daijobu Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 How have you found schools willing to allow homeschoolers to take the AP exam at their site? Who do you contact? The admin office, department chair, AP teacher? When is a good time to begin the search? If they don't offer a particular AP course, then should I not bother asking? What should I keep in mind about their point of view with respect to allowing homeschoolers at their AP exam? Is it more work for them? What misconceptions do they have that I might need to negate? My kids have never been enrolled in a school, so I have scant inside contacts, though I may be able to get some help from neighbors and local homeschoolers. But I may be cold-calling some schools. Any help is appreciated! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onaclairadeluna Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 https://apstudent.collegeboard.org/takingtheexam/registering-for-exams You email them in January and they put you in touch with a local AP coordinator. They you contact them to see if they offer the test you need. I would ask even if they don't offer it. Why not? Worse case they can't do it and you have to find another location. They school my son tested at was very friendly and accommmodating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebastian (a lady) Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 It depends on your state. In Virginia, it was easy. Just call the local high school and ask to be added in. They are required by state law to be open if space is available. In Northern Virginia over the last couple of years, I heard that people had little trouble, at least at the schools that were closest to where we lived. In California, homeschooling is less common and a great many people who are homeschooling use public charter schools. These schools, being public schools, may have connections with local districts for testing. I ended up cold calling a bunch of schools looking for seats. I did start with the schools in the AP Course Ledger who were listed as having the course. It seemed easier to start with schools who ought to be doing an exam. It took me several weeks to secure spots for our two exams. I generally tried to figure out who at the school was in charge of AP testing. Sometimes I could find that out online. Sometimes I just called the guidance office and said I would like to talk to the person in charge of AP testing. Sometimes it took quite a few calls or emails to get in touch with the correct person at a school. In one case, the person on the phone was willing to let us test, but was overall so clueless sounding about AP that I didn't follow up (she sounded like she didn't really know what AP was, which didn't give me confidence that it would happen without problem). We ended up doing one test with a good sized private school. The other test was arranged through a private company in the area that manages test registration for several schools. The school we were at didn't even offer that particular course, so everyone taking that exam was there from a different area school. When I sent an email, I mentioned that I understood we would need to pay for the exam fee as well as any proctoring fee. In one case I mentioned that while this was our first AP, the boys had taken several standardized tests and had no need for special accommodations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjbucks1 Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 My ds has takem 4 AP exams so far through our local high school. The vice principal is in charge of the testing. I think the first year I e-mailed the principal directly and he put me in touch with the right person. I would start trying to secure an exam site now. I have already been in touch with the new vice principal at the high school, and he has assuered me my ds will be able to take the AP exams again this year. I have been fortunate because our high school will also proctor exams for the classes it doesn't offer (so far that has been Comp Science and Latin, and next year it will be both AP Physics C exams). It does require additional time of a staff member to proctor an exam that it is not already administering (about 3 hours or so). I would not EXPECT a school to do this, but I am glad ours is willing. If the school is already offering the exam, then it requires no extra time on their part and I really can not see why they would not let a child take the exam (but I know plenty do). In February I will touch base with the vice principal again and pay the fee. The exams are ordered in March. I know many on this board have had a difficult time finding a school for their child to take the exam. I feel very fortunate that the staff at the local high school has been so helpful. I hope you will have the same experience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teeterbunch Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 We just called the local high school and it was easy peasy. They didn't offer the course for the test we needed, but they did allow one student to take an online class and so he needed to take the exam as well. I'm guessing we'll see more of that....more options because the classes are offered online and the students at the high school need to take the test. Ashley Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elfgivas Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 we started with people we knew who worked in public schools, asked for recommendations, and then called. the first one said yes. i also asked dc if any of their facebook friends were taking AP, and what schools they went to. after the initial contact, everything was thru the secretary and then the teacher responsible for administering the exams. it all went very well. fwiw, ann Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daijobu Posted July 24, 2014 Author Share Posted July 24, 2014 Thanks, everyone! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
In The Great White North Posted July 25, 2014 Share Posted July 25, 2014 We called the local school too and they would order any AP test we wanted. This year, we got the bright idea a few days too late and they had already sent in their order. I started calling all the other local schools and found a private school (an hour away) that went online and changed their order for us (something all the other schools claimed was impossible). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dirty ethel rackham Posted July 25, 2014 Share Posted July 25, 2014 We started with our local school - the one my kids would have gone to. I asked for the AP coordinator. Their policy was that if it was an exam they offered and the student was in the zoned district, they could take the exam. If it was not a class they offered, if they had students taking it anyway, the would allow homeschooled students to take it. If it was not an exam they offered and they didn't have students taking it, they would charge a proctoring fee on top of the exam. The district now has an online process that even has an option of selecting "homeschooled." We had a dickens of a time finding an AP Latin exam. My local high school did not offer it. I contacted many of the private schools, but none of them would allow "outsiders" to take exams on their campus - not even the Catholic school that our parish helps support. That made me very angry. I ended up using the AP Course Ledger and calling schools. I found that calling was more effective than email because it is much easier to just say no on an email than on a person who is being very nice and polite on the phone. We did finally find a school offering the exam that would let my kid take it - an hour away. But it was worth it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebastian (a lady) Posted July 25, 2014 Share Posted July 25, 2014 We started with our local school - the one my kids would have gone to. I asked for the AP coordinator. Their policy was that if it was an exam they offered and the student was in the zoned district, they could take the exam. If it was not a class they offered, if they had students taking it anyway, the would allow homeschooled students to take it. If it was not an exam they offered and they didn't have students taking it, they would charge a proctoring fee on top of the exam. The district now has an online process that even has an option of selecting "homeschooled." We had a dickens of a time finding an AP Latin exam. My local high school did not offer it. I contacted many of the private schools, but none of them would allow "outsiders" to take exams on their campus - not even the Catholic school that our parish helps support. That made me very angry. I ended up using the AP Course Ledger and calling schools. I found that calling was more effective than email because it is much easier to just say no on an email than on a person who is being very nice and polite on the phone. We did finally find a school offering the exam that would let my kid take it - an hour away. But it was worth it. I felt like phone calls worked best too. I did use email as a follow up or when there was no number. I did start asking if they had any schools to suggest. I think that may have helped with one site because I was able to tell her that I'd tried most of the sites she was suggesting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sebastian (a lady) Posted July 25, 2014 Share Posted July 25, 2014 One other thing. I made a point of following up the day after the exam with a thank you email. I mentioned that the boys had felt welcomed and felt like they'd done their best on the exam and that we really appreciated the opportunity to test with them. Never know when you'll need help again. Calling around was very uncomfortable. It felt like I was begging and the turn downs got pretty draining. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rbk mama Posted July 26, 2014 Share Posted July 26, 2014 https://apstudent.collegeboard.org/takingtheexam/registering-for-exams You email them in January and they put you in touch with a local AP coordinator. They you contact them to see if they offer the test you need. I would ask even if they don't offer it. Why not? Worse case they can't do it and you have to find another location. They school my son tested at was very friendly and accommmodating. This link says to contact AP services and they will give you the names/numbers of local AP coordinators who are willing to test outside students. I called them, got the list of schools, and the first one I phoned was willing to test my son. No one else at the school was taking the same AP exam (the course wasn't offered there), but they were willing to order the exam for DS. We paid them the test fee on the day of the exam. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkT Posted July 26, 2014 Share Posted July 26, 2014 How does the Harari virtual school handle AP testing? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KarenNC Posted July 26, 2014 Share Posted July 26, 2014 I believe it would be a case of finding a local school, just like with other online AP providers, but we haven't done an AP course with the yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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