It's great to see more low income and minority students nationwide taking and passing AP exams:

Continuing a pattern from recent years, more students from low-income families are taking—and earning what is considered a passing score on—at least one Advanced Placement exam, a new analysis of results for the public high school graduating class of 2009 shows.

At the same time, significant gaps persist in preparation and access across "traditionally underserved students," the analysis released today by the College Board suggests, especially for African-American students.

For instance, although black students represented 14.5 percent of the 2009 graduating class, they were just 3.7 percent of those who passed at least one AP test. That was a slight improvement from the class of 2008, in which African-Americans were 3.5 percent of the students who did so, and 3.3 percent the year before that.

The results for Hispanic students, who represent a fairly comparable percentage of the class of 2009, about 16 percent, were far stronger than for African-Americans. Of those who passed at least one AP exam, 14.3 percent were Hispanic students. Those categorized as American Indians and Alaska Natives represented 1.2 percent of the 2009 graduating class, and 0.4 percent of those who passed one or more AP test.

The sixth annual "AP Report to the Nation" finds that 18.9 percent of the AP test-takers in the class of 2009 were low-income students, up from 17 percent for the class of 2008 and 13.7 percent for the class of 2004. Meanwhile, such students made up 14.7 percent of those in the class of 2009 who earned a score of at least 3 on one or more AP tests, compared with 13.4 percent for the class of 2008. The tests are graded on a scale of 1 to 5, the highest score.

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Disadvantaged Students Continue AP Climb

By Erik W. Robelen

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/02/10/22ap.h29.html?tkn=QYXFGopBXOHj8AwQ2%2F1cJcfofgpJjHIdcCWF&cmp=clp-edweek