The Scoop on Advanced Placement

The College Board released its annual report on high school Advanced Placement classes today. Among other things, it shows how California students stack up against their counterparts in other states (pretty well) and whether they're getting any better (they aren't). But what we really wanted to know was: What's the easiest AP test to pass? What's the hardest?

It's a little hard to say. Nationally, the class with the highest percentage of students scoring a 5 -- the highest grade possible -- in the 2006-07 school year was ...

Chinese Language and Culture. An astounding 81% of the students taking the class got a 5, and hardly any got a 1, the lowest grade. Worth noting, though, is that this was the first year Chinese was offered, and nearly 90% of the students taking it were Asian, Asian-American or Pacific Islander, making it seem possible that many of those 5s were scored by students whose families speak Chinese.

Next to Chinese, the classes with the highest percentages of 5s were Calculus BC (43.5%) and Japanese Language and Culture (43.4%). Calculus BC is the second year of AP Calculus, so it's a good bet that any student who's gotten that far is on pretty firm footing in math.

So what are the really EASY classes? You'd think the most popular classes might also be the easiest, but that's far from true. English Literature and Composition, the second most popular AP class, is also one of the toughest, awarding 5s to only 7% of its students, and U.S. Government and Politics, the fifth most popular class, was even stingier -- just 6% of the students aced that.

The hardest classes? Well, the classes with the highest percentages of 1s included Computer Science AB (30.3%), Environmental Science (30.7%) and Human Geography (32.9%). Ouch.

The lesson seems to be that there are no easy As in AP. There was one class, though, that stood out as the least likely for students to fail: Studio Art. Only 5.8% of the students taking that wound up with 1s. Fair warning, though: It isn't a cakewalk. Most students wound up with 2s and 3s.

--Mitchell Landsberg

Comments

[Ron]

In the California school system, any student that wishes to take college classes for credit can enroll at and attend a community college. Even where logistics are an issue, web-based classes are offered.Why are we double spending by offering AP classes at the high school level while we are having a fiscal crisis?

[Allen]

AP classes simply add an advanced level of classes to the traditional high school curiculum. This is critical to motivate our best students. AP courses do not cost the schools additional money except that many schools don't have qualified teachers. (Teachers that can't handle AP level work really shouldn't be teaching high school at all.) The movement toward AP and other similar advanced courses is a laudable effort to raise the standards of our schools back towards that of our worldwide competition.

[joshua penso]

AP is not a good thing. We need to return to what was done in the past for gifted students-send them to college early at age 16. The problem with AP is that most colleges no longer give credit for it even if you get a 5 on the test. Thus what it really does is make students waste a lot of work and a lot of their lives when they could just get real course credit at the local community college.

[Kate]

Yeah, AP is such a waste of time. Who do those smart kids think they are, taking more advanced classes?

I would say that the utility of AP varies. I took AP-level courses in high school, but took none of the AP tests, because I didn't see the point. And for my college, there wasn't much of one. I might have placed out of an introductory course or two, but I would have had to take the same number of credit units. In other words, it wouldn't have reduced my time in college at all.

For students who can use them to accelerate the college career, AP courses may help them save money.

Then, of course, there are those students who might take the courses purely because they are more challenging. I don't see anything wrong with that, either.

[Ellen]

Kate, AP gives students a way to be in classes with other students who are serious about their educations.
And you should have taken the tests. They are an indicator of what you have learned and are helpful experience for college.

American students are so non-appreciative of academic rigor. It is so sad.

[Kate]

Ellen, you're making a sweeping--and highly inaccurate--assumption about my motivation, and I don't think your interpretation of benefits to the test holds true in my case. Also, you're missing my sarcasm.

Personally, I can't believe that there are people commenting here that American schools provide advanced students with too much education.

[Millie]

I'm with you, Kate. Anyone who thinks we offer "too many" options to our academically gifted K-12 students in the US has no idea what happens in classroms every day. As a teacher too, few things are more frustrating than having to make a whole first grade class "learn" what 1/2 means when three or four kids don't understand what "two equal parts" means, and three or four others are ready to talk about 2/4 and 4/8 also being other names for 1/2, and that when you multiply fractions, the result is smaller, not larger. You are teaching at the level of maybe half the class, way over the heads of 1/4, and way beneath about 1/4. And all the money and effort right now goes to bringing it down to the lowest 1/4 so they can "catch up", and none of it goes to keeping the top 1/4 challenged.

If G&T kids were counted as "special ed" (which they arguably could be), we would have to pay for their "free and appropriate public education" until they were 21 too, just like we do special ed. That would mean paying for their college completely, while we also pay for the special ed kids to have until age 21 to finish high school. I am not complaining about "having" to pay this either. If we don't pay for all of our kids to get an appropriate education for them as individuals K-12, we end up paying for prisons and welfare for the rest of their lives. I'd rather see ALL of the kids reach their full potential, including the smartest and brightest who can produce great societal benefit as fulfilled and productive adults.

[Kate]

"I'd rather see ALL of the kids reach their full potential, including the smartest and brightest who can produce great societal benefit as fulfilled and productive adults."

I completely agree, Millie. I'm always amazed at the attitude that says that the smart kids can teach themselves. That argument means that smart and/or motivated kids are less entitled to an education--and that makes no sense at all.

Somehow as a society we've arrived at a place where it's not acceptable to acknowledge that some people are smarter than others--we're all supposed to be equally smart. But we're not, just like we're not all the same height. We should be enabling kids to make the most of who they are as individuals.

[joshua penso]

Kate and Millie, I agree with what you both said but it's very important that kids get college credit for college or college equivalent courses. If they slave during their teenage youth on time consuming and difficult classes and not get credit for it later on, that I don't see the point of all this. I took six AP classes and when I got into college I spent the first year and a half retaking the same coursework. What was the point? Plus they were milking me and my parents for money. If I got the credit I deserved I would have graduated a lot sooner and been more focused. Thank you.

[Kate]

Like I said, Joshua, I wouldn't have graduated sooner. My point is not that AP is pointless. It is that each student must determine the value for him- or herself, based on their high school experience and the college they will attend.

And all of this, of course, assumes that all AP classes are created equal. They are not. I took AP English throughout high school, but it was clear that my senior-year teacher did not prepare us for the test. Why? Well, for starters, she spent 20 minutes of each class period getting coffee. She told us not to use Cliffs Notes, and then read them aloud to us as her lectures. So it really didn't seem worthwhile to me to take a test for which I was unprepared and from which I would get no tangible benefits. My SAT scores placed me out of the preliminary English courses, but nothing but taking more than a full load of classes in college would have helped me graduate early.

Similarly, my husband took many AP classes and could tell which teachers were preparing him for the test and which were not. He took the tests for which he had been prepared, and did not take others.

That's why I disagree with the poster who said, "And you should have taken the tests. They are an indicator of what you have learned and are helpful experience for college. American students are so non-appreciative of academic rigor. It is so sad. "

My husband and I both made informed decision based on our experiences and analytic abilities. That doesn't mean that either one of us was "non-appreciative of academic rigor." It means we knew it when we saw it, and acted accordingly.

As for a blanket statement that I should have taken the tests, I guess that maybe taking the test would have changed my life. Since not taking the AP test, I've graduated from college, earned a master's degree, successfully advanced through one career before changing to another and advancing there as well, and been a returning champion on Jeopardy. Clearly not taking an AP test has held me back.

[joshua penso]

Kate, it is obvious to me by the way you write that you are a very intelligent person. I completely agree with you that taking the AP tests or not taking them in fact makes no difference especially since colleges and universities don't even give credit for it. So what are we to do now if we are parents and have our own kids? I intend to encourage my son and daughter to either graduate from high school early or take classes at community college part time to avoid this AP scam.

[Kate]

I don't have kids, but I'd do what my parents did--encourage my children to get the best education they can. Some rewards are intangible.

And plenty of colleges do offer tangible rewards for AP scores. Mine just wasn't one of them.