LYNNFIELD — Lynnfield High School has a long record of excellence when it comes to its Advanced Placement (AP) program.
Despite the many challenges posed by the pandemic for students and teachers alike, scores on the most recent AP exams stayed strong.
Out of 14 AP subjects offered by the high school, test scores in nine subjects improved with two staying the same and just three seeing a decline.
“The percentage of the students who take the AP exam … 75 percent of those students who took an AP exam scored a three or higher,” Principal Robert Cleary said. “They’re really putting the effort in and doing a great job.
“Participation was great. Over 70 percent of the graduating class took at least one AP class, which is a great number.”
One hundred seventy-six students took a total of 378 AP exams which Cleary said is in line with recent years.
A total of 25 students attained AP Scholar status, which means they “scored a three or higher on three or more exams,” Cleary said. Seventeen students earned AP Scholars with Honors status by scoring a minimum of 3.25 on all their exams and a three or higher on four or more exams.
Seventeen students attained AP Scholars with Distinction honors with an average of 3.5 on all exams and scoring a three or higher on five or more exams.
“The average for our Scholars with Distinction was 4.11 so that’s pretty impressive,” Cleary said.
Studio art 2D and music theory were the top subjects with average scores of five.
The studio art 2D exam had an increased number of participants going from three in 2021 to eight in 2022 with all eight scoring five. Four of those students – Emma Condon, Lauren Lim, Kelsey Hodson and Samantha Bunar – were among only 189 students worldwide to achieve perfect scores, answering every question correctly.
“Laura [Johnson] and Liz Hayden, our two art teachers, doing a dynamite job with our studio art,” Cleary said.
The average score on the biology exam hit a five-year high at 3.81, up from 3.13 in 2021.
Average scores in U.S. History (3.78 up from 3.40 in 2021), English Lit/Comp (3.89 up from 3.04, English Language/Comp (3.57 up from 3.55) and economics (3.23 up from 2.95) also rose.
Computer science numbers have risen from last year as well, going from 3.59 to 3.88, a five-year high.
“I do want to call out computer science, I know we’ve invested a lot on that and that has seen a steady increase over the last five years which has been great to see a return on that investment,” School Committee Jamie Hayman said.
One of the subjects showing a dip in scores was calculus AB, dropping from 3.12 to 2.92.
Committee member Stacy Dahlstedt asked if there should be any concern.
“Is there something going on there?” she asked.
Cleary said that, while calculus AB scores did drop, scores in statistics (2.90 up from 2.67) and chemistry (3.21 up from 2.30), where math is included in the exam, went up. The average score in calculus BC jumped a full point to 4.67.
“There is no one thing that you can say ‘aha there it is this is the reason why,’ I think this is just the matter of you know, there are a number of factors that impacted student performance,” Cleary said.
Physics and psychology scores also dropped in 2022. Physics dropped slightly from 3.19 (after a five-year high of 4.10 in 2019 and 2020) to 3.18. Psychology dropped from 3.00 in 2021 to 2.75.
One subject Cleary said he is looking forward to seeing where the scores will go next year is European history. The class wasn’t offered last year but was reinstated this year. In 2021, only four students took the exam with an average score of 3.75.
Kathryn Moody, guidance chair at Lynnfield High School, said she ordered 100 more tests than last school year which is in part due to the addition of European history and another computer science class.
Test scores in Spanish and French were low when compared to other subjects. The average score in Spanish rose from 2.46 in 2021 to 2.80 in 2022, its highest average in the last five years. French scores remained the same at 1.89.
Hayman asked how important languages are to colleges.
“Language is important, I think it helps round out the transcript, having all the core academic classes and language,” Moody said. “Most of our kids do go on for that fourth year so that’s encouraging. It’s not a graduation requirement at Lynnfield High School… colleges like to see it and we push it.”
Hayman also asked if they should be focused on scores or the number of students taking the exams.
“We’re looking at giving kids opportunities,” Cleary said. “I’m far less concerned about what their scores are… when we’re looking at it, yeah five is a great score but depending on the student a three could be an outstanding score depending on how much they might have struggled getting there…and that’s a great life lesson.”
