Reply to APEX - why are kids dropping out?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Is that right that there is no cohorting in sophomore year for English?  I don't think I realized that.  My impression is that there aren't a lot of requirements for sophomore year, other than take a bunch of APs, so I'm not sure why that would drive kids out (unless they just are feeling turned off by their AP Gov class).

I have heard that they significantly changed the APEX Bio curriculum this year and made it much, much harder than Honors Bio (although on the transcript it is just reflected as Honors Bio).  I don't know if some kids are maybe feeling a little burned by that.  I'm a little curious what the average grades in that class are, and how it compares to the regular "honors" Bio.

They expanded the APEX program a LOT a few years ago -- maybe now they are trying to shrink it through an old-school look-to-your-left-look-to-your-right approach.

[/quote]

The best APEX bio teacher retired a couple years ago. APEX bio has always been harder than standard honors, but this may be a growing pains year if they are trying to teach to a test that is a month earlier than end of semester.[/quote]

Has anyone mentioned this to the APEX coordinators and/or the Science department?  Sounds like a problem.

I don’t think it has to do with the state test as my understanding is the issue is unique to apex bio, not the other bio classes.  
I’m very curious whether the drop out rate is higher than this year because of the bio issue.  After seeing the post above, I asked my kid and they confirmed that they know many people dropping solely because of bio — that the tests cover material they haven’t been taught and most of the kids are saying it is by far their hardest class, harder than the APs they are taking.  This includes some kids I know are very brigjt (we’re in the test-in CES program or the magnet middle schools).  Given how easy the MS science classes are, I don’t think the kids were adequately prepared for what sounds like an almost AP level class.  [/quote][/quote]

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