The Roseville Joint Union High School District board voted on and approved AP Human Geography’s potential to fulfill the sophomore social science requirement during the board meeting on Apr. 12.

According to AP Human Geography teacher Cari Oberreuter, the discussion was prompted by a student from Antelope High school who suggested that the class be able to fulfill the requirement. The target for the implementation of the requirement is the 2016-17 school year.

“It’s going to meet the World Studies requirement for graduation,” Oberreuter said. “Well it’s in discussion. The request originated from Antelope High School and I know the principals have been discussing that change.”

World Studies teacher Mark Andreatta believe that the course will need additional revision in order to accurately meet the standard of a world studies class. but acknowledges it would be a good AP alternative for AP European History.

“The background knowledge for sophomores is going to be a bit tough,” Andreatta said. “If it was a yearlong class then great there’s no problem … I don’t know about it fulfilling the sophomore [World Studies] requirements, again that would require a great deal of discussion between all five of the high schools.”

According to Andreatta, AP Human Geography is missing some of the background information found in AP European History.

“The history component is somewhat there but it doesn’t really cover the scope of history that AP Euro does, plus it’s a different skill set as well,” Andreatta said. “AP Euro is the toughest AP class there is for social studies and it’s the first one they get as a sophomore.”

Freshman Preet Badwal believes that if Human Geography was an alternative AP class for AP Euro, then the lesser workload would lead students away from taking AP Euro.

“I feel like a lot more people would take [Human Geography] because it’s easier. I feel like a lot more kids would take the AP exam and you’d have more students getting college credit,” Badwal said.

According to Oberreuter, it wouldn’t be possible to make the course a yearlong because that would require changing the curriculum, which would ultimately be left up to College Board.

“I think with doing a yearlong then you’re changing the class and then it’s not Human Geo, it’s Human Geo and something else and then it wouldn’t have to change at just Roseville but it would have to change at all the sites that teach it,” Oberreuter said.

Oberetteur believes that changing the course to be yearlong is a whole different discussion that is not currently on the table.

“This isn’t just a site decision because there are three schools in the district that teach it: Antelope, Woodcreek and Roseville. So to change it to meet content and be a yearlong it would have to change on a district level, and that not the current proposal,” Oberreuter said. “The current proposal is to see if it can meet the requirement of a world studies class.”

Even if faced with upcoming revisions, Andretta believes Human Geography is a fulfilling course for students.

“I wish it was a required course all across the board,” Andretta said. “It’s the best current events class that we could offer to all of our students. Better than anything we do in the other … history class. We talk about what’s going on in the world today, discussion of culture, land use, economics.”