The entire problem seems to be that the College Board (and ACT and SAT) took an initial design that works fine in a proctored classroom and applied it to a global testing scenario where it doesn't fit.
> If I were to design these assessments, I'd have it be an untimed, synthesis-based assessment...
Yes, but that takes more resources and has more variability among reviewers. It does have the advantages of being more fair for students with time zone issues or closures, and of being durable in the face of temporary website issues. Judging by their decisions, the priorities of the testing agencies seem to have been taking out the cost of the human element of reviewers (multiple choice is easy to grade, synthesis essays need expert reviewers) and the variability of the tests and reviewers to certify their results for schools.
Normal AP tests are half multiple choice and half "free response." What "free response" means depends heavily on the test, but they are always human-graded. This year, the tests are free-response only.
Human graded is a generous way of describing what they do with free response. When I took ap tests a large part of the preparation was knowing exactly how they where going to grade the questions, and optimising answers to hit as many points on the answer key.
Yeah, "free-response" is only true if you're unprepared.
A significant part of taking AP English when I went through was the teacher saying: "Okay, here is the question. Now, what are the likely literature references the AP reader expects you to use? Okay, what are the likely scoring points the AP reader has on their worksheet? Okay, now write to those. Writing anything else is a waste of time."
You could count the number of students out of her class who didn't score a 5 on a single hand.
Wow, none of my AP teachers back in '97 offered anything close to this advice. I wonder if that was normal for the time, or if I just experienced the low end of the variance of preparation.
> If I were to design these assessments, I'd have it be an untimed, synthesis-based assessment...
Yes, but that takes more resources and has more variability among reviewers. It does have the advantages of being more fair for students with time zone issues or closures, and of being durable in the face of temporary website issues. Judging by their decisions, the priorities of the testing agencies seem to have been taking out the cost of the human element of reviewers (multiple choice is easy to grade, synthesis essays need expert reviewers) and the variability of the tests and reviewers to certify their results for schools.