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Elementary and Secondary Education
Quartiles | Findings | Description
Share of public high school students scoring 3 or higher on at least one Advanced Placement Exam: 2004
Share of public high school students scoring 3 or higher on at least one Advanced Placement Exam: 2004
Quartiles
Share of public high school students scoring 3 or higher on at least one Advanced Placement Exam: 2004*
| 1st Quartile (21.2%–13.7%) |
2nd Quartile (13.3%–10.1%) |
3rd Quartile (9.4%–7.7%) |
4th Quartile (6.7%–2.5%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| California | Alaska | Arizona | Alabama |
| Colorado | Delaware | District of Columbia | Arkansas |
| Connecticut | Georgia | Hawaii | Iowa |
| Florida | Illinois | Idaho | Kansas |
| Maryland | Maine | Indiana | Louisiana |
| Massachusetts | Michigan | Kentucky | Mississippi |
| New Jersey | Minnesota | Montana | Missouri |
| New York | Nevada | New Mexico | Nebraska |
| North Carolina | New Hampshire | Ohio | North Dakota |
| Utah | Pennsylvania | Oklahoma | West Virginia |
| Vermont | South Carolina | Oregon | Wyoming |
| Virginia | Texas | Rhode Island | |
| Wisconsin | Washington | South Dakota | |
| Tennessee | |||
| *States in alphabetical order, not data order.
SOURCE: College Board, Advanced Placement Report to the Nation: 2005. See |
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Findings
- Nationally, 13.2 % of public school students in the class of 2003 demonstrated the ability to do college level work by obtaining a score of 3 or higher on at least one AP Exam, compared with 10.2% of the class of 2000.
- Values for public school students in individual states for the class of 2004 ranged from a low of 2.5% to a high of 21.2%. Fourteen states exceeded the national average.
- Values were higher for all states in 2004 than in 2000. Florida and Maryland showed the largest increases; class of 2004 members in the two states exceeded the performance of class of 2000 participants by more than 5 percentage points.
Description
High school students can demonstrate their ability to master college-level material through their performance on Advanced Placement (AP) Exams that cover specific subject areas. A total of 34 different AP Exams are offered each spring by the College Board. The exams are scored on a scale of 1 to 5, with 3 representing a range of work equivalent to midlevel B to midlevel C performance in college. Many colleges and universities grant college credit or advanced placement for AP Exam grades of 3 or higher.
To prepare for the AP Exam in a subject area, most students enroll in an AP class that employs a curriculum of high academic intensity. Scoring a 3 or higher indicates that the student has mastered the content of at least one such course of rigorous academic intensity at a level that would be acceptable in college. Performance on AP Exams is considered by many colleges and universities to be one of the best predictors of success in college. A high value on this indicator shows the extent to which the class of 2004 has been offered access to a rigorous curriculum and has successfully mastered the requirements.
