Officially Accepted as an AP Calculus Reader!
This week I got the email informing me I had been invited to participate in this year’s AP Calculus exam reading! I have been teaching AP Calculus for nine years now, and I have been applying to become a reader for about the past four years. A few years ago, I completed the application and almost got accepted, but CollegeBoard realized they didn’t need need me to score. As a thank you for going through the application, they sent me this lunchbox that I’ve been using for my school lunch every day since then. As you can tell, this lunch box has got a lot of use!
Each year since I’ve completed the application, I fill out this very brief survey letting CollegeBoard know of my scoring availability for the year.
I always answer the same; although I would prefer to have the experience of grading in person with other skilled Calculus teachers and professors, I am willing to grade remotely to still gain from the experience and learn more about how exactly free response questions (FRQs) are scored. Ever since I went to training to become an AP Calculus teacher nine years ago, I have heard from nearly every experienced Calculus teacher that going to the AP exam reading is one of the best experiences they have had as a teacher. After the day of grading, they get to mingle with other teachers, discuss math ideas, network, share strategies, and have fun.
Even though grading can be a drag, especially near the end-of-quarter time frame, grading AP FRQ’s is different and doesn’t weigh me down as much. And of course, being able to get training from the source (CollegeBoard) on exactly what they are looking for on the AP exam will help me so much in my teaching. Needless to say, I was very happy to get this email this week!
After accepting the invitation to become an AP reader, I needed to select which exam I would prefer grading (I chose BC) and how many hours per day I could dedicate to scoring exams during that week (each AP reader gets a 1-week time frame to grade). The choices were 5 hours, 6-7 hours, or 8 hours per day. Luckily, this will be at the very end of the school year when the stress of preparing for the AP exams is over, seniors have graduated, and final exams are being given. It’s hard to believe that the AP exam is in just 3.5 months!