Many students who were scheduled for the May 16 exam were forced to come take it another day due to serve issues with College Board. Photo curtesy of Unsplash.
On May 16, students entered Cardozo’s gym hoping to earn a five on the AP Psychology Exam, but instead were met with technical issues on the College Board’s website. These issues forced many students scheduled to take the exam to reschedule and return for a makeup exam at a later date.
The technical error did not just impact Cardozo—it affected students nationwide.
At 11:30 a.m., when the test was scheduled to begin, Assistant Principal of Data and Testing, Ms. Rothenberg, noticed students struggling to log into Bluebook—the platform the College Board uses for their exams. Students continued to experience login issues, even when entering the correct usernames and passwords.
“We assumed it might be a security issue and allowed students to change their passwords, but that didn’t work,” she explained. “When it kept happening to more and more students, we realized there was a larger issue.”
“I did some research and found out that other schools and other states were encountering the same problems,” Ms. Rothenberg continued.
Once she realized it was a nationwide problem, Ms. Rothenberg emailed the College Board to try to determine what was happening. “We had 156 students registered for the AP Psychology exam, and we were able to get 118 of them tested on the original test date,” she said. “We were concerned that those students might not be able to submit their answers, but we owed it to them to give them the opportunity to take the test.”
“Luckily, all 118 students were able to submit their responses,” she confirmed.
Acknowledging the situation, the College Board posted a statement on their website: “Students who were unable to take the test should speak to their AP teacher or their school’s AP coordinator regarding make-up testing that will be offered at no cost. Late-testing opportunities begin the week of May 19.”
Despite the reassurance, many students—along with Ms. Rothenberg—were frustrated by the server issues.
“Most of the students who couldn’t test were clearly disappointed and frustrated. It was their last test—they came prepared and were excited to be done,” she said. “However, they all took the news well, and many of them were able to take the makeup test on either May 21 or May 23, depending on their schedules.”
One student affected by the technical issues was senior Hafsa Faisal, who shared, “I was one of the students whose login didn’t work, unfortunately, along with around 20 other people—from different classes, both Ms. Fier’s and Mr. Geker’s.” She recalled feeling stressed and upset, but was ultimately able to complete the makeup exam.
“They were incredibly flexible and amazing to work with,” Ms. Rothenberg said, referring to the students who had to reschedule. “It shows how great our students and staff are at navigating challenges.”
Arshpreet Kaur was one of the students who managed to complete the exam on the original test day, but described the scene she witnessed. “When the teachers realized the College Board system wasn’t working, they started opening and testing other laptops to see if those would work,” she said. “When that didn’t help, Ms. Rothenberg began emailing the College Board to try to resolve the issue.”
“In the end, the test was delayed by about half an hour,” Kaur added.