Recomposing the AP English Exam

Abstract

early fifty years ago when the Advanced Placement Program (APP) was created at the intersection of interests between elite prep schools and highly selective colleges, few onlookers could have predicted that the program, under the aegis of the College Board, would burgeon into what it has become: the single largest determiner of college freshman course credit in American higher education. Furthermore, with the increased interest in, and school commitment to, so-called pre-AP programs, students begin gearing up for AP exams as early as middle school. There are currently nineteen subject areas (with thirty-three different courses) that have received the AP imprimatur, and all but one, AP Studio Art, continue to be tested by a single examination that combines multiple-choice questions and a section of free response essays or problem solving. Nearly two-thirds of the nation's 22,000 high schools offer at least one AP course, and last year over 700,000 students took over a million exams in the various subjects offered. Over 300,000 students paid to take one of the two Advanced Placement English examinations in an effort to earn college English credit before matriculating at a postsecondary institution. Yet the large and steadily increasing number of students participating in the APP has stirred relatively little consideration or interest from those concerned about English and assessment. Such silence, or indifference, may suggest that the APP is an un