EUGENE, Ore. -The College Board, which administers Advanced Placement courses and the SAT, is quietly mapping out changes to some of its flagship programs amid concerns that they cover too much content and do not allow for in-depth study.
A team of researchers at the University of Oregon in Eugene is leading a re-examination of AP courses in U.S. history, biology, chemistry, physics, European history, world history and environmental science.
The courses are designed to let high school students test out of entry-level courses in college. Nationwide, AP participation is booming, with one in five high school students taking an AP course and exam last year, up from 16 percent in 2000.
Research has shown that scoring well on an AP test is a strong predictor of college success, and the Bush administration has made the increasing participation in AP courses a source of pride, especially among minorities.
But the current model for shaping AP courses -through a broad survey of the curriculum of college classes in a particular subject -doesn't help us address the concern that AP courses require too much content coverage
said Trevor Packer, Advanced Placement executive director.
We recognize that simply having a course that requires a teacher to cover a lot of content is not the same as the best-level college course in which teachers are facilitating in-depth study Packer said.
Over the next year, staff members at the University of Oregon's Center for Education Policy Research will recruit 2,500 college faculty members in the seven subjects at about 100 schools across the country to detail the material they are teaching to college freshmen.
Researchers will then identify college courses in each of those subjects to serve as a best practices teaching model for AP high school classes.
Packer said this will be the first time the nonprofit College Board has tried to single out the best courses in the field to use as a model for AP course development.
Eventually, plans call for putting all 34 of AP's courses through the best practices model, said University of Oregon Professor David Conley.
Packer said changes spurred by the work done by Conley's team could come to AP courses by the 2008-2009 school year, allowing enough time for textbook and lab materials to be updated.
AP tests in the seven subjects would evolve too, he said.
Conley said he could foresee even greater changes to AP courses in the future; perhaps someday, AP tests will include work samples done in the classroom for college admissions offices to review, he said.
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