What are AP Courses and Should Our Children Take Them?

AP courses are Advanced Placement college level courses which are offered in High School. Through AP's college-level courses and exams, you can earn college credit and advanced placement, stand out in the admissions process, and learn from some of the most skilled, dedicated, and inspiring teachers in the world.
Over the past 20 years there has been a solid increase in the number of black students who are taking challenging Advanced Placement courses in high school. College admissions officers are impressed with the records of students who make the extra effort and take the grading risk in AP courses. Now, with a transcript in hand that shows a student has faced up to these rigorous programs of study, admissions officers often confer a deserved advantage in the admissions process to students of all races who enroll in AP programs.

Unfortunately, most participants in the AP program have been concentrated in high schools in affluent, predominantly white suburbs of major cities. Also, in many racially integrated high schools, large numbers of black students have not been sufficiently prepared to take on the AP curriculum. In many instances black students have been tracked into vocational training instead of college preparatory classes. Unfortunately, many teachers, guidance counselors, and school administrators continue to hold a racist mindset that black students are not capable of coping with the rigorous curriculum of the AP program.
Influenced for many years by widespread opinion that they have substandard academic abilities, black students in many instances do not consider enrolling in the AP program. Also, at some schools black students who might wish to pursue an AP curriculum may face anti-intellectual peer pressure that makes young blacks feel that in pursuing Advanced Placement they are selling out their race or “acting white.”