Coming into my freshman year with almost 70 Advanced Placement units, I had high hopes of graduating in three years.
Then I discovered I had sophomore standing and that the units only helped me pass out of one class. I had received mostly unassigned units that were absolutely useless, because AP units do not count toward General Education requirements.
The University of California should revise this policy and allow students to fulfill a handful of their GEs with AP scores and units. Doing so will allow students to pass out of required classes that cover topics in which they are already knowledgeable. This will also help open up impacted classes to students who really need to take them.
During the GE reform of 1998-2001, which established the current GE requirements, departmental faculty evaluated the typical AP courses offered, according to Judith Smith, dean and vice provost for undergraduate education. Faculty determined that AP courses gave students basic skills found in university requirements, such as Writing I and Quantitative Reasoning, but did not provide the understanding and background knowledge that GE classes do.
Because some AP courses can help students complete major requirements, it seems contradictory to not let AP coursework count toward GE requirements as well.
For example, students who receive a score of 4 in AP Calculus BC are allowed to move into Math 31B, a course higher in the 31 series.
Having received a 5 on the AP Statistics exam last year, I passed out of Statistics 10 for my major, yet still must take a physical science GE ““ even though Statistics 10 fulfills that very requirement.
Further, AP classes were designed to introduce high school students to college-level work. They essentially can be equivalent to GE courses, especially now that AP classes are now focusing more on analysis and experiments rather than memorization of facts and definitions.
Allowing students to pass out of GE requirements using AP credit would help them avoid duplicating their studies. If I took AP U.S. History in high school, I shouldn’t have to take Introduction to American Politics for a GE requirement.
To ensure that students swap in rigorous AP classes, UCLA should only count as GEs those AP classes in which students achieved a score of 4 or 5. High scores on these tests demonstrate that students truly interacted with the course material.
This doesn’t mean UCLA should allow AP classes to completely replace GE requirements. Students with AP credit should still be required to meet at least half of the GE requirements in fields not covered by AP to prepare for higher-level coursework. UCLA could easily find a balance between giving and not giving credit for certain classes.
If this policy were implemented, freshmen and sophomores who currently have a hard time enrolling in courses such as Statistics 10 and History 1B would find it less difficult to do so, because there will be decreased demand for such courses. Allowing AP units to count toward GE credit could also help reduce class sizes.
Additionally, some students would be able to move through classes more efficiently, allowing them to graduate early or to free up their schedule for double majoring, minoring or studying abroad.
To me, sophomore standing really means nothing if I won’t be able to graduate in three years.