Issues in Education - Final Presentation - AP Courses in High School

I chose to do research on Advance Placement courses in high school. Although I only took one AP course myself, I thought it would be a good topic because throughout high school, I witnessed the program changing, and formed my own opinion on it as I began the college application process.

The Advance Placement program started in 1955, and was run by the non profit organization known as "College Board." The program was designed to take a small percentage of high school students in the top tier of their class, and offer them an opportunity for a higher level of learning. Students were then offered college credit in exchange for the extra work they had to give towards the class.


In its original format, the Advance Placement program is a good idea and opens the door for higher levels of education available in schools. Unfortunately, over the years different factors have changed the system, and made a number of problems effecting not only high school students, but college bound students.

English teacher Patrick Welsh from Alexandria, Virginia had this to say about the current state of the Advance placement program.

In the last 10 years, Advanced Placement has become a game of labels and numbers, a public relations ploy used by school officials who are dumping as many students as they can into AP courses to create the illusion that they are raising overall standards and closing the gap between whites and minorities, writes Welsh. And in the process, Advanced Placement has become the College Boards cash cow as each year tens of thousands more students or their school boards fork over an $86 fee for each exam.

Not only are schools and college board persuading students to take AP courses through word of mouth, but they are directly marketing the idea in commercials. They want students to think - "if you want to go to college, you must take AP courses." regardless of your learning capabilities. This future quest video cannot be more direct.

:::VIDEO::::

Here are Some specific problems that have arose from this situation.

1) While schools and college board market the necessity to take AP courses, an increasing number of students have been signing up for the classes. With little regulation on who can join the courses, many students are pushing themselves into a workload that is unfit for them, and in return, they are ironically hurting their GPA.

2) Schools care more about their ratings then if their students succeed, and therefore continue pushing AP enrollment.

3) students from Low income households are at disadvantage since there is now an $86 fee to success.


The Advanced Placement program is not a failure, I think it can redeem itself if there are certain changes made.

1) Regulate the amount of classes students can take per year. This will help preventing students, especially over achievers, from overloading themselves with school work.

2) Make the program cost-free, or at least offer a large range of scholarships and fee waivers. It is not fair that families must pay more for success, especially since family incomes largely vary.

3) Use annual class evaluations to determine how much AP course grades effect GPA in comparison to regular courses, and with that comes the most important change--

4) COMPLETELY prevent college application reviewers from seeing which students took AP courses. AP courses should not effect the college admission process, and this information should only be released to the college after admission for transfer credit evaluations.


Although the Advanced Placement program currently has many problems, I think that with some adjustments, it can find its way to becoming a productive and beneficial program once again.
I'm Frank Stark, and that was my research presentation.

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