Gov. Bob Riley announced Monday that Alabama is tops in the nation for student improvement on AP tests.
According to a press release from the governor's office, the percentage of Alabama students scoring a passing grade on AP tests increased by 17.7 percent.
Riley said the success is directly attributable to the state's partnership with the A+ College Ready program and commitment to funding the ACCESS Distance Learning initiative in Alabama schools.
According to the ACCESS (Alabama Connecting Classrooms, Educators and Students Statewide) Distance Learning website, the program is available to all Alabama public high school students, and its aim is to provide equal access to high quality instruction and an infrastructure that delivers quality learning opportunities.
According to the A+ College Ready website, the program is a division of the A+ Education Partnership. Through collaboration with multiple people and groups, the A+ Education Partnership has secured a grant of up to $13.2 million to help train teachers and improve AP programs and scores in Alabama.
Smiths Station High School in Lee County is one of the schools that has benefited from the grant money.
"We've been able to vertically align and integrate our classes down to the seventh grade," said Mike Nixon, vice principal and AP coordinator at Smiths Station High School.
Two years ago, Smiths Station only offered two AP classes. The school now has nine AP classes in its regular curriculum, and many more are available through ACCESS.
Being able to use ACCESS has been vital to Smiths Station because it enables the school to offer courses to a small number of interested students. When a student wants to take a course, but there is not enough interest to warrant offering it, the student can take the class online.
"The students who have complex scheduling issues are able to take the AP classes when they ordinarily might not be able to because they're not being offered at a time convenient to them," Nixon said.
Two years ago, only about six students took AP tests, Nixon said.
"We had about 213 tests offered last year, and we had 44 students have a qualifying score of three or higher," Nixon said. "We're hoping now that we're starting to vertically align our classes and our programs, that number is going to continue to rise."
Riley said the College Board reports that since 2009, the number of students in Alabama taking AP exams has increased 18.1 percent. The increase nationwide has been only 9.5 percent.
"These results speak for themselves," Riley said.
Nixon said Smiths Station High School will continue to offer more AP courses based on student demand.
"With what the governor and his office is doing for us, we can better prepare our students so when they do get to the AP classes, they're more successful," Nixon said.
Do you like this story? The Plainsman doesn't accept money from tuition or student fees, and we don't charge a subscription fee. But you can donate to support The Plainsman.
