Opening the window of alternative greater than pays for itself.
The Healey-Driscoll Administration just lately introduced that the variety of Massachusetts public high-school college students who scored a 3 or increased on Superior Placement exams has risen by 55% since 2021, with Black and Hispanic or Latino college students making a number of the strongest positive factors, in accordance with latest information from the School Board.
The minority college students’ spectacular positive factors didn’t occur by chance.
In the event you don’t play, you’ll be able to’t rating.
And on this case, in case you don’t have the monetary means to pay for the AP examination, you’ll by no means understand how you measure up in opposition to your different classmates and college students nationwide.
AP exams price virtually $100 every, which will be an insurmountable impediment for college students from lower-income households.
However by means of the administration’s Reimagining Excessive Faculty initiative, which seeks to make sure that highschool graduates have the academic abilities essential to succeed, whether or not in faculty or in immediately’s workforce, the state subsidizes the vast majority of that AP charge.
With the state’s contribution, low-income college students – or their college – will solely must pay $22 per AP examination.
Research present that college students who take AP programs in highschool usually tend to enroll in a four-year faculty and carry out higher in introductory faculty programs.
Below this administration, Massachusetts has backed 90,783 AP exams for practically 50,000 low-income college students.
Bolstered by that inflow of AP check takers, the variety of public high-school college students taking Superior Placement exams grew by 26% from 2021 to 2025.
The variety of Black college students scoring 3 or increased out of a attainable 5 on an AP check practically tripled from 2021 to 2025, and the variety of Hispanic or Latino college students greater than doubled, in comparison with an total improve of 55% for Massachusetts public college college students.
These positive factors got here because the variety of Massachusetts college students taking AP exams is rising, up 47% for Black college students and 72% for Hispanic/Latino college students, in comparison with 26% total.
“AP success opens doorways to school and profession pathways, and seeing such sturdy positive factors, particularly amongst Black and Hispanic college students, reveals what’s attainable when entry, preparation and alternative align,” stated Training Secretary Patrick Tutwiler.
These outcomes reinforce the state’s already documented AP success price.
The administration introduced in February {that a} third of scholars who graduated from Massachusetts public excessive colleges in 2024 scored a 3 or increased on an AP examination, the state’s highest proportion ever and the very best within the nation for the second 12 months in a row.
A rating of three out of 5 on an AP examination signifies a pupil’s means to finish work for an introductory college-level course in that topic space. Some faculties will award college students credit score for AP scores of three or increased.
Sure, opening that door of alternative will pay dividends for numerous college students, and effectively definitely worth the worth of these incentives.
Sentinel and Enterprise
