A Note from Southern Region VP Jenny Krugman

Aug. 2012

Southern News

VP Jenny Krugman

The Southern Regional Office of the College Board is ready to welcome you to the Southern Regional Forum on Oct. 23–24, and we are busily preparing for your arrival in Miami. Our promise: weather in the 70s, perfect surf, and meetings that will stimulate, challenge and inspire.

This year, we invite you to a one-time-only link with the College Board Forum, our annual international event being held in Miami on Oct. 24–26. Our regional forum will highlight our new Advanced Placement Program® (AP®) connection, with higher education, universities and colleges being at the core of AP’s importance.

The AP Program is at the center of our efforts to increase student achievement in secondary schools and to increase retention of students in higher education institutions. An overview of AP’s success is just one of the many stories we will share at this year’s regional forum.

Access to and success in advanced-level courses, of which AP is one, are critical to building career and college success among our region’s high school graduates. Students who take AP courses and exams are more likely than their peers who don’t participate in AP to achieve college completion. From national studies, we learn that 45 percent of students who have taken one AP course and 61 percent of students who have taken two or more AP courses complete their bachelor’s degrees in four years or less (Camara, Persistence, Graduation, and Remediation, 2003).

A closer disaggregated look shows that AP students who earn scores of 3, 4 or 5 on AP Exams increase their probability of college completion. The chart below reveals the details of this achievement advantage:

Student Demographic | AP Score of 3, 4, 5

African American 21%

Hispanic 27%

White 19%

Low Income 32%

Source: Dougherty, Mellor, and Jian, The Relationship Between Advanced Placement and College Graduation, 2006

Florida’s Zora Neale Hurston opens her 1937 novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, with this: “Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.” So too does advanced academic planning for students produce wishes and dreams for our region’s young people. AP is among the key College Board tools at the foundation of those dreams. Please join us in October in Miami and learn more.