Truth behind the Newsweek Best High Schools rankings- which schools have AP students who are actually PASSING AP exams?! (Plano: college, price)

[hamiltonpl]

Originally Posted by tracenat

I think it's tricky to say that those AP tests predict college success. Students who take AP courses are likely to be going onto college as it is. AP courses are also not anything like college courses. As one who graduated high school in 2004 and now teaches at a college, I see students who have taken AP courses in high school and become very frustrated that often times they cannot just memorize and take a "standardized" test.

That being said, I teach English composition. I have mentioned in a previous thread that I also teach dual-credit students in McKinney. Often, according to what many of them have told me, they enroll into dual-credit English rather than AP because they don't see how AP English will relate to college writing. They are quite correct, in my opinion (biased as it is ). AP English focuses on reading books and testing based on "classics" and such. For students not planning on majoring in English, this doesn't prove to be very helpful as it does not teach them to write the many, many essays that (most) of them will compose in college. It does however, allow most of them (depending on score) to skip college English 1 & 2.

I think the discussion about AP courses is somewhat problematic. They are quite important, please don't get me wrong, but I think it's risky to say that they indicate college success so broadly.

I think it heavily depends on the high school. At Highland Park, I felt that my AP courses were just as rigorous as my college courses.

[Lakewooder]

Originally Posted by Big G

In the analysis put forward by the OP, "white" is being used as a proxy for "not economically disadvantaged". That may or may not be fairly accurate for DISD, but probably is a poor assumption for the CoCo schools, which are fairly homogeneous economically. That is, a black or Hispanic person in Collin County (and there are a sizable number of such people, certain posters notwithstanding, southern living) is likely to be just like his/her neighbors - middle-class to upper-class.

A more exact analysis would look at the overall and economically disadvantaged pass rates, then back out from those (and the percentage of economically disadvantaged kids in the schools) to compute a "economically advantaged" pass rate. I don't have the patience to do that, and DISD (the district where such a number would have the most meaning) didn't provide the economically disadvantaged pass rates anyway.

OK but, Southlake Carroll has the virtually the same E&E% on the Washington Post Challenge Index as Woodrow whereas Southlake Carroll only has 2% subsidized lunch and Woodrow has 58% subsidized lunch.

[hal2814]

Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80

Just answered your question about why I pulled out the white segment in my post above.

The Advanced Placement exams aren't "standardized" like the multiple choice SAT or TAKS test. A very small portion of the exam is multiple choice, if at all.

The exams heavily focus on the student's critical thinking and analysis/ problem solving skills. They are 75%+ essay or written problem solving focused, similar to college exams. If the student skimmed through Nabokov's Lolita or slept through Spanish IV, they will have no chance of passing or even knowing where to start vs multiple-choice where students can narrow down and "best guess".

AP exams ARE the best indication of collegiate success because GPA's vary from school to school, as does instruction quality. The AP exams ask the same questions or prompts to all students who completed the class and put all students across the US on an even playing field.

If you haven't been to the AP website, go, and just read some of the literature or calculus prompts from the past decades. I think you'll be impressed by the quality.

About 10 years ago I worked for the admissions office at a large state university with competitive admission. There is no best indicator. GPA is the closest thing you have to one but it has to be adjusted for strength of curriculum and school district (since some give away GPA like candy) among other things.

Standardized test scores were a poor indicator above a certain threshold. For example, an 800 on the SAT was a good indicator you're not going to make it at our school but there was no discernible difference in success* between a 1300 and a 1500. The threshold is high enough for passing the AP exam that an AP pass is not a useful indicator. And merely taking the exam is also a poor indicator since there are some district-specific considerations such as some districts paying for the test and some districts requiring students to take it if they enroll in the AP course. You're better off just looking to see if they took the AP course (which is already part of the strength of curriculum adjustment).

* Success for our intents and purposes was 4 years of continuous full-time enrollment with no academic probation or suspension.

[AlGreen]

Hey, those tests are hard.

I'd like to see the info for the southside suburb schools.

[skids929]

Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80

AP exams ARE the best indication of collegiate success because GPA's vary from school to school, as does instruction quality. The AP exams ask the same questions or prompts to all students who completed the class and put all students across the US on an even playing field.

Maybe..I still feel uneasy with too much emphasis on these numbers since they may be an good indicator of collegiate admission but not necessarily of collegiate "success". Alot of these tests are useful at point of admission, but do little to predict true "success". I mean honestly, how can we truly measure success without looking at how their final College GPA and whether or not they graduated in the normative graduation period of 4 years? Worth considering..

My wife is a great example of how standardized test are fairly useless. Straight A's in a highly regarded private Catholic all girls school in CT. Didn't do so well on the SATs, thankfully still managed to get into a highly regarded Catholic College, although not her first choice. Graduated at the top of her class. I bet their admissions process didn't focus too much on her having success based on AP Test scores or SAT scores.

My point is, truly measuring "success" in College can't be done until you have actual numbers on College performance.


These AP exams still sound like a standardized tests in the true sense of the term. Which means this is only part of the picture, a small part in my opinion. And although helpful, anyone reading this thread in the future, shouldn't use this alone as a valid reference piece.

In terms of using statistics alone, standardized tests usually creates some sort of a Proxy effect. There are just too many variables to consider, and if there aren't controls built into the information one uses in evaluating an education to account for other factors -- such as demographics, financial, social and even academic support while in college I find its just fun with numbers. Sometimes nothing more than validation for overly competitive parents who need this information to feel better about what a great job they did.

The measures that are used to "predict" how a student will do in College are much larger than just AP test exam scores and I still think 4 years of achievement calculated through GPA, and 4 year graduation periods is worth looking at before this.

[TurtleCreek80]

Originally Posted by tracenat

I think it's tricky to say that those AP tests predict college success. Students who take AP courses are likely to be going onto college as it is. AP courses are also not anything like college courses.

They are just like college when they're taught correctly. My AP US history teacher at Highland Park was hands-down, to this day, the very best professor/teacher I ever encountered.....and I was in the Honors History program at a state school with some very well published history professors. My AP Biology class at Highland Park used the same textboook that my freshman bio class used in college. My AP Calculus class at Highland Park was more diffult than the two math courses I had to take in college. If the school has the right teachers in place and a rigorous curriculum, AP courses SHOULD be as challenging as college work and be structured in a similar format (lecture + discussion or lab) as college courses.

[skids929]

Originally Posted by loves2read

I am not surprised at how Southlake really does not blow anyone out of the water with their scores--
I know two people who have taught there and they both said that the students are not really that motivated to excel
most of them know they can get into decent colleges--either through connections or just because they can pay full tuition

Not that I am defending Southlake..But this is different than the rest of the world how? Cause don't think for a minute an unprivileged black student doesn't get special consideration when being admitted to a College.

[Lakewooder]

Yes AP courses were rare when I was at WW but I 'placed out' of English and Spanish. When I took Editing in Journalism it was a piece of cake because of my high school AP English class (we had to read 100 pages per night and be ready for questions the next day).

Incidentally, my entire AP English class placed out except for one person (who still bears that stigma today!).

Now my beloved alma mater offers 22 AP classes plus 8 dual-credit and will be giving IB tests in the next couple of years. Texas has mandated that 24 college hours are earned for an IB Diploma. Some colleges offer 30 hours. And you can still take AP tests for even more credit.

It's possible to 'place out' of the entire freshman year. Not only does that save a bundle but also I would say it's a pretty good indicator that they will do well in college when they only have to worry about finishing three years of classes at matriculation.

[barney_rubble]

Originally Posted by skids929

In some academic studies, which I consider more credible than US News data, High School GPA is consistently the strongest predictor of four-year college outcomes for all academic disciplines. Standardized tests just make it easy to create data like this..Show me some GPAs for each then lets compare the validity of each data set.

The most commonly referenced study was completed at the University of California. It found that HS GPA was a better predictor than SAT scores, but also that none of the available metrics did a very good job of predicting future GPA.

This study did not look at AP scores.

Originally Posted by TurtleCreek80

The exams heavily focus on the student's critical thinking and analysis/ problem solving skills. They are 75%+ essay or written problem solving focused, similar to college exams. If the student skimmed through Nabokov's Lolita or slept through Spanish IV, they will have no chance of passing or even knowing where to start vs multiple-choice where students can narrow down and "best guess".

It's more like 50% written, and you don't need a 90%+ to get a score of 5 on most exams. So it's entirely possible to do well based mostly on MC.

Not that this is entirely a bad thing - I don't share your disdain for multiple choice examination.

Originally Posted by tracenat

AP English focuses on reading books and testing based on "classics" and such. For students not planning on majoring in English, this doesn't prove to be very helpful as it does not teach them to write the many, many essays that (most) of them will compose in college.

Yes! This is absolutely correct. AP English Literature is a literature course first and an English course second.

[chipper21]

Originally Posted by Big G

You left off Plano West (69.4% overall, 71.9% white)

Thanks I was wondering why this one was left out.