I’m going to take AP next year to raise my GPA.

Too bad it’s not true.

Advanced Placement courses provide dedicated students with the opportunity to excel in a subject while the rigorous homework and studying mimics college-level classes and prepares students for the workload. Indeed, it does give students the opportunity for an extra point for one’s grade-point average — if they do the work.

A study of Texas universities showed that AP classes are worth the struggle.

Students tend to have higher four-year graduation rates and there is a strong correlation between high SAT scores and students who take AP.

While they offer many benefits, some argue that these courses are too stressful for high school students, and therefore do not help.

Yes, AP courses are stressful for students, especially those who participate in athletics or clubs, but they’re worth it.
“(AP) puts students in a demanding environment,” Stewart Jacoby, social studies teacher, said. “It is an unreasonable amount to do, but you do it (to pass the exam).”

Some students may not be sure whether to take AP, either because it’s too hard or because their GPA might slip. Now that’s just the problem. Grade point averages have become so important to dedicated students that they may rather take an honors class than an AP one because they’ll receive the same credit for less work. But AP means much more than passing a class.

GPAs are useful because they sum up an entire year’s worth of work into one number and they are always considered when a college looks at an application. But they cause a lot of stress to dedicated students because if their GPA falls just a little, it may be hard to recover it before report cards come out.

And students often come to the conclusion that GPAs represent exactly how much they learned and how intelligent they are in academics, when really it simply shows how well they passed a class. This is the same for all courses, regular through AP.

This isn’t to say GPAs aren’t important, because they are; colleges always look at them to get an idea on how well one did throughout the year. On the other hand, colleges also look at how much one pushed him or herself.

Dedicated students should enroll in AP courses to prepare themselves for the college level work and grow much more than they would in an honors class. GPAs are very important, and students should always aim to improve them.

But the point of school and the point of AP is to teach students how to think. They teach them how to take information and put its puzzle pieces together to support an argument or go against it.

But it is important to note that AP classes can be very difficult and students should not take several of them just to make their transcript look pretty.

Instead, a student should pursue a subject they enjoy and push themselves to learn more about it because there is no real sense in taking an AP class that is not enjoyable.

The irony to that note is that students who do take AP should remember that the class will be moving fast every day and it may get overwhelming. But if students are there for the right reason it’ll be worth the work.

Students should not be afraid to push themselves now in high school by taking AP classes because colleges will see that they challenged themselves to learn more.

This school offers open access AP courses, which means any student should be able to take them without being tested before they are accepted into the class.

“It’s the top course that students should take,” Jacoby said. “And to not take it means you’re going to be that much farther behind in college.”