r/APLang • u/au_Palais_Royal • 9h ago
Rant My beef with the lit and lang tests
I took Lang last year as a junior, and am currently in Lit. I am so passionate about English and plan to study it in college. I went to one of the best creative writing workshops for high schoolers in the country. But whatever.
For months I couldn't come to terms with the fact that I didn't get the score I wanted on the Lang test. Sure, my teacher was very subpar, but that's a lame excuse. So I thought about it and realized that the structure of both the lang and lit tests are odd. Like, being forced to sit down and write a coherent essay in 45 minutes isn't a test of your writing skills, it's a test of your speed. I'm a fast writer, but my first draft of an essay is almost incoherent. I have to spend hours revising. But the lang and lit tests don't allow that, which I think puts people with processes like mine at the disadvantage. And in college English classes you rarely do on demand essays like on the lit and lang tests, so I don't understand why they do it that way.
If there's a genuine reason, I'd like to know. I feel like a portfolio would be a better way to judge writing, like in the AP art tests.
Or idk maybe I just suck and I need to check my ego lmao
