Shelby County High School: Success with AP scores Presented by Mary Louise Pozaric & Jennifer LaRue & Jennifer LaRue

Shelby County has shown a dramatic increase in the number of students enrolled in AP courses.

2008 enrollment  328 students enrolled in AP courses*  7% of 12 th grade in an AP course  13% of 11 th grade in an AP course  19% of 10 th grade in an AP course  No courses available to 9 th grade  81% took corresponding exam *Includes duplicate students if student is taking more than 1 course

2011 enrollment  470 students enrolled in AP courses*  41% of 12 th grade in an AP course  40% of 11 th grade in an AP course  14% of 10 th grade in an AP course  11% of 9 th grade in an AP course  90% took corresponding exam *Includes duplicate students if student is taking more than 1 course

2012 enrollment  604 students enrolled in AP courses*  41% of 12 th grade in an AP course  46% of 11 th grade in an AP course  36% of 10 th grade in an AP course  30% of 9 th grade in an AP course *Includes duplicate students if student is taking more than 1 course

How and why did this happen?

Shelby County created a climate that emphasizes AP courses.

Advance KY/NMSI grant  National Math Science Initiative grant administered by Advance Kentucky  Goal is to increase enrollment and qualifying scores in Math, Science and English AP courses  Shelby County is a member of the first Cohort of the grant, which began in school year

NMSI Grant’s elements of success

Results of Grant Note: SCPS split high schools in Enrollment reduced by 50%

College & Career Readiness Awareness  AP Night  Invite 8 th grade students to encourage them to enroll in AP as freshman  Power Point presentation available at: s/AP-Parents-Night-Presentation ppt s/AP-Parents-Night-Presentation ppt s/AP-Parents-Night-Presentation ppt

CCR Awareness  Benchmarks and goal of increasing CCR by 10% are posted throughout school  Students know benefits of AP courses and college tuition  Students know that enrollment in AP courses in high school leads to greater success in college  Resources for informing students are available at: aspx aspx aspx

Eliminated Honors classes  Eliminated Honors level courses for English in 2011, all courses for 2012 school year  Assumption is that Honors students are college bound  These students should be in courses that prepare them the most for college  College recognize AP, no standard for Honors  Students given Honors credit if they don’t take AP exam  KEES weighting for all courses

Training for teachers  Advance Kentucky sent MSE teachers to Advanced Placement Summer Institutes for first three years of grant  SCPS worked with OVEC and UofL to send all AP teachers who had not been trained to APSI in 2011  Laying the Foundation  Pre-AP training  Send as many teachers as possible!

Scheduling  Accelerated Academy  New initiative of SCPS  Students selected through application process  Students will move through as a cohort  Students take an extra “zero-hour” course before school  Opportunity for 15 AP courses throughout high school

Scheduling  AP drives Master Schedule  Schedule AP courses first to prevent conflicts  SCHS on 7-period day  All Science courses last two periods  Calculus has optional lab course for those students needing extra help

We actively recruit students for AP courses  DATA  PLAN  Report correlates PLAN scores and success in AP courses  SCHS paid for 9 th graders to take PLAN in May  Used scores to place students in pre-AP Physics course  Use data from 10 th grade PLAN to identify students that did not sign up for AP  df/UsingPlan.pdf df/UsingPlan.pdf df/UsingPlan.pdf

More Data  PSAT  Plan to give PSAT to Accelerated Academy students  Optional for juniors  Use AP Potential to identify more students  Teacher recruitment  Gave rosters to teachers after scheduling to check for level changes

New classes  Created new classes based on student interest  Statistics 2008  Comparative Government 2009  Human Geography 2011  Computer Science 2013

District Goals  Our district has identified THREE BIG Goals:  Send every elementary student to middle school on grade level by 2012  Send every middle school student to high school on grade level by 2014  Graduate every senior with college/career readiness skills by 2016

Beyond the AP Classroom  AP Courses prepare students for college and/or their chosen careers:  Exposure to rigorous content  Instruction by highly trained teachers  Access to after-school resources/tutoring  Removal of potential barriers to higher education  Unprecedented support at the classroom, building, district and state levels

Questions?  Mary Louise Pozaric   Jennifer LaRue 