Blog 5

College Board, the site that many teenagers use for facts about colleges, is nothing more than a money hungry monopoly organization. I will admit College Board can be helpful in giving ball park estimates of admissions statistics for colleges, however the money they charge people for SATs and AP tests is ridiculous. The cost to take the SAT is about $50 while the cost to take the AP exam is about $100. It is unbelievable to me that a test that almost all colleges require costs less than a test that most elite colleges don’t even give credit for. Not to mention the fact that teachers pressure kids into taking the AP exam for that class. So teachers are not exactly off the hook as far as pressure on students goes. Some students may not want to take the exam because their college does not give credit for it or because they simply cannot afford to take it. Either way teachers should not make kids feel guilty about not taking an exam that they do not want to take in the first place. Perhaps if College Board lowered the price of the AP test more students would want to take it. However that is pretty unlikely to happen given that a major way that the site can stay in business and make money if off of students paying insanely high prices for difficult tests. I feel that as long as the SAT test remains as important to colleges as it presently does, kids will not stop signing up for them. However, because of the price and dropping of importance of the AP tests to colleges, more and more students will choose to not take the exam which will eventually cause College Board to lose money and business. Students at Sharon High School generally do well on the AP exams. However, just because they do well on them doesn’t necessarily mean that they want to or should feel obligated to take them.