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Boardman High School's Advanced Placement program excels
BOARDMAN
Twelve years ago, Boardman High School offered one advanced-placement class.
Today, the school offers nine.
Back when one course was offered, about 20 students took AP exams each year.
Last year, 207 members of Boardman’s 2013 graduating class took an AP exam.
And Boardman had the highest percentage of test-takers with a score of 3 or above out of all public school districts in Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties in 2013, according to the 2014 state report card released earlier this month. Exam-takers can score between 1 and 5.
“The reason for the success is the kids and the teachers. You can’t put it down to anything else,” said Dave Kornbau, associate principal and AP coordinator.
He also credits Tim Saxton, director of operations for the school district who, as principal of the high school from 2002 to 2013, made it a priority to expand the AP program.
Saxton said he noticed a national trend in which getting good grades was not enough anymore for students to get into good colleges.
“If you want to make sure we have credibility in the eyes of colleges, this is the way to go,” he said he thought at the time, since AP scores are a standardized measurement of students’ achievements, whereas a grade of ‘A’ can be subjective.
Advanced-placement exams are administered by the College Board. Students take them after completing the corresponding AP courses, and can receive college credit depending on their exam scores.
Those taking the exams can score between 1 and 5.
A score of 3 or above was received by 37.5 percent of Boardman’s AP test-takers, according to the state report card.
At some other high schools in Mahoning County, the percentages were: 11.9 percent for Austintown Fitch, 32.1 percent for Canfield, 4 percent for Lowellville, 29.3 percent for Poland, 4.4 percent for South Range, 25.9 percent for Springfield, 13.3 percent for Struthers and 2 percent for Western Reserve.
“Not only are more of our kids taking it, but we’re also getting higher scores” compared with other schools, Kornbau said.
In November 2013, the College Board named Boardman to the fourth annual AP District Honor Roll to recognize the district’s efforts “to open AP classroom doors to a significantly broader pool of students while maintaining or improving the percentage of students earning scores of 3 or higher,” read a letter from a College Board representative.
Two Boardman students, Jessica Fox, 18, and Luke Carabbia, 17, said they are happy with their school’s AP program.
Fox said AP courses are faster-paced than her other classes, and she decided to take them “to challenge myself, and [because] I’m really interested in the topics.”
“I like the fact that my high school offers so many AP courses,” said Carabbia, who has gotten all 5’s on his exams so far, and hopes that will help him get into schools such as Princeton, Stanford and Cornell.
By the time they graduate, Fox will have taken six AP classes, and Carabbia will have taken seven.
Kornbau said the school will continue to expand the program, perhaps adding AP Chemistry or U.S. History in the future.
“Our students want that,” he said.