As Advanced Placement (AP) tests near, so too do the anticipatory conversations buzzing around the halls. The final summit of year-long, college-level courses is here. Underclassmen mull over which classes to take, and upperclassmen tell tall tales about the “hardest” classes. AP Physics stands alongside AP United States History (APUSH) and AP Chemistry as towering beasts, feared by many, and exciting for some.
Physics students prepare for two AP exams: Physics C: Mechanics, and Physics 2: Algebra-Based. AP exams are graded on a five-point scale. In the past two years, students’ scores have dropped by an average of 0.694 points on the Physics C exam and by 0.426 points on the Physics 2 exam. The scores for AP Biology and AP Chemistry have stayed mostly the same (rising by an average 0.045 points and 0.197 points, respectively).
The corrected change in average scores (adjusting for the change in scores of the national average) has also dropped, by 0.590 points for Physics C and 0.655 points for Physics 2, according to the high school’s score distributions. Students attributed this recent decline in test scores to lenient class policies and students’ mindsets surrounding the class, while physics teachers pointed to the new test format as a potential reason for the dropping scores.
New AP test format
In 2025, multiple AP Physics exams, including Physics 2 and Physics C, underwent structural and content-related changes. The test most affected by these changes was the AP Physics C test, which is now three hours long instead of 90 minutes.
Senior Eric Bardon took AP Physics in his junior year. He said that it takes time for teachers to adapt to a new format.
“I don’t know if students were fully prepared for a changing format. Changes in formats are always going to be difficult for teachers to handle, just to learn and then reteach to their class,” Bardon said.
AP Physics teacher Melissa Nixon said that while the new changes allow students to adequately display their knowledge, they make it difficult to simulate exam conditions in class. Nixon added that grading AP tests with Physics 1 teacher Julia Mangan last year gave her important insights into the AP rubrics that she could relay to her students.
“It’s not like I can give a three-hour practice test,” Nixon said. “What’s given me more insight is when Ms. Mangan and I went to go grade AP tests last June and saw hundreds of student samples, and [we] saw what students struggle with and what the rubric looks like.”
Steep curves
AP Physics classes also prepare for the exam by simulating a curve similar to the one used by the College Board for AP Physics exams during unit tests. The AP Physics C exam, for example, uses a 40 percent curve, meaning that a raw score around 60 percent can be enough to earn a 5.
The class test curve is usually calculated by automatically giving 50 percent to each student and allowing the remaining half of the points to be affected by the students’ accuracy, according to students.
Nixon said that because the AP Physics exam has historically been more fast-paced in terms of how much time students get for the number of questions being asked, the curve is designed to account for the lack of time to check one’s answers, which is similar to the reasons for the College Board curve.
“[Before the changes in the AP format] I did not expect students to be able to finish the test,” Nixon said. “And therefore, the test was a test of how much physics you could do in an hour, not a test of how much physics you knew. That’s gotten better. But the curve is built in the College Board’s system and because we try to match that and get students to anticipate that format, we curve.”
Senior and AP Physics student Eva Forman said that while the curve may seem extreme, it is used in the students’ best interests when it comes to their grades and their preparation for the AP exam.
“I appreciate the curve because it is pretty nicely modeled out of a curve of the actual AP test,” Forman said. “I find it pretty realistic. It’s definitely a big curve, the biggest curve I’ve ever had in any class, but as a student, I really appreciate it.”
On the other hand, some say that the big curve fails to accurately measure how well students know the content. Bardon said that the AP Physics curve could be detrimental to students’ preparation for the AP test.
“Lenient curves give students a false sense of security in their knowledge of the content. When curves are one-half your score and then one-half guaranteed, a 50 percent on a test, which is a failing grade, can convince you that you have a C and so forth,” Bardon said. “So curves can be really dangerous in a sense, even though they’re meant to help students.”
Flipped classroom structure
A “flipped classroom” is one where students complete instructional content outside of class time (for homework) and complete practice assignments during class. The AP Physics class is a “flipped classroom” course, which many students say puts the responsibility to understand the course content on students rather than teachers.
Mangan said that the flipped classroom structure is becoming more and more prevalent in college-level classrooms, and is helpful for AP Physics specifically because of the course’s problem-solving nature.
“The problem-solving part of physics is the hard part and so we really wanted it to be like, ‘We do the hard part together,’” Mangan said. “And that’s also where you have the teacher who can show you pro tips or examples of, ‘When you see something like this you should really think through these steps.’”
Forman said that the flipped classroom allowed her to receive active help from her teachers, especially because physics is very hands-on.
“For physics, it makes a ton of sense because you’re doing labs, you’re doing demos, and the whole test is actually practice problems. I like it, but I get why other people don’t,” Forman said.
Many students report that the late work policy for homework is not very strict, allowing students to complete all of their notes for the unit right before the test. Some students appreciate this level of freedom so that they can schedule their time accordingly, whereas others say that the policies are dangerous.
Senior and AP Physics student Amir Tomer said that he appreciates the policy because of the speed of the class but that it presents some risk for students to fall behind.
“I know some people that leave the homework till the last minute and some people that do it every night. And you can totally tell in the classroom,” Tomer said. “Students that are up to date with all their homeworks are much more engaged in the lesson and have a stronger understanding of the material while we’re doing it.”
Bardon said that in an AP class, forgiving late work policies actually harm students’ ability to do well on the AP exam, especially in a flipped classroom.
“For kids who do the notes at the end of the unit, that can be helpful for that unit test. But doing all your notes, 10 days of notes in one night, will not prepare you for the AP exam because you’ll have spent one day learning the content of the unit, not the whole length of the unit learning the content,” Bardon said. “So your information retention is going to be much lower by cramming all your notes into one night.”
Student mindset
Some students attribute the dropping scores to students’ mindset surrounding AP Physics.
Senior and AP Physics student Elana Braun-Jones and Forman both said that many seniors do not prepare for a 5 on the exam, depending on what type of college credit they could redeem in the future. Mangan said that many schools still require students to take introductory courses, even if they take the students’ AP scores for college credit towards graduation.
Braun-Jones said that this could lead to decreased test scores because students would have less motivation for doing well on the exam.
“That might be another part of it, is that seniors just aren’t really taking the test to get 5s, usually,” Braun-Jones said. “If you can get a 4 and get credit for it then that’s great, or if you’re going to a school that doesn’t take the credit, then it sucks.”
Tomer cited individual students’ mindsets and motivation in how well they are able to do in the class. Despite the difficulty, he endorsed AP Physics and said that if one uses the resources given to them, they will be able to be successful.
“For students who are more STEM-oriented and like the sciences and math, it’s super engaging and there’s a lot of fun labs and things that keep you occupied,” Tomer said. “But you have to be prepared to work hard alone and work hard outside the classroom.”
Changes in AP Physics
Over the past 10 years, physics teachers have worked to shift the reputation of AP Physics from being the hardest class at the high school to being more accessible to students, according to Mangan. She said that this work came out of a desire to make the class more diverse, in terms of gender, race and students with learning disabilities.
“Way back when I started teaching, about 10 years ago, we had only three girls in all of AP Physics,” Mangan said. “So we had a massive gender disparity and the girls that did take AP Physics felt like it just was a culture that wasn’t for them.”
Students like Braun-Jones and Forman said that they’ve felt this shift in how the class was advertised. Forman said that she compares the past mindset surrounding AP Physics to the reputation of APUSH.
“In sophomore year, we had the people who were describing AP classes to us and it was like, ‘You could take honors history and it’s great, and then there’s APUSH, and this is the dawn of destruction.’ Whereas for physics, that’s how it used to be, but no longer do we have this,” Forman said.
Part of the initiative to make AP Physics more accessible included teaching basic calculus needed for AP Physics during the class, allowing students who are not in calculus classes to take the course, according to Mangan.
“I think that is a big part of what you’re seeing in terms of more kids taking [the class]. Not everybody’s doing amazing,” Mangan said. “But it’s not necessarily because the course structure has changed. I think it’s because of who we’re trying to invite into the club.”
