<p>When I look at percentage of people that got a 5 (from last year), it seems like Calc BC had over 40 percent get 5s but other tests, like APUSH and AP English Lit had below 10 percent get 5s.</p>
<p>Why is it like this? And how do they determine the cutoff line for a 5,4,3,2,1.</p>
<p>All my friends say that it is based on how other people in the country do. I disagree with them because if that was the case, how come its not just 20,20,20,20,20 percent get 5,4,3,2,1, respectively. Why is there such a huge difference in percentages?</p>
<p>Is there another way they determine the cutoff? My dad said that they might give the tests (or tests of the same difficulty) to college students beforehand and see how they do. Then the A student's averages is the cutoff for a 5, the B student's averages is the cutoff for a 4. He said that the cutoffs were determined before any high school student had even taken the test...that actually sounds more logical. </p>
<p>I also thought maybe they also used previous years cutoffs for the AP test.</p>
<p>But does anyone else know?</p>
<p>Collegeboard’s website has explanations for how they determine the scores. You could check that out. Here are a few things that I vaguely remember:</p>
<p>-I’m pretty sure the cutoff scores are different every year.
-I think they use something called “equating” to compare how strong groups of test takers are from year to year (which is why you’re not ever allowed to discuss the MC: they reuse questions over the years for this “equating” process).<br>
-I think your dad is on the right track, too. I think I remember something about college students being tested so that a 5 can correlate to an A, a 4 to a B, and so on. I don’t remember the specific details, though. </p>
<p>Like I said, you can always check out Collegeboard’s website. I am not at all sure that any of the things I just listed are correct. Sorry.</p>
<p>^ I think you are right :)</p>
<p>They do use the “equating” process which basically is comparing a section of questions that are similar to both the current and previous edition of the test. Then they establish a curve based on that i presume.</p>
<p>Dang, I wish they made the percentage higher for AP Lit, which I did not do as well on as I would have liked.</p>