Tuesday, March 31, 2020

Online instruction for AP Econ & APUSH due to Coronavirus. See Syllabi & online resources:

Subject: AP Econ & APUSH Final Assignments for Spring 2020 - Please read carefully
Hello Students & Parents: 
Fortunately, at the time of school closure, the majority of my AP students were doing well in these AP courses! I thought long and hard about what to do.  I am enclosing an abridged syllabus of final assignments for our AP Economics and AP US History (APUSH) students to close out the semester. These remaining assignments combine 2 or 3 learning objectives/impact standards at a time so that there will not be any question with regard to completion of AP credit earned. I have taken in to account many things to help our students. For example, I've listed things as a checklist; all resources may be accessed online; I have included everything needed in one document; and students may access individual documents and resources via Synergy email or the AP classes I created in Google Classroom. When completed and they send assignment to me they are done! :)
NOTE: There are/were several in each class that did not complete assignments. (You know who you are.) These students have the option of making up missing 5th 6 weeks assignments; upon completion, they take a photo/screenshot of it and email to me ASAP; OR they may complete the Alternate Make-up Assignment (completion of a research paper), see attached rubric, instead. Completion of make-up assignment(s) will assure that these students receive credit for this class for graduation.
Again, I have created corresponding AP courses in Google Classroom which students can access, see respective code below, should they need assignment documents which are listed in the syllabus. Please see email for the Google Classroom Code for access to each of these AP classes (readings, documents-rubrics):
AP Exam: Students signed up to take the AP Exam in AP Government (from my Fall 2019 AP Govt class) or APUSH may access practice questions through their AP Collegeboard - AP Classroom account. The latest update from AP Collegeboard states that the AP Exam for all subjects will consist of a 45 minute open-note essay that students may take online at home but I am not sure this is the final word. The next update from AP Collegeboard will be 04-03-20. This is a fluid situation so I'll keep you posted.
My best to everyone, Ms. Cox     Have questions? karen.cox@aps.edu
P.S. To the handful of students that were considering the AP Macroeconomics exam -- It is my understanding that, through no fault of our own, due to school closures the registration deadline was not met. 

Thursday, January 23, 2020

AP Macroeconomics Current Events Portfolio - Spring 2020


Each student is responsible for constructing an AP Macroeconomic Current Events Portfolio which will consist of ten articles, a summary or précis of each article including your thoughts.
àà DUE DATE: ALL 10 articles with summaries are DUE on or by March 20th, 2019.

SOURCE: Where do I find current events? Acceptable sources where articles may be obtained:

·      NEWSPAPERS:
o   Albuquerque Journal &  Santa Fe New Mexican
o   USA Today
o   Wall St Journal
o   etc.
·      NEWS MAGAZINES:
o   U.S. News & World Report,
o   Newsweek,
o   Business Week,
o   Time
o   The Economist
o   Christian Science Monitor
o   Fortune Magazine, etc. . . .


·      WEBSITES:
o   etc…


CURRENT EVENT TOPIC/CATEGORY: What does your current event need to be about?
·      The current event of choice must be related to economics.
·      The topics of the articles that you should be looking for are as follows:

1)    Opportunity Costs/Tradeoffs                                6) Investment/Stock Market
2)    Supply and Demand                                             7) Monetary Policy/Banking System
3)    Economic Indicators-GDP                                   8) Fiscal Policy
4)    Economic Indicators-Unemployment                  9) International Trade
5)    Economic Indicators-Inflation                              10) Topic of Your Choice

The articles DO NOT need to be done in this order, but plan on doing ONE article per week.

What is the format/layout of my current event assignment?
Format or Layout: At the top of each summary you should have the following information:

YOUR NAME:
SOURCE:                                                                  
TITLE & DATE OF ARTICLE:
CURRENT EVENT TOPIC/CATEGORY: (see list above)
SUMMARY (Précis) OF ARTICLE:

The article summary should be a brief description of what the article is about; highlighting the main points. Try to identify the article as either microeconomic or macroeconomic; relate your thoughts to the subject matter; and if possible, relate it to what’s discussed in class.
The length of each summary should be a minimum of 100 words or a half page (12 point font, single-spaced, and double-spaced between paragraphs).

Tuesday, January 7, 2020

January 2020 - What is the War Powers Act?

Image result for war powers act"AP Collegeboard FRQ -- Quick back-to-school lesson covering current events focused on curriculum:  videos regarding Soleimani & War Powers Resolution, Tweets from POTUS & House Foreign Relations Comm, AP US Govt FRQ 2007 #3 (use as Concept Application FRQ w/video as the scenario) and APUSH FRQ 2008.  Here are the links:
Soleimani Video [show 3:00]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKB0jr2aHl4
APUSH FRQ: https://secure-media.collegeboard.org/apc/ap08_us_hist_frq.pdf