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4 High Schools To Key On AP

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By RONNIE BLAIR

rblair@tampatrib.com

Published: February 12, 2009

LAND O' LAKES - Four Pasco County high schools plan to raise the academic bar for high-performing students by replacing some honors classes with more challenging Advanced Placement courses in 2009-10.

"I think if they are college-bound, they need to be in AP," said Andy Frelick, principal at Wesley Chapel High, which is one of the four schools.

The others are Hudson High, Gulf High and the still-under-construction Anclote High.

High schools in Pasco already offer some AP courses, but these four schools will place an even greater emphasis on AP.

Admissions officers at state universities give a lot of weight to AP courses when they evaluate student applications, Frelick said.

With college enrollment becoming more competitive, students without AP courses on their transcripts can be at a disadvantage, he said. That's even truer, he said, when Wesley Chapel High students end up competing against students from high schools with International Baccalaureate programs.

"We are trying to level the playing field," Frelick said.

Wesley Chapel High already offers 14 AP classes. The school will add two more, world history and human geography, in 2009-10.

The school isn't doing away with all honors classes, but wherever it's possible to offer the AP equivalent of an honors class, Frelick wants to opt for AP.

Parent Penny Clardy, whose daughter is a sophomore honors student at Wesley Chapel High, was concerned when she heard some honors classes would be dropped.
Clardy said she worried that some students in honors classes wouldn't qualify for the AP classes and would be placed in regular classes, leaving them with neither AP nor honors classes on their transcripts when they apply for colleges.

That shouldn't be a concern, though, said Angie Murphy, supervisor of secondary programs for the school district's curriculum department.

State law doesn't allow schools to require students to meet a prerequisite - such as a minimum grade average or Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test score - to enroll in an AP course, Murphy said.

In some instances, though, teachers, guidance counselors and parents need to help students make an educated decision on whether a course is right for them, she said.

That can be especially true of math classes where skills build from year to year.

"You can't just throw a kid into AP calculus," Murphy said.

One method for helping students judge whether they can succeed in an AP course is AP Potential, a Web-based tool that correlates students' Preliminary SAT scores with the likelihood the students would score a 3 or better on an AP exam. A 3 is considered a passing score.

The College Board, a nonprofit organization that operates the AP program, offers this caveat to schools: AP Potential should never be used to discourage a motivated student from registering for an AP course.
Frelick agreed that a student's attitude and willingness to work hard can be a good indicator of success in an AP course.

"I like to look at the sweat factor," he said.

Students can earn college credit depending on how well they perform on the AP exams given at the end of the course. For example, at the University of Florida, a student is credited with one English class for scoring a 3 on the AP English exam and credited with two classes for scoring a 4 or a 5.

"That's definitely an incentive for the student," Murphy said.

Each AP exam costs $86. In many states the student pays, but in Florida the school districts cover the fee.

The College Board released a report Feb. 4 that shows more Florida students than ever are taking and passing AP exams.

Florida schools can qualify for additional state money based on the number of students who score a 3 or higher on the exams. The state also gives teachers a financial incentive for teaching AP classes by offering bonuses based on how many students score a 3 or higher.

Although the financial incentive is there, it's not necessarily the reason high schools would move toward adding AP courses, Murphy said.

The bonuses are "a drop in the bucket" compared with the extra time teachers spend teaching an AP course, she said.

Murphy said the district plans to track whether the emphasis on AP courses makes a difference in student performance. She said it will take about three years for the district to compile enough data to make an assessment.

Reporter Ronnie Blair can be reached at (813) 948-4218.

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