Fayette County Public Schools plan to remove the cap on how many AP classes each grade level can take. While this decision has benefits, they should also bring back test requirements and teacher recommendations to ensure that students are fit to take more AP classes.

For years, the school system has limited the number for each grade. Freshmen could only take one AP class, sophomores could only take two, juniors could take up to four AP classes, and seniors could take a maximum of six. Next year, this will change.

Dedicated students will benefit from more AP classes with the cap removal in place. AP classes provide many benefits to students because they are more rigorous, which can teach students how to manage their time better and develop good study habits.

In addition, if students are successful on multiple AP exams, they can earn college credit and possibly earn their prospective degree earlier. 

One huge benefit to removing the cap is that students can now spread out the number of AP classes they take each year, instead of cramming them all into their junior and senior years. 

Since AP classes are weighted more, they can bring up grade point averages. If you get an A in an AP class, you get 5 points in your GPA, while a B gets you 4 points. Regular classes would give you 4 GPA points with an A and 3 with a B. 

For most students, this is a good boost in their weighted average. However, for those who plan to apply to competitive schools in the future, this could also lead to increased competition in class ranking, which could impact who gets accepted to Ivy League schools. 

Unfortunately, as we have already seen, students who are not academically motivated may pick up AP classes for an easy A from the test curves, and would most likely flunk the end of the year exam. Too many students taking AP exams they are not prepared for could bring down the school’s test average and therefore ranking.  

In addition, adding more AP classes may result in higher-level fine arts, career-courses, language, or technology classes ceasing to be taught. Less people may take these courses as a result of taking more AP classes to increase their GPA and class ranking. 

You also cannot drop AP classes, so if you choose too many and begin to fail them, there is no going back. In addition, multiple AP exams can get extremely stressful and overwhelming, which could possibly impact the health of students during exam season. 

A solution to these potential issues would be to bring back test requirements and/or essays and teacher recommendations. AP teachers should require test scores on previous exams and teacher recommendations to ensure that the students who sign up for these classes are prepared for the challenge and are academically motivated to study for these exams.

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