Every year only 10 percent of incoming freshmen students are admitted as Advanced Placement Experience Scholars, or commonly known as APEX. To be admitted, each student must fill out an application including an official middle school grade report, a list of extracurricular activities and four teacher recommendations. Perspective students also have to complete a timed writing. But fast-forwarding past the admission process to three years later after completing the last semester of an APEX class, senior Jane Tuszynski believes the program really made a difference in her life.

“I’ve had a really great time being in APEX overall,” she said. “It’s really sad now to be done with APEX. The teachers we had have been really great…it’s really great to create a community in a class where everyone wants to be there and really cares about learning.”

Tuszynski attended Eastern Middle School instead of North Bethesda or Tilden, WJ’s traditional feeder schools, and thought that the program would help with her transition into WJ.

As for senior Teddy Owen, the decision to enroll in the APEX program depended on whether or not he was accepted into Georgetown Prepatory School. After being admitted to both, Owen finally chose APEX knowing that the level of education would be as rigorous, yet at a fraction of the price.

“[The difficulty of classes] has fluctuated throughout the years,” said Owen. “Freshman year was not too bad. I’d say the biggest shocker freshman year was taking [my] first AP class. [It was] just a whole other level of reading and comprehension.”

Two years ago AP U.S. Government and Politics (NSL) started to be offered to all incoming freshmen, a class previously taught to only sophomores and APEX freshmen. Recently, more people believe that this trivializes the program.

“Honestly, I don’t think the main benefit of the program should be based on just the ability of being able to take one AP [class] as a freshman,” said Owen. “I think that the benefit really comes from more in depth analysis and learning from different classes and I think that everyone should have a right to take [AP NSL] freshman year if they so choose.”

Both Tuszynski and Owen said they would choose to be in APEX if they could redo their high school experience. While Owen learned a lot about the value of time management, Tuszynski enjoyed the welcoming environment of many motivated students.