With AP exams quickly approaching, John Livingston, a counselor at South, thinks it’s important to make an environment that’s comfortable and convenient for AP testing. This year, South is adding the Frank Southern Arena as a new location for testing.

“This is a chance to have a dedicated space [for AP testing],” Livingston said. “When we test inside the school building, school’s still going on. All the bells are ringing and passing periods are going on and there are distractions…It will be distraction-free, hopefully. That is really the motivation behind it, is to have a place where students can test and not have distractions of what happens during the school day and school building.”

Students are wondering what the arena will look like on test days. Livingston said the staff went over to Frank Southern Arena and toured it recently to make sure it was a good space. “It’s obviously closed to the public, and there is no ice in there right now. It’s climate controlled, and it’s quiet there. Like we always do in the white gym, we’ll bring in a PA, tables and chairs, clocks, and pencil sharpeners to make sure that it’s a good place to test.” 

Not all exams are at Frank Southern. Exams will also take place in classrooms and in the white gym. However, this year, Livingston commented on how South won’t be using the Large Group Room as a testing area. “We’re anticipating construction in the auditorium, so we were a little bit worried about there being noise with the construction in there. We thought it would probably be better to test in Frank Southern and hopefully, it goes well this year. Anticipating that it will, we’ll continue to do this in the future.” 

AP exams start at 8 a.m. and 12 p.m. Monday through Friday on May 1-12. Here is the link for more scheduling information. https://www.mccsc.edu/cms/lib/IN01906545/Centricity/Domain/1146/2023%20Calendar%20Student%20new.pdf