In May 2023, juniors Jack Jaminski and Dev Shah became one of 35 students in the world to earn a perfect score on the AP Macroeconomics exam and one of 44 to perform identically in AP Microeconomics, respectively.

Around the world, 175,000 students took the 2023 AP Macroeconomics exam while 88,000 students opted to take its related counterpart, the AP Microeconomics exam. According to the College Board, in 2022, only an extremely slim 0.02 percent of all AP Macroeconomics test takers managed to earn the coveted perfect score, while an even smaller 0.005 percent of AP Microeconomics test takers were able to receive the same distinction. 

Junior Jack Jaminski reminisced about the moment he first discovered the news that he had indeed passed the AP Macroeconomics exam without missing a single point. 

“I got an email at 8 in the morning on a school day while I was emailing myself a link to make sure I had a Google form ready for DECA,” Jaminski said. “While I was waiting for it [the form] to show up, I was reading my email. I almost skipped it [the congratulatory message], it was an AP email. I was like, ‘Oh, it’s probably just another scholarship or whatever, like one of those raffles.’ But then I actually decided to read it and I figured out what happened. I was in shock because there was only a 0.02 percent [chance of it happening]. It was a big accomplishment.”

At Niles North, AP Economics is offered as a yearlong social studies elective to both sophomores and seniors, with the first semester covering Microeconomics, analyzing the financial behavior of individuals on a personal level, and the second semester covering Macroeconomics, exploring the principles of large-scale economic factors that affect the general population. Although the majority of students enrolled in the course tend to be seniors, Jack and Dev did not allow their younger age to hinder them from achieving success.

AP Economics teacher Sarah Stucky reflected on Jack and Dev’s remarkably diligent work ethic within the classroom environment, which according to her, was made evident even at the beginning of the 2022-2023 school year.

“AP Econ is a really interesting class because there’s a lot of seniors and then I always get a couple of sophomores,” Stucky said. “I’m never quite sure what is going to happen to the sophomores in the beginning because the seniors are all big, loud, sure of themselves, and used to being in school, and the sophomores kind of hang out in the back corner, which is what they [Jack Jaminski and Dev Shah] did too. But by the time they took their first test, they distinguished themselves as being really serious students who had a strong grasp of economics.”

In order to help gain a solid understanding of the course, Junior Dev Shah shared some of the most useful study techniques he utilized.

“Honestly, I just read the textbook every day and watched the videos [Ms. Stucky] would assign us,” Shah said. “We had this thing called Mods, which had videos, the textbook, and questions, and I just kept doing those until I actually understood [the concept]. If I didn’t get something, I would usually talk to my friends about it because Jack [Jaminski] was sitting right next to me and he would help me out, so we would work together.”

Both students earned the admiration of their predominantly Senior classmates for their profound knowledge of financial concepts, as well as their dedicated willingness to help navigate their peers through the perceivably difficult elements of the course. 

“After a test, I’d put the numbers of the most frequently missed problems on the board and the students met in pairs, then quads, then as a whole class consensus, and when the whole class consensus came to the correct answer of the question, then that was the curve for the test,” Stucky said. “There were a couple of times when we were doing these test corrections and the kids refused. And I was like, ‘Why?’ And they said, ‘Dev’s gone.’ Another time, Jack was on a DECA trip to Florida and the class Facetimed him in the middle of test corrections just so he could explain the problems to the class. And there was Jack, at Disney World, Facetiming his Econ class.”

Oftentimes, AP Economics is perceived to be a challenging course, leaving many students scratching their heads in confusion attempting to grasp its core concepts. However, Shah firmly believes that learning to apply one’s knowledge of economics outside the classroom setting is one of the most effective ways of keeping oneself engaged with the material.

“If you don’t like [AP Economics] as much, I would say you should try and find real-life applications for it,” Shah said. “If you see what you’re learning in real life, you’ll be excited that you’re actually using what you’re learning and see that it’s important.”

In the meantime, both Jack and Dev are contemplating using the strong financial knowledge they have acquired to translate to careers related to the field of economics. It’s safe to say that for these young scholars, the future ahead looks bright.