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    That's part of the impetus behind my original post. A part of me suspects that the students are not necessarily getting smarter or better educated, just that there is massive dilution. On the other hand, it is possible that colleges may not look at AP Environmental Science in quite the same way as AP Chemistry or AP Physics.

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    That aspect is confusing in our district as well. Sometimes you can go right to the AP course but not others. The 20% 5s seems overly high but the 6.5% 5s seems overly low.

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    Originally Posted by Quantum2003
    On the other hand, it is possible that colleges may not look at AP Environmental Science in quite the same way as AP Chemistry or AP Physics.
    I think this is true, and one can verify this using the AP Credit Policy Search.

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    Thanks for the link, Bostonian. It is interesting to see that my undergrad institution no longer considers L Englsih iterature/Language Arts or Chemistry even for placement, much less as part of the credits to graduate a year early. I wonder if that is because they are not selective enough and too many students get 5s on those tests.

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    Originally Posted by Quantum2003
    That's part of the impetus behind my original post. A part of me suspects that the students are not necessarily getting smarter or better educated, just that there is massive dilution. On the other hand, it is possible that colleges may not look at AP Environmental Science in quite the same way as AP Chemistry or AP Physics.


    Yes.

    Honestly, I'm not thrilled that AP Physics B (which my DD took and did well in) is now a two year course. Oh please.

    The pacing is now undoubtedly completely unsuitable for gifties. It was about right when DD took it (without any preparation other than an honors physical science course taken years earlier which had about a month of classical mechanics topics and very little math).

    As for "who takes this stuff," well, we didn't care about COLLEGE credit for the course, but we did care about GPA weighting, and the course is far, far more rigorous/better designed than the alternatives that DD's school had on offer. She hadn't had calculus, so AP Physics C was out. Frankly, that course was a nightmare in terms of pacing before the redesign, but it was great for the tiny handful of HG kids in it. The pacing was perfect. For them, I mean. LOL.

    She needed the challenge of the pacing and high level content, but without the expectation of calculus, and yes-- she'll probably take a sophomore level calculus-based mechanics course in college, but so be it.


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    Originally Posted by Quantum2003
    Thanks for the link, Bostonian. It is interesting to see that my undergrad institution no longer considers L Englsih iterature/Language Arts or Chemistry even for placement, much less as part of the credits to graduate a year early. I wonder if that is because they are not selective enough and too many students get 5s on those tests.
    There is also the consideration that classes like freshman chemistry, physics, biology, and calculus are cash cows. There is one professor paid decently and lots of teaching assistants paid very little. Colleges do not want lots of students placing out of their introductory classes and going straight to their smaller, more expensive (for the schools) classes.

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    Yes, two years for AP Physics without calculus does boggle the mind! Back in the day, there was just one AP Physics class and exam. I think all my classmates were taking Calculus BC simultaneously so the teacher had freedom to teach how he wanted, which was actually a mixture. Of course, I also don't remember any of my AP teachers teaching to the exams.

    Mechanics was a first semester course used to weed out all the freshmen who mistakenly thought they wanted to be engineers. The herd had thinned considerably by the time Electricity/Magnetism rolled around in second semester. Interestingly, I think that Electricity/Magnetism was less vigorous than Mechanics and therefore would have been less effective for weeding purposes. I actually stayed a whole year before switching majors but it was a shock going from a high school AP Physics course to a freshman engineering course on Mechanics.

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    Cynical but likely correct although interestingly you can still use Biology and Physics C as part of the credits to graduate a year early as long as you earned 5s.

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    Originally Posted by Quantum2003
    On the other hand, it is possible that colleges may not look at AP Environmental Science in quite the same way as AP Chemistry or AP Physics.
    I wonder to what extent an interdisciplinary subject such as environmental science can be studied at the college level without the prerequisites of college-level biology, chemistry, physics, and perhaps even economics.

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    Our HS math sequence for gifted kids is honors Alg II/Trig (9th), Honors pre-Calc (10th), BC Calc (11th), and then Calc III (you need a 4 or higher on BC exam), AP stats, or AP Computer Science for senior year- overall, 3 years of math, so you could also skip senior year.

    Our gifted science curriculum is Honors Bio (9th), Honors Chem (10th), Honors Physics (11th), and then usually one AP science senior year. Students can also double up or take a summer course to fit in more AP. Honestly, I like the way this is done. Honors Bio was a very general course and not nearly as rigorous for my dd as AP Bio, so I didn't feel like it was a lot of overlap. Maybe it depends on what they do in middle school. Dd majored in bio in college and felt like she went in with a really deep understanding; her AP course was rigorous. I guess she could have taken AP Bio without the first course, but this worked well for her. The last two years, AP bio has had the lowest or second-lowest percentage of 5s for all test takers, and I wonder if that is because more freshmen are taking it.

    History curriculum has AP Human Geo, Honors World History or AP World (considered the most challenging) for 9th, then AP Euro (10th), APUSH (11th), and AP micro/macro and/or APGov and AP Comparative Pol senior year. For my dd who did liberal arts in college, she found these better/higher level than the English courses, and they really developed her reading/writing skills. Again, though, AP World has had the lowest or second lowest (changing with bio) percentage of 5s in the past two years, and I also anecdotally hear of many more freshmen taking it.

    English is honors 9th and 10th and then the two AP in 11th and 12th. We found these relatively watered down, and the results on both are usually relatively low as far as percentage of 5s. I think too many kids are taking them.

    At our local HS, a student can take AP Computer Science as a freshamn with no pre-reqs except math (drop out rate is high), AP Human Geo or World History, AP Art History, or any course in which you are sufficiently advanced (for ex, one could take AP stats in 9th if the student had taken AlgII/Trig in 8th, or could take AP French if he or she had already taken outside French).

    I don't see my son's AP World being diluted - it's a tough class and there is the expectation of an hour a night of reading/note-taking. It's very rigorous. I've seen the AP Computer Science syllabus (he's not taking it) and I understand why so many drop out. The only pre-req at our school is Geometry, but if the student has never taken any programming, I think it would be really, really challenging.

    Yes, it is different than when I was in school, but honestly, my kids are so much better prepared than I was. The standards are so much higher and the curriculum is pretty tough at MS.

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