enrollment. </p>
<p>And it’s true that the AP courses aren’t generally equivalent to a good college course. In my opinion, they should try to make them more rigorous, but that would prompt even more of the outcry described in this movie. Regarding your specific comment about writing, one issue I see with the non-STEM AP classes is the lack of emphasis on significant writing assignments other than the specific type of short essays required on the tests. After all, that’s not being tested. I feel the college board should require completion of major papers equivalent to what a student would do in a good college course in order to certify the curriculum as AP.</p>
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<p>Ummm, Berkeley remedial course enrollment is down by a lot compared to a few decades ago, presumably due to higher admissions selectivity. A few decades ago, a majority of entering frosh needed to take remedial English composition courses; now, the number is under 10%. I would not be surprised if something similar applied to most other UCs, which have gotten more selective over the decades.</p>
<p>Or were you referring to high remedial enrollment at the less selective CSUs?</p>
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<p>Of course, many high school AP courses are of low quality, even by AP test standards. <a href=“http://www.houstonisd.org/site/handlers/filedownload.ashx?moduleinstanceid=73138&dataid=92561&FileName=2013%20AP_final.pdf”>http://www.houstonisd.org/site/handlers/filedownload.ashx?moduleinstanceid=73138&dataid=92561&FileName=2013%20AP_final.pdf</a> figure 5b shows that, for many AP courses at the school district in question, students earning A grades in the AP courses most common score 1 on the AP tests.</p>
<p>I hear our teachers and counselors here parrot the line that the College Board has done studies that show there are benefits from taking an AP class even if you don’t get a passing score over taking a less rigorous course. I looked briefly for those studies, but found this, which is more recent than those studies:</p>
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<p>But, there is still a big push to get kids who will get marginal scores into AP classes and to tell them that a score of 3 is “passing” which is not true at many colleges. And, no matter what Trevor Packer says, the College Board has a financial incentive to have as many kids as possible take AP tests.</p>
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<p>That is not exactly a surprise. A student who merely takes an AP course but does not learn the material to AP test standards (whether for student or school reasons) has not shown the ability to succeed in AP-level material.</p>
<p>(Of course, the proliferation of “AP lite” courses like human geography has diluted the meaningfulness of the AP label as an indicator of an advanced level course in high school that may cover college frosh level material.)</p>
<p>Yes, and the AP lite courses have a very high combined rate of 1s and 2s:</p>
<p>AP Environ Science: 51.8% fail
AP US Gov: 48.4% fail
AP Human Geog: 47% fail</p>
<p>AP World History is 51.1% failure, which is usually blamed on it being mainly taken by 10th graders.</p>