Once again this year I spent a week this month reading Advanced Placement (AP) English Literature exams. Here are some thoughts from what I have observed this time. I have most frequently been assigned to read the poetry question. This year was no exception. I really have no preference; each of the three questions have their advantages and disadvantages in scoring them.

I tell the students in my high school from ninth grade on that there are two things that every essay must have: a thesis and evidence. You can call these by different names; William Perry in his essay “Examsmanship and the Liberal Arts” famously called them bull and cow, but they have to be there.

The thesis is why the AP question prompt always ask for some variation of “the significance” or “the meaning of the work as a whole.” AP teachers sometimes refer to the latter as the MOWAW, pronounced like “moo-wah.” This is where many of the AP essays fall short. There is no significance. There is no meaning. There is no purpose, other than to spend forty minutes trying to write an essay that might—but absolutely will not—give the writer a shot a some credit or higher standing in college.

One scorer said to me, “Were you stuck in the land of four?”

The English essays and similar lengthy exercises on other AP tests are scored on a scale of zero to nine. The scores five to nine are considered upper half scores. That is, there is to some degree a thesis and some kind of support for the thesis. The AP scoring guides call eights and nines “persuasive.” They are thorough, pointed, often original, and stylistically competent. Sixes and sevens are “reasonable”; fives are “plausible.”

The lower half scores have something lacking. Most commonly, it is a thesis, theme, or purpose for the essay. When readers finds themselves in the “land of four,” they are usually reading a list of features about the work but with no unifying thesis. The three to six points that the essay makes may be OK, but there is nothing significant about them. I tell my students from ninth grade on, ask yourself “So what?” I confess that occasionally a student gets offended by that question, but it is important. Most people most of the time do not say or write anything unless they have a reason to do so. That is certainly true of the poets, playwrights, and authors used in English Advanced Placement tests—both the traditional English Literature test or the English Language test.

Some essays will say something at the end of the essay that these three to six points reflect the “significance” or “meaning” of the work, but they do not say what the significance or meaning might be. Normally, that means a lower half essay, a score of four at the highest. In other words, be specific, or you will end up in “the land of four.”

I would also encourage student writers to go beyond formulae. The essays scored a five, while plausible, are often weak because, in the words of the scoring guide, they are “formulaic.” That is the word that the scoring guide uses. The five paragraph essay may be a useful model to start with. But it is a formula.

It is true that unless an essay butchers the language, a short essay with an introduction, three points or observations, and a conclusion that makes some attempt to bring the three points together and state a thesis would earn a five.

However, any writer who wants to write well has to go beyond the formula. How is that done?

There can be a number of ways. Discuss the significance of each point, do not merely list them like so-called bullet points. Be creative. Keep the writing focused on your main idea. Get outside your own life and into the life of the work you are reading.

This gets into the other two things that the craft of the essay values: continuity and unity. The paragraphs should follow one another in a way that makes sense. Most writing and composition texts will have a list of transition words and phrases. Those might be somewhat formulaic, but if they make sense, they are better than simply saying “first,” “second,” or “my next point.”

Another thing that can help is a clever or effective introduction. The 2014 poetry selection was one that the question makers thought most students could relate to. It was a sonnet from the sixteenth century, but the poet was explaining why he was avoiding a certain young lady. He had a crush on her, but she consistently turned him down. He was still attracted to her, so he knew he would get hurt if he saw her again. It was better to avoid her. The poem may have been over 400 years old, but the problem has not changed at all.

The best essays often related to this because the writers had had similar problems, or knew someone who had. There were many opportunities for a teen to really write something well, whether it is a rant against the opposite sex, a discussion of heartbreak or rejection, or perhaps a lighter touch looking at the “game of love.”

Even if the essay writer feels the need to write a more formulaic essay, he or she should make sure each paragraph does not just list a point, but analyzes it, shows its significance, and relates it to the main thesis.

The instructions to the reader usually say that an essay that shows especially poor control of the language should get no higher than a three (a two on the English Language test). This is rarely an issue because if the writer is having difficulty using the language, he or she is not communicating anyhow and probably would not get more than a two or a three for the content.

Having said that, sometimes the control of language, including grammar, paragraphing, and spelling may make a difference in a score. If readers are undecided between two scores, for example, they may ask themselves, “Is this a six or a seven? It has some qualities of either one.” If it is presented well and clearly, the reader will probably give it a seven. If it has a number of errors—not just a few typos of typical of anyone’s rough draft—then it will probably get the six. Not breaking the essay into paragraphs makes it harder to follow and almost guarantees a lower score.

Many lower half essays repeat or quote extensively from the work in front of them. It is important to refer to the work, to note word choices, and, yes, to quote the work, in order to present an argument; however, if you find that you are quoting several lines of the work at a time, you may want to ask yourself if you have a good reason to do this.

Many essays quote several lines and then paraphrase those lines. Such essays really display no analysis at all. They simply are proving that the writer understands the English language. Presumably anyone taking an AP English test is familiar with the language! Let the text speak for itself. Use it, of course, but remember, the goal is not to put the passage into your own words or summarize what it says. The goal is to answer the question.

Many times an effective or meaningful conclusion makes the difference in an essay as well. Readers will tell you that many times they are reading an essay, and from its introduction and its examples it is sounding a lot like the essays scored a certain number. The reader might be thinking, for example, this looks and sounds like a six. He or she is ready to call it a six when the conclusion brings things together and comes up with a really good observation or expresses something really well. That essay is no longer a six, it has just gone up to a seven.

Similarly a poor conclusion that says very little could bring an essay down.

Readers will sometimes give what is clearly the last essay in the exam book a slight break if it appears that the student ran out of time.

Practice good handwriting. I have no doubt that many essays are scored less than they deserve because the readers cannot decipher the handwriting. This is a problem for several reasons. One is simply that the reader is spending so much time deciphering that he or she has lost the overall argument the essay is trying to make. It is hard to see continuity when the writing is hard to read.

Remember, too, that the scoring guides always say that threes and fours “fail to offer adequate analysis.” Some readers say that if they handwriting is unreadable, the most the student will get is a four because they did not do an adequate job of communicating their ideas.

Please note that the key word is readable. Everyone likes to read neat, crisp, unambiguous handwriting. Some students have sloppy writing, but it is still readable and does not hinder comprehension.

All the AP readers are experienced college or high school teachers. Many of them have had experiences with students who could not read their own handwriting when the teacher asked students to read what they had written. Even if the essay is eventually decipherable, the reader may have become slightly angry, and that also could affect the score. Readers are trained to follow the scoring guide and for the most part can be detached, but they are people, too. Even the best baseball umpires can get ticked off at a player and give his opponent the breaks on close calls.

This may not be the best organized essay, but I hope it gives students who take the AP tests some things to consider. Most of this has to do with essay writing which is especially important in English, history, and government AP tests. The handwriting issue covers all of them, even the Calculus APs. Keep in mind thesis and evidence, continuity and unity. Do not summarize the work but answer the question that the prompt asks. And before starting to write, always ask, “So what?”

I should also add that this year there were about 402,000 English Literature and Composition AP test given. English Language and Composition is far and away the leader with about 600,000 tests given this year. Although I do not have any figures to confirm it, it looks like U.S. History is in third place with a little under 400,000 from what I can gather.

Nearly every year since I have been a reader, students ask me if I have ever come across essays written by students in my classes. With over 400,000 tests, the odds are very slim that that would ever happen, but I did run into a case this year. A reader friend told me that a woman at his table read essays from her class. She knew it was her students because, while the essays are anonymous, the essay booklets have the six-digit College Board school code on them. She recognized her school code. She told her table leader. Her table leader told her to read them and score them and then he would check her scores. He was satisfied with her scores, and that was it. My experience has been that the readers do have integrity when it comes to doing their job.

Remember, the purpose of scoring any entrance exam—be it the SAT, ACT, and AP—is to help the colleges make a good match. A badly inflated score is not going to help a student. He or she will be overwhelmed. It is better to make an honest match. That way, students learn without being bored or outclassed.

P.S. In last year’s AP Reflections essay, I spoke of “word inflation.” I noticed some of that this year. What was more puzzling this year were some words that just seemed to be the wrong word. The poem this year was about an experience the poet had when he was a boy. A number of the essays used the word whimsical to describe either the boy or the experience. There is nothing in the poem that indicates any of the three characters were acting on a whim, nor was the poem lighthearted or capricious.

Also a number of writers used the word blatant when they probably meant obvious or clear. Blatant always has a negative connotation and implies offensiveness. I really cannot imagine too many people would have been offended by the poem. The College Board is really pretty careful about that sort of thing. As has been said, you’ll never find a passage on abortion on the SAT.