Sun staff
A Milford High School student was recently notified that she had achieved a perfect score on the Advanced Placement United States Government exam she took in May, which makes her one of only 25 students in the world to do so this year.
AP exams are college-level tests administered by the College Board that assess what a student has learned in an AP class, according to a bulletin from the high school. Students can earn college credit if they pass the AP exam.
Chloe Elleman, now a senior, learned in July that she had earned a 5 on the test, which is the highest score category, and she received a letter from the College Board in mid-October informing her of the perfect score.
“I was just proud of her because Chloe is one of the kindest, most hardworking students; she has so much integrity,” Anna O’Neill, who teaches AP U.S. History and American Studies at the school, said.
O’Neill was Elleman’s AP U.S. Government teacher last year.
“Anytime they had any type of activity or project, Chloe always went above and beyond,” O’Neill said. “And she didn’t just impress me, but her peers were always so impressed with her as well.”
She added, “It made me so happy because it’s not just a student who is naturally smart, because she is – she’s very smart, she’s very bright – but in addition to that, I know that a lot of hard work went into earning that achievement, and so I was just so proud of her because she’s just such a good person too.”
Elleman, who also took the AP Biology exam last year and the AP U.S. History exam in 2015, said she was excited when she learned the good news.
“I was surprised,” she added. “I was also very thankful to have such a wonderful teacher in Mrs. O’Neill who prepared me really well for the test.”
Leading up to the exam, Elleman rewrote her notes into an outline from which she studied.
“There are four essays on the AP exam, so I did a lot of practice essays,” she said. “That took up about five weeks of time; other than that, I didn’t really do much.”
O’Neill, who has taught social studies for the past 14 years, has never had a student earn a perfect score on the AP U.S. Government exam before. She went on to say that she believes Elleman is the first student at the high school to earn a perfect score on an AP exam.
“In general, a perfect score is incredibly rare,” O’Neill said, adding, “She put in the time; the hours, upon hours, upon hours, I know that she spent working with the material and studying the material and learning it to be able to know it that well.”
Despite earning extraordinary marks on the government exam, Elleman said her favorite subject fluctuates from year to year.
“Last year I liked biology, and the year before that I liked U.S. History, so it just depends,” she said.
Elleman, who recently turned 18, used her knowledge in U.S. Government to help her as she cast her vote during this year’s presidential election.
“It was really helpful having that knowledge about the government and judging which candidates to vote for,” she said.
Looking ahead, Elleman plans to attend college and go on to medical school; she hopes to become a pediatric doctor.
“I really like science, and I like helping people, and I volunteer at Children’s Hospital so I’ve gotten to see a little bit of what it’s like,” she said.
In that same vein, Elleman went on to share her advice to other students preparing for exams.
“I would just say, just always try to do your best and not worry about what other people think of you,” she said. “Whether you do well, or not well, it doesn’t matter just as long as you did your best.”