Six RI School Districts Honored By Advanced Placement

Hundreds of school districts nationwide, including six in Rhode Island, have been named to the annual AP District Honor Roll, which recognizes schools that increase access to and performance on Advanced Placement programs. More than 370 school districts across the country and in Canada were recognized on the ninth annual list.

To qualify, large school districts had to show at least 4 percent more participation and access to Advanced Placement programs year over year. Medium districts had to see at least a 6 percent increase and small districts had to see at least 11 percent.

These schools increased access to Advanced Placement courses for minority students while also improving or maintaining the rate at which participating students scored a 3 or higher on an AP Exam.

Here are all the schools in Rhode Island:

• Barrington: Barrington Public Schools ★
• East Greenwich: East Greenwich School District
• West Greenwich: Exeter W Greenwich Regional School District ★
• Narragansett: Narragansett School District ★
• North Scituate: Scituate School Department ★
• West Warwick: West Warwick Town School District

Districts marked with a star achieved the AP honor over several years. An asterisk notes districts that saw at least 30 percent enrollment of American Indian, African-American and Hispanic/Latino students, and a dagger shows those where at least 30 percent of participants qualified for free or reduced-price lunch.

National data from this year showed that about half of underrepresented students with a “high degree of readiness for AP” participated in the program, the organization wrote on its website.
College Board sponsors the Advanced Placement program and the popular SAT test, which attempts to assess a students’ college-readiness. The Honor Roll recognition is based on three years of data from 2016 to 2018.

Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report.
Photo credit: Charles Dharapak/Associated Press