For the second year in a row Utah has grabbed a top national ranking for students participating and earning college credit for Advanced Placement courses.
Tuesday the College Board released the second annual Advanced Placement Report to the Nation, placing Utah third in the country for the percent of students earning college credit by attaining scores of 3 or above on AP exams.
Nearly 30 percent of Utah high school seniors took AP tests in 2005 and 20.5 percent of seniors scored at least a 3 on the test, according to data released Tuesday by the College Board, which administers the AP program.
"It's a sign of the quality of education in this state — AP courses are a fairly inexpensive way for kids to get college credit," said Mark Peterson, spokesman for the State Office of Education. "It's a choice that's available in a lot of schools in Utah — not all states are like that — and it's a good way of filling some of those liberal arts requirements before going into college."
Utah ranks behind New York and Maryland — in New York, 34.8 percent of students took AP exams and 22.8 percent of them earned college credit, and in Maryland 31.5 percent took exams and 21 percent earned credit.
"I would certainly attribute this to some of the most prepared AP educators in the nation," said Ann Harrison, AP coordinator for Granite School District. "And I think Utah's public schools and communities support that kind of excellence and rigor in this state."
The number of Utah students taking AP classes increased by more than 600 this year over 2004.
The data show 14,105 Utah students, including seniors and underclassmen, took 23,133 AP exams in 2005 and that 15,145 of those tests earned a grade of at least 3.
That's a pass rate of 65 percent. The national pass rate was 58 percent.
"Utah's AP classes do a great job preparing students for college-level work, and we'd like to see this success continue," said Amanda Covington, spokeswoman for the Utah System of Higher Education. "We believe a rigorous high school curriculum is increasingly important for all students, whether they plan to enter the work force or higher education."
But in many states, including Utah, the number of minority students taking AP courses and getting college credit lags behind their Caucasian counterparts.
According to the report, Latino students are well represented in AP classrooms nationally — they represent 13.4 percent of the student population and 13.6 percent of AP examinees. But they remain underrepresented in AP programs in many individual states.
In Utah, Hispanics represent 11 percent of the school population but only 4 percent of AP test takers.
However, the number of minority and low-income students taking AP tests has, in some cases, more than doubled in Utah since 2000.
Salt Lake City School District spokesman Jason Olsen said those strides can be credited in part to school and district programs that provide outreach and awareness to underserved populations.
Programs like Gear Up and Advancement Via Individual Determination, peppered in schools throughout Utah, target underrepresented and underserved students and help them get on college tracks by involving them in AP courses and educating families on the opportunities that are available.
"It is something that has to be a conscious effort in the underserved populations," Olsen said. "We know they're suited, they can take these classes and pass them, it's just getting out there and letting them know what is available."
Harrison said outreach efforts have gone to students as early as the fifth and sixth grades in hopes of identifying those students who have the interest, aptitude and passion to take AP classes later on.
Also the trend of only having the straight-A cream-of-the-crop students in AP classes has changed to become more inclusive, Harrison said.
"We are reaching students that are not traditionally enrolled in honors programs," Harrison said. "The college board is encouraging AP coordinators and administrators to move away from focusing on grade-point averages and standardized test scores and to focus instead on students with an inherent interest or motivation to pursue a university education."
Still, despite the strides that have been made by educators to provide traditionally underrepresented students with AP opportunities, the data still show an achievement gap between white and minority students.
Michael Clara, former chairman of the Coalition of Minorities Advisory Committee for the State Board of Education, said he attributes the increased minority participation simply to the growth of minorities in the schools.
"It's good news, but once we look at it a little closer we see not much has changed — it's a short-lived celebration," Clara said.
However, he said the state is starting to recognize and acknowledge that achievement gaps exist, and in doing so, it is putting Utah on the road to improvement.
E-mail: terickson@desnews.com