Despite the growing popularity of the College Board's Advanced Placement program, which allows high school students to earn college credit for advanced work done in high school if they perform well on national exams, some elite high schools are becoming increasingly critical of the program.
New York City's prestigious Ethical Culture Fieldston School took the widely publicized step last year to drop AP courses from its curriculum, setting off a debate at many similar high schools about the value of the AP curriculum.
APs have escaped much of the controversy surrounding the College Board's other tests, such as the SAT, because they are based on a set curriculum and, watchdogs of the standardized testing industry say, contain fewer biases. By creating a high standard for high school classes, many schools have found the AP to be a useful tool for raising their profile.
But schools that already enjoy close relationships with college admissions offices sometimes criticize the College Board's curriculum for being too rigid. Not only that, but they are finding that APs are not always synonymous with success in college admissions -- more Fieldston seniors were accepted to their first choice colleges this year than last year, before it eliminated the AP.
Susan Cayse, director of academic counseling at the elite Milton Academy, a private school in Milton, Mass., noted that Milton has long had "a mixed view of AP courses."
When Fieldston dropped AP courses from the curriculum, one faculty member at Milton immediately emailed Cayse to ask whether or not Mitlon should consider taking a similar step.
Milton offers AP classes in foreign languages, but not in any of the sciences or humanities. That is because Milton's faculty, particularly in the sciences, has long criticized AP courses for focusing on breath, not depth, of material, Cayse said.
But other high schools continue to find value in the AP curriculum.
Marilyn Albarelli, director of academic counseling at Moravian Academy -- a private school in Bethlehem, Pa. that does not have as high a reputation as Milton or Fieldston -- noted that Moravian Academy's adoption of the AP curriculum has helped its students get into good colleges.
The prevalence of grade inflation nationwide, she said, has meant that strong grades are not as revealing to colleges as a solid performance on an AP exam.
"It's a way to validate our grading system," she said.
Nonetheless, Albarelli believes AP offerings are stronger in some areas than in others, and that Moravian therefore does not offer APs in the sciences, which the school considers weak.
Trevor Packer, director of operations for the AP program at the College Board, disagreed with the view that AP courses tend to be broad rather than deep.
"First of all, AP courses are designed to resemble corresponding college courses, so that institutions will give students credit. If AP courses are broad rather than deep, then it's because introductory college courses are broad rather than deep," he said.
Packer also noted that the tests are structured to examine both the breadth and depth of a student's knowledge.
"Each test has a multiple-choice section and a free-response section. The free-response section is designed to test students' knowledge about one particular topic," he said.
Karl Furstenberg, Dean of Admissions at Dartmouth, said a school's decision not to offer AP courses does not hurt its students in the college process.
"We tend not to use APs very much anyway because so many schools don't use them or only use some of them," he said. "Besides, students can always choose not to show us their AP scores."
Rather, Dartmouth admissions officers look to see if a student has taken the most challenging courses available at his or her high school, Furstenberg said.
He added, "The program's only become more popular nationwide in recent years. Nationally, I think that APs have enriched high school curricula."
