New AP science courses offered for the 2018-19 year
Juniors Frannie Scherer and Megan Daubenberger examine solutions during a lab in their honors chemistry class. Next year, AP chemistry will be offered as a second-year class for those students interested in a science field.
The Science Department, prompted by the requests of students, made the decision to offer three new AP science courses for the 2018-2019 school year. The new science curriculum will include AP Chemistry, AP Physics I, and AP Seminar: Biomedical Science.
Despite the newness of this addition, the Science Department has had the idea for roughly five years. However, they were never very fond of the AP Curriculum offered for AP Chemistry and AP Physics. This year brought a change to the AP Curriculum, one that they felt was a better fit for the course to be offered at BSM. “We like [the new AP curriculum] a lot better, and we think it fits in more with our practice of teaching science at BSM,” chair of the Science Department, Ms. Lindsey Novak, said.
The push to include the course in BSM curriculum came mostly from students. Students and parents had requested it, especially students that wanted to go into the science field. “Students really interested in going into the sciences wanted a more advanced and rigorous curriculum, an opportunity to take the AP test, and an opportunity to earn college credit,” Novak said.
AP Chemistry is a second year chemistry class, intended for first year college students. On the other hand, AP Physics is a first year class. It is designed to replace the current class of Honors Physics. However, AP Physics goes more in depth on less material. “AP Physics actually covers less breadth of material, but it goes more in depth in a lot of ways,” Novak said.
In terms of enrollment, Novak is not quite sure what to expect. She expects AP Physics to be more popular, solely due to the fact that it is a first year class, while AP Chemistry is a second year class. “It’s a really experimental year…but I really don’t know what the interest is,” Novak said.
Junior Isabel Fleming is glad that BSM decided to offer AP Physics for her senior year. She plans on enrolling in AP Physics for the fall, hoping that it will better prepare her for college. “I want to study engineering in college and having a strong physics background would be important for that,” Fleming said.
Although BSM has never offered these AP science courses before, the Science Department is looking forward to this change. They hope that this change helps better prepare students for college. “We’re excited and curious to see how it goes,” Novak said.
