<p>From looking at the results for schools in my district, it would seem that adding material to AP courses that is not included in the official syllabus is not a problem (either that, or the teachers aren't admitting to it).</p>
<p>In our school system, additional curriculum is often added to AP courses to enable the courses to satisfy two requirements. For example, a unit on state and local government, not part of the AP curriculum, is added to AP U.S. Government and Politics so that students can use this course to satisfy the state requirement for a government course, which must include coverage of state and local government. Our AP U.S. Government and Politics course passed muster.</p>
<p>Similarly, we have several combined AP/IB courses, where IB material is added to the AP curriculum in order to enable students to prepare for either (or both) of the exams. These courses passed, too.</p>
<p>I'm glad that AP isn't vetoing courses of this type. Such courses help school systems offer their students a lot of curriculum flexibility.</p>
<p>So lets say that you are in a class that did not pass muster as an AP. You pay for the AP test and pass it anyway. What is the point of the audit? If colleges offer credit to home schoolers or those who self studied, then I would think that those who were in a class that did not pass the audit, but where the student passed the test anyway, would receive credit. Is this now incorrect?</p>
<p>BTW, our district has one AP class that passed, but virtually nobody scores higher than a 2. I wonder what is entailed in passing the audit.</p>
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BTW, our district has one AP class that passed, but virtually nobody scores higher than a 2. I wonder what is entailed in passing the audit.
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<p>same here. i guess maybe it is based solely on the syllabus. we had a good syllabus for that class, but we only got 1/3 of the way through it.</p>
<p>We were told it was just the syllabus that is audited, though I really wish the quality of the course(ie grades received) would be more telling.
We have two AP History teachers, one never has a kid score anything below a 4 another teacher no body gets above a 2, yet both are certified to teach it. Huh, same curriculum, such a disparity of grades.</p>
<p>The syllabus is what they can practicably examine. Some high schools still list their former slate of AP classes because the teachers are still revising the syllabuses and hope to be approved in the next round of syllabus review. Perhaps the audit process has already gotten rid of courses like "AP basketweaving" or "AP industrial arts" or whatever other silly things some high schools were labeling as AP courses when the course isn't part of the AP program at all. </p>
<p>At all the colleges I have checked, the most crucial issue is TEST SCORES on AP tests, whether or not a student has taken a course with the AP brand name label. As Marian aptly points out, some high schools will like to design both-and courses that fit more than one model syllabus (e.g., AP and IB, or AP and New York Regents) and that is fine, as far as College Board is concerned. I suppose if a college bases ADMISSION decisions on taking an AP course as such (as contrasted with submitting an AP test score) </p>
<p>that now such colleges may have an admission officer check the audit list to make sure a high school's AP course really is an AP course. That would only be fair, if high schools were formerly overlabeling wimpy courses as AP courses just to fool students, parents, and colleges. Pass rate alone is not the main thing that distinguishes a good AP course from a lousy ersatz AP course, and everyone in college admission offices knows that pass rate on the AP exams is not considered in the AP audit process.</p>
<p>My syllabus did not pass the initial audit, because the reviewers found that it was missing evidence that students are taught to consider different historiographic perspectives. I added one sentence, resubmitted, and it was approved the same day. I wonder if anyone really even looked at it the second time around.</p>
<p>I use a thoughtfully designed syllabus; most of my students say I am a good teacher, and they generally do well on the exam. I felt like a lot of the audit requirements were a waste of time (for example, writing a bibliographic citation for every single piece of supplementary material I use--close to a hundred for my APUSH course).</p>
<p>I do recall reading through a list of FAQs at the time, and CB indicated that students' scores would not be used to evaluate AP programs because that might lead to schools discouraging all but the most prepared students from even taking the exams.</p>