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The College Board has reminded high schools that the Advanced Placement program, which many view as essential for admissions to competitive colleges, is something that can be removed from high schools that don’t uphold certain standards.
The board published a statement, “What AP Stands For,” that could suggest problems in states that are considering some restrictions on the high school curriculum.
The statement says, for example, “AP is animated by a deep respect for the intellectual freedom of teachers and students alike. If a school bans required topics from their AP courses, the AP Program removes the AP designation from that course and its inclusion in the AP Course Ledger provided to colleges and universities. For example, the concepts of evolution are at the heart of college biology, and a course that neglects such concepts does not pass muster as AP Biology.”
In addition, it says, “AP courses foster an open-minded approach to the histories and cultures of different peoples. The study of different nationalities, cultures, religions, races, and ethnicities is essential within a variety of academic disciplines. AP courses ground such studies in primary sources so that students can evaluate experiences and evidence for themselves.”
The statement also says that AP courses should not promote indoctrination. “AP students are expected to analyze different perspectives from their own, and no points on an AP exam are awarded for agreement with a viewpoint. AP students are not required to feel certain ways about themselves or the course content. AP courses instead develop students’ abilities to assess the credibility of sources, draw conclusions, and make up their own minds. As the AP English Literature course description states: ‘AP students are not expected or asked to subscribe to any one specific set of cultural or political values, but are expected to have the maturity to analyze perspectives different from their own and to question the meaning, purpose, or effect of such content within the literary work as a whole.’”
The College Board said the principles outlined aren’t new: “Thousands of Advanced Placement teachers have contributed to the principles articulated here. These principles are not new; they are, rather, a reminder of how AP already works in classrooms nationwide.”
What about when the principle can’t be followed by a high school?
Zach Goldberg, a spokesman for the College Board, said via email that there are “course audits” available in which college professors review the syllabus of a course. “This process is required by colleges because students are making use of the AP designation on their transcripts during the college admission process, well before AP Exam scores are available to affirm that students learned the required material.”
When a syllabus fails the audit, the AP program gives the high school feedback to improve and submit to another audit.
“If a school receives authorization but then, in the course of the school year, censors or omits the required topics, the license is revoked and the AP designation must be removed from student transcripts,” Goldberg said. “This is rare. We shared an example in the communication with educators: ‘For example, the concepts of evolution are at the heart of college biology, and a course that neglects such concepts does not pass muster as AP Biology.’ Similarly, the AP US Government course requires the reading of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, several of the Federalist Papers, and King’s letter from Birmingham Jail, so omitting these required readings would result in losing the AP license for that course.”
