Update on 2020 AP Exams in Progress COVID-19 Series
The Princeton Review
Hi, everyone.
I’m Rob Franek, Editor-in-Chief at The Princeton Review, and I’m here today to talk to you
about a topic that is on so many students’ minds right now—AP exams!
Those started on Monday, May 11th, and so far, lots of students have taken this year’s
at-home, open-book AP exams—if you’re one of those students, kudos to you!
In some cases, students encountered technical difficulties along the way.
Leave a comment and let us know whether you were able to submit
smoothly.
(Don’t comment on the content, please!
Just the process.)
We’re hearing and seeing lots of complaints—from students, parents, and teachers—about students
whose submissions didn’t go through or weren’t accepted, despite their many efforts to get
College Board to accept their answers, from converting file formats to submitting as text
and more.
Many of those folks are saying that while the demo worked fine for them, the actual
exam submission did not—and they’ll now need to take the June makeup.
Now it’s true that we’re not hearing from the students who had smooth experiences—and
College Board is saying that 99% of students have been able to submit.
We can’t speak to the 99% figure, but we can say that there have been difficulties,
and so if you haven’t taken your exam yet, and if you want to do all the things within
your control to obviate difficulties, here are a few things to try:
First, check your browser, and make sure you’re using the latest version of Chrome, Firefox,
Safari, or Microsoft Edge.
College Board recommends Chrome, so use that if you can.
Note that you can’t use Internet Explorer.
If you’re working on a borrowed computer, reach out to the computer’s owner to request
admin access to update the browser.
Also make sure that you’ve turned off all browser plug-ins and extensions, except for
those that you use for accessibility.
Again, if you’re not the owner of the device, check in with that person or organization
to ensure that you’ve got access to turn those plug-ins and extensions off.
Also check your operating system to make sure it’s the latest version.
There’s a list of latest versions on College Board’s site—we’ll link to it in the
description.
If you’re planning to submit a photo of an answer: If you’re using a cell phone,
College Board recommends emailing the photo to yourself so you can attach it from your
computer.
Choose the “medium” file size, and save your photo as PNG or JPG.
If you take a photo on your iPhone or iPad, it will be in HEIC format, and College Board
will not accept that.
If you email the photo yourself, that should automatically convert it to a JPG.
Try this with another photo ahead of time to check and confirm!
If your content is within a PDF, that counts as a “Text File”—and you should therefore
submit it NOT by attaching a photo, but rather by clicking on “Attach a Text File.”
We heard from a lot of concerned students that they forgot to write their AP ID number
and initials on their exams.
If this happens to you, do not fret!
College Board will still accept and review your submission—but do make sure that you
put the pages in the proper order.
And if your answer is multiple pages, remember that you can submit just one text file per
exam question.
Also, there won’t be an option to preview any files you’ve uploaded, so give those
files really obvious names!
That way, you won’t accidentally upload an unrelated file.
If you’re submitting your answer in the text box, remember that you can’t type directly
into College Board’s text box—you’ll have to copy and paste the entirety of your
answer.
And if you decide you want to add to your answer, you’ll have to do that in the original
application, and then clear the text box and re-paste everything.
Keep in mind that after you submit, if all goes through, you’ll see a page that says,
“Congratulations!
Your AP Exam Is Complete.”
You will not get a confirmation email, so we strongly advise that you take a screenshot
of this page so that you have a record of your submission.
Now, I’m sorry to be the messenger here, but we have heard of students submitting their
exams, getting the “Congratulations” screen, and then subsequently receiving an email from
College Board saying that one or more of their files were corrupt, and that they’ll need
to retake the exam in June.
This seems to have happened to a small percentage of test takers, so if you get a “Congratulations”
screen, you’re probably in the clear—but it’s a possibility to be aware of.
And do definitely check your junk folder in case messages get routed there.
If you do receive that subsequent email, you can always reach out to College Board for
further info and clarification.
Now, it may happen that you do not see the “Congratulations!” page at all.
You may instead encounter a page saying “We Did Not Receive Your Response”—if that
happens, you’ll need to request a makeup in June.
You can and should reach out to your teacher or counselor, and College Board, to ensure
you won’t re-encounter any of the same issues a second time—because there is no makeup
to the makeup.
I sincerely hope everything did and will go smoothly for you.
You’ve worked really, really hard to get to this point—and for that alone, I want
to pause and say something that, amidst a global pandemic and a lot of last-minute changes,
you may not be hearing enough: You’re awesome.
I know this is a stressful time, so if you still have AP exams left, take some solace
in these facts.
Most students so far have not encountered problems and have been able to submit their
exams.
If you did encounter technical difficulties, you can still take the makeup in June.
And there are steps you can take to minimize your chances of having problems again: Check
to see if any of the issues we mentioned—out-of-date browser, unconverted HEIC file, and so on—may
have been at play.
If they were not, then reach out to your teacher or counselor as well as College Board so that
you can figure out why your first exam didn’t submit or wasn’t accepted—the problem
may not have been your fault!
But that doesn’t mean you can’t proactively take steps to prevent it from happening again.
You’ve come so far, and you can do this too.
If you’re still prepping, check out the recordings of our AP livestreams here on YouTube
as well as our AP Practice Tests on our site.
We are rooting for you every step of the way!