<p>My school only offers like 5 total AP classes. We only have about 750 kids in our school, and only juniors and seniors are allowed to take them.</p>
<p>I’ve taken 3 of those 5, and it was wonderful. Passed the one last hear and waiting for the results from the other two. However, basically anyone can take a few of the AP classes, and only a select few actually do well in them. For AP Calc this year, we only had 12 kids in our class. But out of those 12, only 3 of us actually took the AP exam seriously. So, because there were no requirements except for having completed all the prerequisite math courses, the whole AP path kinda failed there. </p>
<p>But for AP Lit, however, we have 25 kids, and most of us went through a carefully monitored Honors English course through high school to prepare us for everything. A few people didn’t go through all the honors courses, and some didn’t go through it at all, but they turned out okay. </p>
<p>So, at least in a small, country town, not a lot-a lot take AP classes, but even out of the few that do, only a few actually do well. I guess that shows the integrity of the courses lol</p>
<p>I know a lot of parents here who tell their kids not to take AP classes because they may not transfer as college credit and a B on their transcript even in an AP class counts against them. I don’t understand their way of thinking. I encouraged (i.e. nagged) my kids about AP mostly because the so-called advanced classes at our school are a joke. The advanced classes move a little faster compared to ‘regular’ classes but not much. I told my kids that if they didn’t take AP classes that they would be very sorry once they got to college because they would have forgotten how to study. I really don’t care if they get the credit in college; I want them to be prepared for REAL college classes. Also, the majority of the AP teachers are much better trained and can challenge kids because the classes are usually smaller. Last year was my kids had AP World. The teacher was known to be hard and one of my DDs was balking at taking the class. She took it, did well and made a 5 on the exam. That one class gave her more confidence in her abilities and now she is not afraid of AP classes or college.</p>
<p>I am really finding this thread interesting in terms of the differences from school to school and region to region etc. </p>
<p>BC Calc is a good example. We have ~2k kids in our HS and there are only something like 20 kids in the class. Last year there were 17 I think, and there were 13 fives, 3 fours, and 1 two. This teacher is known as being one of the best in the school. On the other hand, D has taken a couple of APs where she said the teacher was horrible and she would never pass the AP test despite an A in the class, because they didn’t actually learn anything. She still managed a 3 in those but it makes me wonder about the quality of the teaching. </p>
<p>I mentioned the overall stats earlier from our HS (~50% take and of those, 70% pass). That is the highest in our very large city. The only higher figure is an IB magnet school.</p>
<p>I would love to see the breakdown done with only true open enrollment public schools included. </p>
<p>I wanted to make one final comment on grades and college acceptances. I was talking to an admissions counselor at a top “public ivy” the other day and mentioned that like many parents I struggle with wanting D2 to take challenging courses, but not too rigorous a load that she gets a B or 2. She said that it is a common misconception that students have to have a 4.0 UW to get in there, and that they accept many kids who have a few Bs in the tough APs/IBs etc.</p>
<p>drmom, it’s hard to be transparent because a lot of it is touchy-feely. I really think some days those committees look at a B+ in an AP course and say “Not good enough” and the next they’ll say “Oh that B+ is fine” for the same course. It might be forgiven because of the rigor of the rest of the schedule, a perception that the student is fabulous in some other area and stretching themselves in the B+ course. A teacher might write a letter explaining that the B+ was the highest grade they gave out, or that you have a fabulous math mind, but struggle with memorization (which is pretty much what my son’s math teacher said). My younger son also seemed to get forgiven for his mediocre Latin grades. All this stuff is really hard to predict - we just make educated guesses here on CC. :)</p>
<p>As for the definition of rigor, I think it’s a mix of comparing it to both high school courses and college courses. In that light all AP courses are generally considered more rigorous than a high school level course, APs that cover one semester of a high school course that are stretched out over a year are less rigorous than one’s that cover a whole years worth of material. When you only learn one semester’s worth of material stretched out over a year, you don’t learn anything about what the pace of college is like, though obviously you are theoretically learning higher level material than would have been covered in the typical high school course.</p>
<p>This may be part of the reason why some students who had AP calculus in high school struggle in college math – they may have had AB over one year, or AB-BC over two years, so they may not be used to how quickly a true college math course covers new material.</p>
<p>wow! how many AP classes are offered? The way it’s designed in my DD’s school, it’s virtually impossible to take an AP before junior year, and there are maybe 10 courses (including music, art and foreign languages)</p>
<p>That’s because the key criteria that USNWR uses for determining a schools’ performance is the percentage of AP tests taken. By definition, the schools that have every senior taking AP courses gets a higher ranking.</p>
<p>mathmom—I understand. You just never know what anyone is thinking…which realy gets frustrating! However, I think the goal of taking classes that are rigorous but also keeps in mind a balanced life is important; I wish that the schools would indicate that. Or, maybe it’s the HS atmosphere in some of these places…</p>
<p>D’s school has about 41 % of students taking AP Exams and an 83% pass rate on those taking the test. Our school goes by semesters, with the excpetion of AP physics, chem and bio- those classes go 27 weeks. </p>
<p>I feel like she is better prepared for college because of the way her schedule has been the last few years.</p>
<p>My boys’ high school…81% take AP Classes, with an average of 4.2 AP Classes/student. Students are required to take the AP exams, and they are paid for by the school. The pass rate is 74%. About 15% of the students qualify for free lunches. </p>
<p>Also, remember when you are talking about the rigor, most HS students juggle a number of classes, much more than college students handle at a perticular semester. So even though a perticular subject is extended over a year period, they do a number of such subjects in a year. So they definitly are well prepared.</p>
<p>2011 Total U.S. Grade 11-12 AP Students – 1,926,204
(took at least one AP test)
2012 Total Enrolled U.S. Public 11-12 Students – 6,786,772
% of AP Students (calculated) – 28.3%
National Pass rate (3 or higher, all tests) – 57.5%</p>
<p>So approximately 15% of high school juniors and seniors are passing college-level exams after appropriate instruction. This is not a number I find surprising.</p>
<p>I don’t see any evidence that the AP curriculum has been “diluted” – the text books I have seen have all been college-level and the exams ask for college-level analysis of essay questions. Some high schools deliver curriculum more slowly than the equivalent college-level course might proceed (and half-college-speed has long been typical for high school languages and math), but this does not mean the evaluative standards have somehow declined.</p>
<p>Here in Florida, having a large number of students in advanced courses helps the school’s grade, so there is a good possibility that some students are scheduled into classes, or encouraged to go into advanced classes that they may not be prepared for to increase the school’s stats. Chances are those students won’t take a lot of those classes, but they would still count toward that percentage.</p>
<p>anniezz–our high school offers all of the AP courses available (32 I think). We have about 2000 students in the high school and a large number of kids taking the advanced classes all along. There were 12 sections of AP Bio last year and 3 of those sections were “double” sections so 15 total sections-so about 450 kids out of about 550 in the class. Biology is a required course so that is partly why there are so many AP sections.</p>
<p>The public school d attended is a magnet for the highest achieving students in the district: by offering a fairly large number of ap courses, by offering curriculum written by teachers which is more rigorous that ap courses( course is accepted for credit at the university of Washington- without separate test), and by having an extremely strong music program.</p>
<p>Some students take courses like ap calc in 9th grade, she didn’t take any until 10th grade when she took Ap Euro history. Students in most ap classes are required to take tests, the cost is only covered if you are FRL college board reduces the fee for FRL students to $53, .( my impression is that teachers are pushed hard to have students take tests by the principal/district administration. Some teachers are experienced and push back on that requirement, other teachers- aren’t)</p>
<p>There are generally three tracks of many classes, regular, honors & ap. Her school allowed students to decide if they wanted to take Ap for many classes- since she had an IEP in middle school I didn’t think about her taking ap, until she took honors history in 9th grade and the teacher recommended ap for 10th. She took 4 classes (6?) altogether and did well, but compared to her other classes that weren’t ap, such as the class that the Uw accepted, I can’t say that the ap courses were noticeably more in depth- broader maybe.</p>
<p>I liked that the school allowed students to decide which track to be on and for which courses, which was why she was attending that school.
She had an IEP because she has learning differences and some subjects were a big challenge for her. ( especially when combined with the districts badly written curriculum)</p>
<p>Other schools in the district required students to be above average in all areas before they could try advanced classes. I appreciated that her school tried to support her where she needed it & challenge her where she needed that.</p>
<p>Now however with the increase of rating systems in high schools ( Newsweek & Washington post), as well as us news, more schools are adding ap classes.
For example while 40% took ap Euro history in 10th grade at Roosevelt high school, the principal decided that all sophomores should take an Ap class to “clean the slate”.
So he cut Euro, and replaced it with Ap human geography. But as far as I know, students are not required to take the test.</p>