The College Board's Advanced Placement Program (AP) is a collaborative community of AP teachers and students, states, districts, schools, colleges, and universities committed to the daily work of developing college-level knowledge and skills. We’ve been delivering excellence in education to millions of students across the country since 1955.
The story of the AP program begins in the 1950s. In the midst of the Cold War, American policymakers began to fear that high school was not adequately preparing students for college and post-graduate study --and students with advanced training were viewed as an essential part of the American triumph over the Soviet Union.
A huge number of AP Courses have been recently revised or are in the process of revision. Of course, each course is different, but there have been some general themes to the changes. One major aim is to reduce the content scope of many of the courses so that students can get more mastery over a narrower span of subject matter.
The College Board encourages the elimination of barriers that restrict access to AP courses for students from ethnic, racial and socioeconomic groups that have been traditionally underrepresented in the AP Program. Schools should make every effort to ensure that their AP classes reflect the diversity of their student population.