Description
Book SynopsisShortchanged is a brilliant book.The Washington Post Author and high school English teacher Annie Abrams reveals how the College Board's emphasis on standardized testing has led the AP program astray. Every year, millions of students take Advanced Placement (AP) exams hoping to score enough points to earn college credit and save on their tuition bill. But are they getting a real college education? The College Board says that AP classes and exams make the AP program more accessible and represent a step forward for educational justice. But the program's commitment to standardized testing no longer reflects its original promise of delivering meaningful college-level curriculum to high school students. In Shortchanged, education scholar Annie Abrams uncovers the political and pedagogical traditions that led to the program's development in the 1950s. In revealing the founders' intentions of aligning liberal arts education across high schools and colleges in ways they believed would protec
Trade ReviewAbrams usefully shakes us out of our complacency about a program that seems good enough only because we expect so little of it.
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Wall Street Journal[Abrams] says the [AP] program hurts students and the values of the liberal arts....The most damning portions of the book are on the present state of AP.
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Inside Higher EdShortchanged is a brilliant book not just because of its content, but because of the way that Abrams grapples with the potential of a humanities....This book is everything we say that the humanities can do. And it's everything that, according to Abrams, the Advanced Placement regime is likely to destroy.
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Washington PostAnnie Abrams's new book, Shortchanged, puts the story of Advanced Placement courses in perspective.It's an important read for anyone contemplating the time honored courses, either from a teacher or student perspective. And it is a reminder that while the name 'College Board' sounds like some sort of quasi-governmental entity overseeing higher education, they are simply a private company with products to market.
—Peter Greene,
ForbesTable of ContentsIntroduction: Collecting Data
Part 1: Validity
1. Rational Reform
2. Common Purposes and Common Standards
3. The Blueprint
Part 2: Accountability
4. Copy Paste Classroom
5. Artificial Intelligence
6. Better Citizens
Conclusion: Opportunity and Transparency
Epilogue: Formative Assessments
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index
