Dartmouth College Ending AP Credit

Colleges and Universities A-Z Dartmouth College
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<p>Not according to Dartmouth or most Profs or HS classmates, friends, and relatives who attended Dartmouth or its academic peers. </p>

<p>Judging by what I’ve seen firsthand from college classmates, AP coverage was pretty hit or miss even if they scored 5s. A lot also depended on the quality/rigor of high school attended. </p>

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<p>A lot depends on the academic level and work ethic of the overall student body in a given class, especially considering most teachers/instructors/Profs teach to the middle 50% of the class. Only a few exceptional/harsh educators would allow the top 1/3 or even top 10% to set the pace and expect the bottom 2/3s or 90% respectively to keep up or sink. </p>

<p>In light of the that, on average and with few exceptions, the Ivy league course will most likely be more rigorous than the other two choices. </p>

<p>As for comparing HS AP courses/curricula vs community college courses, depends on the quality/rigor of the teacher/instructor/curricula at the given high school or community college course and the individual HS or community college. </p>

<p>HS AP courses quality/rigor range from being equivalent to their elite university equivalents to being so watered down that even if students received a 5 on the AP exam, they end up being shocked at their college’s courses and end up overwhelmed to the point of receiving crummy or even flunking grades. This also isn’t restricted solely to public HS. </p>

<p>The quality of community colleges and their courses are also quite variable ranging from equivalent to their Ivy/elite peers to being little more than effective 13th grade for the remediation of the most academically marginal students. </p>

<p>My personal impressions, however, is that most community colleges lean more towards the latter than the former. However, I’ll admit my impressions are limited to mostly the East coast, NE Ohio, and the SF/LA areas of California.</p>

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<p>Dartmouth’s existing AP and other transfer credit policy is here:
[AP</a>, IB, A-Level, & Transfer Credits & Placement](<a href=“Apply to Dartmouth | Dartmouth Admissions”>Apply to Dartmouth | Dartmouth Admissions)</p>

<p>Note that some of the AP scores only give unspecified credit, not specific course credit. Presumably, this means that the credit can be used only where a free elective would be needed.</p>

<p>AP psychology is not given any credit at all.</p>

<p>Dartmouth has its own placement tests in many subjects:
[Placement</a> Exam Schedule 2011](<a href=“http://www.dartmouth.edu/~orientation/placement/placementinformation.html]Placement”>This Page Has Moved)</p>

<p>So the effect of the policy change is not all that great, except for those students who may have wanted to use some of the AP credit to graduate a quarter or two earlier than they otherwise would have. Students mainly concerned about advanced placement (i.e. not having to repeat what they know well) but are not trying to graduate early are unlikely to find any actual effect of the policy change.</p>

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<p>Almost any four year school requires more than 4 upper division courses to graduate; even the most generous-with-AP-credit schools grant only lower division subject credit for AP scores. There is typically also a senior residency requirement.</p>

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<p>It depends a lot on the specific courses* and instructors. Obviously, getting a 5 on the AP test indicates mastery of what is on the AP test, but there can be variation between “just enough to get a 5” and “know the material in considerably greater breadth and depth than a 5 indicates”.</p>

<p>*Regarding “Ivy League courses”, Harvard Math Ma-Mb and Harvard Math 55a-55b are hugely different courses, for example.</p>

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<p>CCs serve students ranging from the marginal ones needing extensive remediation to the bright but poor ones aiming to transfer to four year schools. So their (for example) math offerings may range from elementary algebra (i.e. high school algebra 1) to multivariable calculus, linear algebra, and differential equations (college sophomore level math for students intending to transfer to a four year school as a math, physics, or engineering major). Of course, only the more advanced of this range of courses are accepted for transfer credit by the four year schools.</p>

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<p>At MIT (I know, not an Ivy) a 5 on an AP exam gives you the opportunity to take an MIT exam to place out of a course. This seems fair.</p>

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<p>Catria, re your earlier comment, yes, I was referring to Ontario’s U-level courses, which are uniformly u-prep curriculae. As you noted yourself, Quebec’s CEGEP system also contains a university-level prep that as you pointed out, perhaps more closely matches university rigor

Britain’s O-levels are indeed a better example of the phenomenon I’m trying to describe, which is that of a quantifiable national u-prep curriculum.</p>

<p>My point about APs is that from what I’ve witnessed in the US in terms of unequal funding across districts even in the same state and dramatic disparity in delivery quality, APs at least offer access to a form of standardized curriculae to school districts who might otherwise devote all their scarce funding to instead serving the mid range or failing population that represents the majority and further “ignore” it’s most academically talented kids. </p>

<p>The difference is that it’s prepared by a separate, self-financing entity that of course seems interested in sustaining itself, and ergo keeps broadening the pool, instead of having the funds we pay in taxes for education used to develop a uniform advanced curriculum.</p>

<p>So it’s a blessing and a curse because offering APs gives a district the opportunity to appear to cater to advanced students (and a mechanism by which to tell if its teachers are delivery the material or at least covering it via the test scores) but the ubiquity of AP also means ultimately it could and perhaps has been curricularly diluted, though its existence prevents states from developing truly standard advanced curriculums and in service.</p>

<p>To give you an example: my son attended a public GT magnet program that was known for its inter-disciplinary approach to humanities study. All of its classes were viewed by colleges familiar with the program to be honors/prep/advanced. Then a generous funder supplied the opportunity for the school to move toward IB accreditation. During the process, the school first implemented AP (to much parental outcry, since that meant no longer pairing/crossing disciplines in delivery structure.) Ostensibly, it did so to ready all staff equally for the imminent transition, and in the interim, still provide students with “advanced” curriculum to demonstrate talent to colleges. The school is now an accredited IB program, which more closely matches its original inter-disciplinary emphasis.</p>

<p>In this case, the curse part of AP was simply that for a while, it had to trump the unique, rigorous and preferred original interdisciplinary curriculum – much more teaching to the test.</p>

<p>But in a cash-strapped public school district, it is difficult to fund gt programs adequately without rancor, it appears, and even more difficult to in-service the teachers and type of delivery quality produced, because other board-and-union-inspired shenanigans can get in the way.</p>

<p>Nothing short of a national, standardized university prep curriculum would come close to communicating readiness to rigorous colleges as well as AP exam results can, and with rampant grade inflation and such a disparity in quality among districts and states, I would suggest that AP is therefore useful, when triangulated with SAT and GPA, rank and school reputation to assess a student’s preparedness.</p>

<p>That said, I’ve always been of the mind that I’d prefer my son was taught college material by college professors, and felt the “save money” rep of AP was more just a way to sell it to parents :wink: My greater concern was for students to leave high school without knowledge or habit gaps that would hurt them at the university level, and I’m not clear that really happens if everybody is scrambling to get college credit in high school :wink: </p>

<p>But at rigorous schools, even other college courses should probably be scrutinized. Eg as a dual enrolled student in HS, my son had an A in a subject taken at a local four year university that transferred for general credit but did not fulfill his grad requirement. Good thing too, because he actually had to work his tail ff just to pass the equivalent class at his university now, and it was the foundation of a sequence he might not have mastered had he been allowed to skip it due to the university credit ;)</p>

<p>I like the idea of rewarding credit for AP after successful completion of the next corse in the sequence! Great common-sense answer to what is otherwise a conundrum.</p>

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<p>Depends on the subject:
[MIT</a> Class of 2016: Academics - College Board Advanced Placement Credit](<a href=“http://web.mit.edu/firstyear/2016/subjects/ap.html]MIT”>http://web.mit.edu/firstyear/2016/subjects/ap.html)</p>

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<p>AP credits have become a debased currency now that so many students have them. I think we’ll be seeing more colleges of Dartmouth’s selectivity eliminating or limiting AP credit (i.e. using it only for placement, or limiting credit to electives that don’t fulfill program requirements). These colleges will be the ones where applicants already assume they will be spending four years in undergrad anyway (not 3, not 6) and are not trying to save time or money on credits. Because of the nature of its applicant/customer base, Dartmouth loses nothing by not accommodating AP credits.</p>

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<p>I personally believe that Darmouth is doing this because of the financial implications. Like most people wrote previously, why not administer a placement exam to test readiness?
The same argument they are using for AP could also go for SAT scores. I am sure lecturers are complaining about the lower turn out of students in entry level courses. Students that get into Darmouth have most likely taken a substantial amount of AP courses which automatically lives most of these courses low in number. $$$$$$$</p>

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<p>Actually, lower-ranked colleges that are trying to attract applicants tend to have more generous AP credit policies than higher ranked schools. A school like Dartmouth does not need to cater to AP students in order to get good applicants. Many applicants will, of course, have AP credit because that is the de facto curriculum at many affluent suburban public high schools across this country. However, prep schools and magnet schools often have a non-AP, or even anti-AP, culture. A college like Dartmouth, that offers an elite four-year, full-time, residential experience as its market product, does not need to worry about catering to the student who wants to limit time in college to fewer than four years, or who sees a college education as a process of acquiring credits efficiently toward a degree. There is nothing wrong with any of these approaches; different colleges cater to different student goals. I doubt that Dartmouth’s decision will have a significant impact on its applicant pool or its curriculum.</p>

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<p>Please name the departments at D which have a strict schedule of courses starting with “Intro to X” and progressing onwards. Then tell us which of those departments have a corresponding AP course. </p>

<p>I think you will find that the departments in question are all foreign language departments. And there is no way that a foreign language department is going to complain that students who achieved a 5 on the AP exam are not being required to start the language all over again. It simply makes no sense. In the other departments, there are a variety of options at differing levels.</p>

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<p>“Students that [who] get into Dar[t]mouth have most likely taken a substantial amount of AP courses[,] which automatically lives [leaves?] most of these courses low in number.”</p>

<p>I try to restrain myself from commenting on bad writing in posts, but, if you are going to complain about being denied college credits, please prove you are capable of writing at a college level. </p>

<p>For extra credit, please identify the mistakes in the quoted sentence that I did not correct.</p>

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<p>A lot of the schools that are generous with credit units are public schools, who want to get students (at least in-state ones) through as quickly as possible (graduating early, or avoiding graduating late), so that they use the minimum amount of in-state discounted tuition subsidy in the process of getting their bachelor’s degrees. These schools may also have a higher percentage of non-wealthy students, for whom trimming a quarter or semester of college costs out of their bachelor’s degree program may be a significant consideration. (Dartmouth’s percentage of students with Pell Grants is only 16%, versus 39% for UCLA.)</p>

<p>Subject credit and placement for AP tests may be a different story from credit units, though. (E.g. UCLA is generous with AP credit units, but stingy with subject credit.)</p>

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And there you have it in a nutshell. I will join NJSue’s prediction. Kind of the same thing that has happened to BAs since the 60s ;)</p>

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<p>This will hurt Darthmouth’s already small Engineering program.</p>

<p>Whether Dartmouth “gets away” with this depends on whether peer colleges follow suit. My guess is that peer colleges will take a more nuanced approach, keeping recognition for the more rigorous AP exams like BC Calculus and Physics C, and discounting (as most already do) such well-known easier APs like English and Psychology. Dartmouth has erred in letting a poorly designed study performed by a possibly self-interested Psychology department dictate poor policy across the college.</p>

<p>For average colleges, AP exams may very well reflect the level of instruction. Certainly, as has been repeatedly pointed out, public universities are motivated to recognize as many APs as they can.</p>

<p>And no recognition should be given for just taking a course with the name AP in its title, without taking the AP exam.</p>

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<p>Oh really? From another post:</p>

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<p>^^^ Passing rate does not equate to rigor and difficulty. Or else, by your reasoning, AB Calculus would be more rigorous than BC Calculus …</p>

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<p>Oh, it is not “my” reasoning. I completely agree that passing rate does not equal degree of difficulty. Obviously, we all know that the population actually taking the test has a lot to do with the passing rate. The high passing rate in Chinese, for example, has much to do with the bogus practice of people for whom Chinese was a first language taking a test aimed at people who have only studied it for 4 years, starting at zero.</p>

<p>However, let me quote you:</p>

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<p>You cite the supposed difficulty of the EXAM, not the content of the COURSE or whether it actually covers the material of a college course, or whether the AP course is worthy of granting actual credit at the level of an elite college. Apparently you think that virtually anyone can “pass” the English AP exams. Equally apparently, you are mistaken.</p>

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<p>^^^ Wow, somebody’s gotten all defensive and riled up. Listen, I am not going to argue with you, but if you really feel that strongly about this, go convince Harvard, Yale and Princeton that an AP of 5 in Psychology is as rigorous as an AP of 5 in BC Calculus.</p>

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<p>Not really. If anything, I’d think many instructors at schools like Dartmouth would be relieved. Many instructors at Ivy/elite universities, especially tenured Profs with strong research records tend to regard teaching intro courses as the worst part of the chore of teaching undergrads. </p>

<p>They’re much more likely to prefer teaching graduate courses and intermediate/advanced courses, especially those in their research specialization.</p>

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<p>Let me correct that for you, as “gets away” intimates the school is actually wrong about this:</p>

<p>Whether Dartmouth is seen as the courageous pioneer that values academic integrity it is will depend on whether peer colleges follow suit.</p>