Next year, Honors American Literature will be replaced with AP Seminar, a class set to focus on, according to the College Board, “how to find and use evidence from experts and how to present the case from your own perspective effectively, both through writing and multimedia presentations.” These skills are definitely important to have. Many careers students will pursue will require them to know how to do research and use it to support their arguments, and more importantly, knowing how to research effectively can help them identify bad arguments and improper usage of research.
But the move from American Literature to AP Seminar will come at a cost. The class won’t be doing any reading beyond Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” and maybe some summer reading. This will take away students’ option to delve deeper into American Literature and, in turn, learn more about the history of American culture and how it has been changed and challenged. The point of having an honors literature class is to offer students an opportunity to dive deeper than a normal English class would into the themes and meaning behind fiction, along with fiction’s ability to communicate complicated messages and themes with immense power.
Though Honors American Literature could be a bit overwhelming, I remember it fondly. Through my time in Honors American Literature, not only did the books and poems we read offer me more insight into American history (both the good and the bad) but also into myself. This was especially true through books like “Tuesdays with Morrie” by Mitch Albom and the assignments that went along with it, which encouraged me to explore the book’s themes through self-reflection and tying them to my own life. Additionally, the class offered a deep dive into movements like Transcendentalism and the Harlem Renaissance and their impact on American history and culture, which I would never have learned about without having an American literature class. Next year, students won’t be able to have this experience, and many will choose AP Seminar over a regular English class simply for its AP label.
So what’s to be done? How do we move forward? If Honors American Literature has to be removed, so be it. But AP Seminar shouldn’t be allowed to be a replacement for a sophomore year English credit. Research and literature are not the same thing. If one wants to argue that students need a class to teach them research skills, well, that class already exists! It’s called AP English Language and Composition, and it’s offered starting junior year. AP English Language and Composition not only teaches students how to interpret and make arguments on top of reading literature, but it also finds space to fit in a yearlong research project, which teaches students many of the same skills AP Seminar says it will.
In short, sophomores shouldn’t be allowed to substitute their English credit for AP Seminar because the skills and perspective gained by a literature class can’t be replaced by learning how to do research—especially when BHS already has a class devoted to that very purpose.
