yolland
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A questionable course
Editorial, Los Angeles Times
February 13, 2006
Advanced Placement (AP) courses have long held a kind of magical allure for high school students of a certain clique. What other classes offer the chance to earn college credits? But now, 50 years after the first AP test was offered, AP courses are raising concerns familiar to the College Board, which also administers the exam's older cousin, the SAT. And after an almost inexcusable delay, the University of California is asking a lot of the right questions.
Since the first AP exam in 1956, the industry has become a force unto itself. More than 15,000 U.S. schools offer at least one of the 35 AP courses, according to the College Board, which last week issued a 94-page "Advanced Placement Report to the Nation" detailing how many more students are taking and passing the courses. President Bush has even made AP courses a part of his education policy.
AP courses, however, are now less about students seeking out deeper knowledge than about kids racking up points to impress college admissions committees. Academics are increasingly concerned that, although the courses are more rigorous than average classes, their quality has grown uneven. Too many such classes emphasize memorization over research, analysis and writing. About a dozen elite high schools have stopped offering them, and some top universities have made it harder to get college credit for them.
Now the University of California, which for nearly a quarter of a century has given an extra grade point to applicants who take AP and certain honors courses, is reconsidering its AP policy. The UC regents had noble intentions when they introduced the policy in 1982. Concerned that high school students were avoiding tough courses, the board hoped to encourage students not to shy from challenging coursework. So they decided a student shouldn't be penalized for taking an AP class; a B in an AP course would count as an A in a regular class, a C as a B, and so on. (An A in an AP class was literally off the charts, allowing students to inflate their grade-point average beyond a perfect 4.0.) Since then, AP courses have proliferated as students rack up as many as they can in the nuclear arms race of grade inflation.
In 1999, the UC faculty admissions committee recommended reducing the credit that students receive for taking AP classes, citing studies that found AP courses were a mediocre predictor of UC success. It also was growing increasingly obvious that reliance on AP courses discriminated against low-income and rural students, who attended schools that offered few, if any, AP courses. Despite these solid arguments, the regents tabled the matter.
Since then, an effort to bring more AP courses to low-income and rural schools has made some inroads, although it fell back during bad budget times. And last year, a UC task force found many of the same problems with the AP policy, and pointed out that other elite universities seldom award extra AP credit to applicants.
Now the UC faculty admissions committee is preparing to recommend that the system drop the AP credit entirely. Instead, the idea is to look more comprehensively at whether students took some of the more rigorous courses available at their schools. This time, the regents should listen. AP courses can be a fine addition to a high school curriculum, and the College Board deserves credit for its role in encouraging high schools across the country to offer more high-level classes. But a class well-designed by a teacher or district can be just as valuable. In the end, the lesson should be that higher standards are about learning.
Push for Advanced Placement questioned
By Liz Bowie
Baltimore Sun, February 13, 2006
A similar complaint was voiced in a 2002 report by the National Research Council, which said AP courses didn't provide enough opportunities for students to debate ideas, and analyze and solve problems. The College Board acknowledged the criticism and has just embarked on a major revision of its course standards and exams.
Local school districts that have fought attempts to create a national curriculum under the No Child Left Behind Act are fully in support of the AP exams, which have begun to dictate what is taught in high schools across the nation. The trend is likely to continue with support from President Bush, who recently announced that he wants to see 70,000 more math and science teachers trained to teach advanced classes.
But some educators are adding a note of caution to the headlong rush toward making AP the standard. The National Research Council report said that AP math and science courses "should focus on helping students acquire in-depth understanding rather than the more superficial knowledge that comes from covering too much material too quickly."
Trevor Packer, executive director of the AP program at the College Board, said his office is trying to address those concerns in its revision of course standards. "Rather than try to mimic what is taught in the typical freshman college course, the College Board now is looking for the elements of the best college courses," he said. He said the board began with the science and history classes, which have received the most criticism, but will revamp all 35 subjects offered. "These are huge changes. This is the biggest shift in AP since the program started 50 years ago," Packer said.
The College Board is also attempting to provide better quality control. Within a year, AP will audit high schools for what is taught and provide colleges and universities with a list of schools they certify as being up to their standards. The board is hoping to stem criticism that some students aren't receiving top-level teaching.
For many high school students, the issue of whether to take an AP course is determined in part by whether they think it will impress college admissions officers. But some college admissions departments aren't impressed with students who pile on the AP courses. Lee Stetson, dean of admissions at the University of Pennsylvania, said he would rather not see a student place too much emphasis on AP courses to the exclusion of other things.
As more students enter college having taken multiple AP classes, the most selective colleges are giving fewer students credit. So students are not guaranteed that they will save time or money by taking AP classes. Only students who get a 5 on their exams (on a scale of 1 to 5) will be given college credit at Penn, Stetson said.
For students in urban high schools, the AP courses can provide an opportunity for advanced study that they would probably not have otherwise. In Baltimore and Baltimore County, moves are being made to increase the AP classes offered. But nationally, the percentage of African-American students who take the exams was far below their representation in the population. Blacks represented 13 percent of graduating seniors in 2005 but 6 percent of AP test takers. In Maryland, the gap was just as wide. African-Americans were 33 percent of graduates and 14 percent of test takers. Often the scores of black students lag behind, possibly a result, educators say, of their lack of exposure to the most rigorous classes in elementary and middle schools.
Bush has announced plans to try to encourage schools to offer more students higher-level classes earlier so that by their high school years they will be ready for AP courses. But Severna Park HS senior Stacy Biddlecomb says she thinks many students are ready now. "The difference between honors and AP isn't intellectual ability," she said. "I think it is just dedication."
That's very strange...we have to pay a $70 fee to take the test, which is sort of a lot, but I'm hoping it will be worth it.
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