TheLittleHawk Iowa City High School - Iowa City, Iowa - Volume 71, Issue 2 - November 13, 2013 - www.thelittlehawk.com
The AP Achievement Gap
School administration has acknowledged and is working to address the underrepresentation of minority students in AP classes. The solution will likely require changes at both the school and district level. By Ellen Carman & Edgar Thornton ellencarman@thelittlehawk.com
Jenny Flores’s mom didn’t know what an Advanced Placement (AP) class was until her daughter decided to take two her senior year. Flores is the only Hispanic student in her section of AP Statistics and AP Psychology but decided to take the classes to prepare for college. “I used to think that average was good enough, but now I’m thinking I should go beyond what I thought I could do,” Flores ‘14 said. “My mom is proud of me. I think it’s something I can do, to do better than my parents are doing right now. I don’t think they are satisfied with what they are doing right now.” Flores is the exception to a trend of minority student underrepresentation in AP classes at City High. The school is offering 20 AP classes this year. Advanced Placement classes offer college-level curriculum to students. If a student earns a qualifying score on an AP exam – typically a 4 or 5 score out of 5 – they may receive college credit. AP classes are also commonly used as a tool to rank high schools. In Newsweek magazine’s “America’s Best High Schools” rankings, AP tests taken per student accounts for 25 percent of a school’s score, and average AP scores account for 10 percent. Addditionally, percent of students enrolled in at least one AP class contributes five percent to the ranking score. In the 2013 ranking, City High is 997. In AP offerings at City High overall, minorities have far less representation than in the general population of the school. School administration has acknowledged this and knows that more could be done to encourage minority and low-income participation in these classes. “I think we probably need to set some goals and be more aggressive, to have our statistics be more reflective of our student body,” Principal John Bacon said. “We have to target our efforts better.” Bacon emphasized that encouraging students to try an AP class can improve not only the individual student’s learning but the academic achievement of the school as a whole. Kiera Washpun ‘14 has never taken an AP class and does not plan on doing so. “No one has ever pushed me to take an AP class,” Washpun said. “I wouldn’t think to myself, ‘Oh, I should take an AP class.’” One way Bacon thinks that the school can raise numbers of students in AP classes is by working with teachers of freshman classes to find, prepare and encourage students who may be successful in higher-level classes. “The school focuses more on lower achieving kids than the higher achieving ones,” Omar
Shaban ‘14 said. “I mean that they try to help lower kids catch up to the middle. But they aren’t helping middle kids get to the top.” Shaban has taken seven AP classes in the past four years. Of the factors that could prevent minority students from taking advantage of AP classes at City, socio-economic status is likely to play a key role. According to Professor David Bill, a professor of sociology and Associate Dean at the College of Education at the University of Iowa, the achievement gap between minority and majority students has narrowed in recent history. However, the socioeconomic gap has widened. “Part of what you’re seeing when you see a racial or ethnic gap is really a class gap, because for the most part minority kids are still more likely to be from lower-income homes than majority kids.” Bills said. The achievement gap is not only related to race. “One thing I find really interesting is when people say an achievement divide, they often think just solely of racial achievement, but it is not,” said Ryan Wise, Deputy Director of the Iowa Department of Education. “Once you factor in English Language Learners (ELL), students with disabilities, and socio-economic status, the achievement divide largely disappears” In fact, the new ICCSD diversity policy defines minority students as those receiving free or reduced price lunches. It does not mention race. This year City has added four new AP class offerings in an effort to get students to challenge themselves in a subject area where they have an interest. One indication of positive progress is the new AP Language and Composition class, in which minority representation is comparable to the school’s minority populations. “Maybe people don’t see the relevance of AP English, or they are not going to be studying Literature in college, therefore, why would they take an AP class in it?” Robyn Fields, AP Language & Composition teacher said. “Whereas in AP language most of what we do is going to get kids ready for college. It’s reading non-fiction and writing in a style that they would use in college.” However, simply adding more AP classes seems unlikely to solve the underlying problem. Bills says that parents who have been to college themselves have a better idea of how schools are set up. They are also better prepared to navigate their children through course selections. “Parents who already have advantages see more AP offerings as a way to secure a little more advantage,” Bills said. “It’s not that anybody is deliberately keeping kids down, but in the process of trying to maximize the chances for their own kids it just sort of widens the gap a little bit more.” *Continued on A3
APbythenumbers
CHS Student Body ‘13-’14
African American - 18%
Asian - 3.9% Caucasian - 66.7%
Hispanic- 10.9 % Other - 0.5%
CHS AP Enrollment ‘13-’14
African American - 4.5%
Asian - 3.9% Caucasian - 87.2%
Hispanic- 4.4% Other - 0.2%
Iowa AP Tests 2013
African American - 3.1%
Asian - 7.7% Caucasian - 80.3%
Hispanic- 4.17% Other - 4.4%
Info. provided by the CHS Guidance Dept. and College Board. CHS AP Enrollment is an avg. of the % of students in each class.
SMART Board placement nears completion By Jacob Buatti
jacobbuatti@thelittlehawk.com
As more and more SMART Boards are added to City High, some people can’t help but argue against the expensive use of money. Students don’t see how they are more helpful than a less expensive route, like the document camera, Elmo. In fact, most classrooms are equipped with both a SMART Board and document camera. Students are questioning why there is the same technology in classrooms K-12. By the end of the school year, there will be more than 70 SMART Boards at City High alone. Mean-
ing that 83% of classrooms will have a SMART Board. The Addition of SMART Boards first began in August of 2007 with the Iowa School Microsoft settlement that granted City High $308,000. City High used the money to update software and purchase more than 30 SMART Boards. Shortly after this, the Iowa City School District Foundation started a $1.5 million technology fundraiser that supplied almost 300 SMART Boards, 425 document cameras, and 221 projectors. The arguments and unrest of high school students is caused by the universal treatment by the school district. Students disagree with technology
being the same in classrooms K-12. “I think that the rush to get the newest technology up is not as thought out as it should be,” Doug Lestina, Dean of Students said. “It should be more about what teachers want.” For many elementary schools, the coming of technology is an improvement. The new additions have proven to make younger students more focused in class. The interactive boards are having a visible and positive influence. SMART Boards work better with younger students because there are more interactive capabilities with younger and less advanced studies. “Elementary students want to use SMART
Boards. They pay attention so they can have a turn using it. They’re excited to learn,” said Susan Brennan, the Development Director for the Iowa City School District Foundation. For high school students, the addition isn’t having the same effect as elementary schools. “For me, it hasn’t enhanced school. I don’t care about SMART Boards. I think it’s taking money away from other areas of the school district that need it more,” Elijah Jones 14’ said. In addition, some high school students see the SMART Boards as a negative influence on learning. They think that the new technology wastes class time and distracts students.