Break out the popcorn-- it’s movie time in Advanced Placement classes around the city!

It’s common knowledge that after the AP tests, which take place in early May, AP classes become a total joke. At LaGuardia, stories are passed down about the dumbest, most irrelevant movies teachers have shown for the last month of school, or which AP teachers expect you to actually show up in class after the test. It would be a lie to say that some part of me does not enjoy this payoff for hard work, but I do think it reflects directly on the test-prep culture that we all have entered. Though APs are test-prep courses by nature, I've learned information and study skills that will be useful for life. And unlike most standardized tests and the SATs, I find the AP tests to be measures of real learning and understanding, not of a student's ability to test well. Learning how to write essays or speak Spanish for the AP test are skills that I will need, and use, forever. But in these last few weeks of school, when all teaching and learning in AP classes ends abruptly, I wonder if my teachers feel the same way. If the AP skills are life skills, why do teachers stop teaching the day after the test?

It seems to me that when the focus of a year is a test, teachers do not push themselves to go beyond. A month of school is a lot of time to waste just because “we took the test.” We could still be learning: The AP Composition test is over, but I have hundreds of essays left to write in my life, not to mention the other ways I will to need to organize and present my thoughts. There are hundreds of good books left to read and analyze, and hundreds of countries I plan to visit where I will need my Spanish skills.

I think the time after the test should be prized teaching time. To me, it seems like every good teacher’s dream: with no test at the end, teachers can teach whatever they want , however they want, and at whatever pace the students need.

Students and teachers complain a lot about the limits of standardized testing, but why don't we take advantage of the freedom that comes once the big test is over? I would encourage AP teachers and students alike to take advantage of this time of looseness to teach and learn in new, interesting and creative ways. It's a luxury we can't afford to squander.