Abigail Flyers has achieved perfection.
The Roslyn High School junior took the AP Psychology Exam in May 2015, an exam scored on a one to five scale with five equivalent to an ‘A’ grade in a college course.
Flyer not only received the maximum score on each portion of the exam but also accomplished a rare feat — being one of four students in the world to earn every point possible on the Advance Placement psychology exam.
“I didn’t even know that this was a thing,” said Flyer nonchalantly.
“I came out of the exams thinking that was a really long test and it was my first AP,” she said. “I came out of the exams thinking that was a really long test and it was my first AP.”
Flyers was honored by the Roslyn School Board of Trustees for her outstanding performance on Thursday.
Flyers, a sophomore at the time the exam was taken, appeared before the board with her parents in tow and Andrea Pearlman, her psychology teacher.
“I’m so honored that I get to be the one to do this one,” said Allison Brown, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction at Roslyn High School. “Abby was my student when I was a principal at East Hills and if you had said who would get this award, I probably would have put my money on Abby.”
A letter to Roslyn High principal Scott Andrews from Trevor Packer, who heads College Board’s AP programs, lauded Flyer’s accomplishment, saying her outstanding accomplishment is likely a direct reflection of the top quality education being offered at Roslyn High School.
In 2015, Flyer took her first and only advanced placement class which quickly became her favorite class.
“I’m really thankful to Ms. Pearlman for being such a great teacher,” Flyer said. “I really got to look forward to that part of my day because it never felt like work to me.”
Pearlman, a social studies teacher at Roslyn High School praised Flyer’s work ethic and passion for the subject.
“I’d like to take all the credit but Abby was really the outstanding student that she is,” Pearlman said.
Of the nearly 4.5 million AP exams taken worldwide taken worldwide in all 37 subject categories, only 322 students earned a perfect score according to Roslyn school officials.
The school said in a statement that while many Roslyn High students earn a top score of 5 on AP exams each year, this will be the first time that the school had been notified by the College Board that one of its students had a perfect score on any exam.
“I felt good and I felt like all the work I had put in had accumulated,” Flyer said.
Flyer, whose inspiration is David G. Myers, the famed author of numerous psychology books, said she wants to become a psychologist.
“Even though my teachers ask me if I would consider a career in physics and the hard sciences, I always tell them I love psych,” Flyer said. “I want to be a psychologist.”
Flyer was also one of the 55 students who won gold medal at the Long Island Math Fair held yearly at Hofstra University in 2013.
