Concerned Parents of Color: Tremendous Increase in Black Students taking AP Courses

Posted by: rbutler on Thursday, March 13, 2008 - 10:53 PM Print article   Email to a friend

Articles and reports from both the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education and the College Board's  AP Report to the Nation, highligt the increase in Black student participation in Advanced Placement courses.

Taking AP courses and obtaining a good AP Exam Score have been identified as o­ne indication of increased rigor in high school courses and correlate well with SAT performance and first year college GPA.

You will also discover that more still needs to be accomplished in this area.


Journal of Blacks in Higher Education
Huge increase in Black participation in the AP Program (March 13, 2008)
http://www.jbhe.com/latest/index031308.html#ap

Highlights --- Black participation significantly increased between 1985 and 2007
a. Almost quadrupled o­n a percentage basis
b. Up by a factor of more than 15 times o­n an absolute numbers basis


College Board's AP Report to the Nation (2007)
http://www.collegeboard.com/prod_downloads/about/news_info/ap/2007/2007_ap-report-nation.pdf

Highlights
a. Massachusetts ranks 6th in the nation o­n the percentage of students garnering a grade of 3 or higher o­n an AP exam (page 8).
b. Blacks although representing 13.7% of the student population o­nly represent 6.9% of AP exam takers (page 11).
c. Charts showing AP Exam participation by race/ethnicity are given for all AP subjects and include feedback useful to both educators and students.


New York Times
Advanced Placement tests are leaving some behind (February 7, 2007)
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/07/education/07ap.html

Highlights
a. Although significant increases have occured in participation, Blacks are still under-represented in AP courses (still lower percentages than their representation in the student population).
b. Although participation has increased, o­n average Black students are scoring at a lower level than their peers of other races or ethnicities (see graphic in article).  To overcome this aspect students must be better prepared in middle school courses (see quote from article below).

“Too few African-American students have achieved in middle school and in the first years of high school at a level that will allow them to take advantage of the courses,” Dr. Hrabowski said. “We need to encourage students to do better when they are in seventh and eighth grade.”