Q#12) Which comes closer to your view?

A) The more students taking AP courses the better--even when they do poorly in the course, they benefit from the challenge and experience
B) Only students who can handle the material should take AP courses--otherwise it’s not fair to them, their classmates, their teachers, and the quality of the program.

<Question asked of 1,024 teachers on a recently published study from the Fordham Institute>

I'm always surprised about how people come down on this question. For every Jay Mathews out there, the Washington Post education reporter who writes feverishly in support of opening up access to AP courses for all high school students who are interested in them, regardless of their prior academic track record, there are many more who think that access to Advanced Placement classes should be a privilege reserved to the few students who have earned it.

The controversy exists for good reason. Almost everyone who's been to high school is familiar with the AP program (or its counterpart, the International Baccalaureate program), and more than 1.6 million high school students participated in 2007-2008--a sixty percent growth from just five years earlier. There's little question that the program is a net positive: it adds a much-needed dimension of academic rigor to high school curricula, offers rewards of college credit (and higher grade point averages in schools weighing AP classes on a 4.5 or 5.0 scale) to the students who participate, motivates many veteran teachers to hone their craft, and generally increases the outputs of our K-12 public school system.

The question is just who is the program supposed to benefit? The answer will differ depending on who you ask, but let's start with one pertinent stakeholder group: teachers themselves. 52% of the teachers who were asked the question above on Fordham's survey agreed with statement B compared to 38% who chose statement A. To drive things home further, 63% of teachers surveyed indicated that it would improve the AP program to screen students more heavily at the outset, limiting access to only those who are ready to do the work.

Do you agree with that viewpoint? One high school student who I've worked closely with over the past few years,who has taken numerous AP classes herself, and who I respect deeply, does agree with the majority of the teachers surveyed. As she explains it, opening up AP classes to just any student would water down the rigor of the program, make it hard on teachers, and do little justice to the students who are under-prepared.

My own view is quite different. I don't see 15 year-olds as static, take-them-as-they-come finished products. When a sophomore who has gotten C's and D's in her classes decides she wants to challenge herself and take AP classes in her junior year, I'm willing to give her a shot--although I, as some others have suggested, would require her along with any other student who wants to take AP or IB classes to sign a contract promising to do the required several hours of added homework per week. Kids change, and academic achievement is at least as much a product of hard work and effort as it is a function of the grades you got the year before.

To tell a student, either directly or passively through signaling mechanisms like honors track classes starting in middle school, that they aren't fit for AP-level classes is, in my opinion, only a few steps removed in logic from charging poll taxes to vote. You can articulate sensible reasons in support of both--both poll taxes and exclusive AP screening increase buy-in from participants, ensuring that those who participate do so thoughtfully--but in the end those reasons are trumped by much more important social goals: democratic solidarity and political and social equality.

So in the end, it comes down to what our priority for the AP program is. Is it to create an elite (and elitist) cadre of students who are thoroughly ready for college, a program that is a reward for young people who have already demonstrated success and a program will be measured by how successful each of its participants are? If so, your answer to question #12 on the survey is B. But if your goal is broader, to encourage college readiness among young people even if they haven't earned the opportunity through their prior work and even if it means that the best-of-the-best will share on their college applications something in common with the less "accomplished" students, bubble in the circle next to letter A.