AP Chemistry is considered by many to be one of the hardest AP courses out there. We cover more chemistry topics and concepts than I ever even knew existed before taking the course. When I checked off AP Chemistry as my elective on my course form in the spring of my sophomore year, I thought I was crazy. Spoiler: I did change my elective a day after I submitted my form, but after rethinking it for the next few weeks, I decided that I wanted to give it a try. What was the worst that’d happen? 

Our first day of class came, and from the beginning, it was all-business. We did a quick run-through of all of our summer work, which consisted of unit one of the AP Chemistry curriculum. It wasn’t that bad, though, since it was mostly concepts that we completed in regular chemistry. 

Unit two came shortly after, and I was completely lost as we learned the material in class. I often found myself in our teacher, Mrs. Baker’s, office hours. Without her constant availability for extra help and willingness to help with understanding concepts throughout AP Chemistry, I likely wouldn’t be where I am today in the course. 

Shoutout to my fellow members of the fearless septet of AP Chemistry students: Caroline Shannahan ‘23, Leslie Baker ‘24, Hana Shinzawa ‘24, Vivian Krawiecki ‘24, Hailey Baughman ‘24, and Hansini Gundavarapu ‘24. 

Despite the difficult concepts, and the many tears that have come with being an AP Chemistry student, I have come to truly love being a member of the class. How could I love chemistry so much, you may ask? I love AP Chemistry because it gives me a challenge… and at the same time, it is very fulfilling when you finally understand a tough concept. Second, our teacher, Mrs. Baker… or as we like to say, Auntie M, is great at explaining all of the concepts that the curriculum has, even the toughest ones to understand, and she’s always available for extra help. 

While Quick Quiz Friday is not quite the highlight of the class, getting to do many labs has been awesome because we get to learn in a fun way. My favorite lab so far has been making Christmas ornaments, where we used Hydrochloric Acid to create a design on a thin iron sheet. For this, we got to pick Christmas designs from the internet, then cut them out, and place them onto an iron sheet, covered by masking tape. We then had to meticulously cut out our designs on the masking tape, leaving our design fully exposed to the Hydrochloric Acid, which made the iron change from silver-colored to bronze, leaving our design on the iron sheet. After leaving them to dry for a bit, we got to bring them home, and personally, I put mine on display right in the middle of my Christmas tree. Overall, while AP Chemistry is by far the most difficult class I’ve taken, and has caused some stress at times, I have truly grown to love the class through the amazing teaching of Mrs. Baker, and my amazing classmates! 

By Kristina Klauzinski ‘24, Assistant Sports Editor

24kklauzinski@montroseschool.org