America's Top Public High Schools

[ExarKun666]

La Canada is ranked 231. Our team number is 2429.

[smurfgirl]

Originally Posted by JesseK

AP classes, IMO, are great if one wants a harder class or wants to see what college classes are like. They're TERRIBLE for replacing a college course. Don't do an AP Calc, Chem, or Physics class in high school and expect that you'll know even half of everything you'd get out of a good college's Calc I, Physics I, or Chem I class. As an engineer or scientist, this really only sets you up for failure in the follow-up courses.

For the most part I'd agree with this, but it really depends on the quality of your AP teacher, as well as on what you plan to study in college.

For example, I took AP Calculus BC in high school. My teacher was fantastic. He always went well beyond the explanations and examples expected for the AP curriculum; he truly wanted us to understand how to apply what we were learning, how it worked, and how it was derived from other principles we knew. He loved showing us special tricks and applications. His enthusiasm and passion for math was contagious. Even though I knew he was a terrific teacher and I felt I had a solid grip on calculus after his class, I wasn't sure if that would be good enough for MIT. I decided to enroll in the math sequence that does a six-week review of single-variable, and then goes on to all of vector/multi-variable calculus for the rest of the semester. It turns out that even with MIT's rigor, I learned nothing in the first six weeks of class, because I had already learned it in my high school AP class. Maybe my class was exceptional. But I do think that it's worth it to use your AP credit if you truly have a good grasp on the subject... or if you don't plan to use the subject extensively. For example, I got a 5 on the AP French exam. I'm an engineer, not a French major, so I'm going to use that as a sign that I don't have to retake French III and IV here to make sure I remember every single verb conjugation 100%.


As for a school's merit being based off of their AP/IB offerings and results, I think it's a somewhat arbitrary criterion. Some schools which may not offer AP/IB courses may have equally or even further challenging offerings, but they choose not to buy into the AP thing. Though companies like CollegeBoard try not to advertise this, the standardized test industry is a lot about profit, and not necessarily about a solid education.

Furthermore, high scores on AP tests don't necessarily correlate to a good grasp of the subject matter, or ability to apply it in the real world. Scoring well on certain AP exams or other standardized tests corresponds to a lot of "memorization" of facts, or learning how to tailor your formatting to their expectations for high scores. Not scoring well on standardized tests doesn't necessarily mean that you don't understand a subject or can't apply yourself in the real world. Some people who may get nervous on tests or take longer than the allotted time, but may be able build a beautifully functional robot with structural integrity which solves a problem well, and explain all of the physics in it even if they bombed their AP physics exam.

I am by no means trying to take away from the merit of the schools on the list. They certainly all offer a comprehensive and high-quality education to their students. I am just trying to point out that in some cases, there may be more than meets the eye. Maybe other schools who are also terrific are getting overlooked because they don't offer AP/IB courses.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

[...] Whitney High School (1135) all have teams (a majority of the "public elite").

WHS doesn't run an FRC team anymore due to (lack of) funding and school support. Their VEX/FTC (not sure which they do these days) is still going strong, as is their FLL team, at least, last I checked they were.

[waialua359]

If we ranked teams based on AP scores, I'm pretty sure we'd be 32xx out of 32xx.
Or not make the list.
Or be dead last of the Hawaii FIRST teams.

[smurfgirl]

Originally Posted by waialua359

If we ranked teams based on AP scores, I'm pretty sure we'd be 32xx out of 32xx.
Or not make the list.
Or be dead last of the Hawaii FIRST teams.

Like I said in my previous post, AP scores are not everything. (This is one of the reasons that I think a lot of the "rankings" of schools locally and across the country are somewhat pointless; there are so many criteria that aren't analyzed that should be, and some that are taken into account that are can be false indicators, like AP scores.)

If what you say is true, then your team is a brilliant example of the point I am trying to prove. Standardized test scores are not always a good indication of someone's ability to understand a subject and apply themselves to a real-world task (like building a robot) or to communicate effectively to make meaningful contributions to the world (like community service).

[Anna B.]

If Burncoat High ever made that list... well... I don't have to worry about that because it's not happening any time soon.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by JesseK

AP classes, IMO, are great if one wants a harder class or wants to see what college classes are like. They're TERRIBLE for replacing a college course. Don't do an AP Calc, Chem, or Physics class in high school and expect that you'll know even half of everything you'd get out of a good college's Calc I, Physics I, or Chem I class. As an engineer or scientist, this really only sets you up for failure in the follow-up courses.

In the world of No Child Left Behind, test results are all we have to rate education these days . If only someone were able to get past the red tape and implement a Taxonomy on Education Objectives -style program in an entire school system. Then we'd have measurable results for a non-subjective article that aren't based upon funding or 'status'.

I have to agree that tests are a pretty crappy way to measure education but to say that AP classes don't teach you what you need to know is outright wrong. (based solely on my experience so take it with a grain of salt) I took Calculus AB in high school, passed the test and took Calc 2 my first term at Kettering. Throughout the class I was bored because I had already learned 95% of the material. I did eventually struggle with Calc 3 but I believe that was more due to my being sick through roughly 20% of the class. About AP classes, they MAY teach you the material (this is up for debate) but they will NOT prepare you for college. Too many times I heard teachers tell me that AP classes are like college classes, now after 2 years in college I can safely tell you that none of my classes have been like any of the AP classes I took. Don't go into college thinking you are going to be fine because you got A's in your AP classes.

Originally Posted by dtengineering

I just want to make sure that everyone is taking this list about as seriously as when the National Enquirer runs a story on "Hollywoods Hottest 100 Stars".

They are both judged by equally scientific comparisons and are both equally as meaningful.
Jason

WAIT! Those lists aren't serious I thought they were, isn't that what we vote on every couple Novembers?

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by smurfgirl

Like I said in my previous post, AP scores are not everything. (This is one of the reasons that I think a lot of the "rankings" of schools locally and across the country are somewhat pointless; there are so many criteria that aren't analyzed that should be, and some that are taken into account that are can be false indicators, like AP scores.)

If what you say is true, then your team is a brilliant example of the point I am trying to prove. Standardized test scores are not always a good indication of someone's ability to understand a subject and apply themselves to a real-world task (like building a robot) or to communicate effectively to make meaningful contributions to the world (like community service).

If you ever came to Hawaii and asked about a college-prep curriculum at our school, no one would even consider sending their kid to Waialua.
Part of our (robotics program) mission at our school, is trying to change that mentality. Private schools in Hawaii only accept the creme of the crop and you have your fair share of public schools that I refer to as the "public private schools." Almost all of them have FIRST teams now.
The pressure for us to deliver a high-level program to continue to attract high-level sponsorship from large businesses and foundations..................well, lets just say its beyond the roof.
My role on the team has slowly moved from construction team to lead administrator/coordinator/coach/documentation-leader in order to solely work on this aspect of our team.

[Phyrxes]

At our school we have some students that are so competitive with each other that the valedictorian/salutatorian is largely a function of who can get more A's in AP classes. I know we have kids taking 4 to 5 AP classes a year. as Juniors and Seniors and 2 to 3 as Sophomores. Anytime a significant portion of the population is taking that many AP classes (and tests) and usually scoring "okay" or better its skews a list like this.

[RMiller]

Originally Posted by JesseK

AP classes, IMO, are great if one wants a harder class or wants to see what college classes are like. They're TERRIBLE for replacing a college course. Don't do an AP Calc, Chem, or Physics class in high school and expect that you'll know even half of everything you'd get out of a good college's Calc I, Physics I, or Chem I class. As an engineer or scientist, this really only sets you up for failure in the follow-up courses.

I am sorry, but I have to agree with

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

... but to say that AP classes don't teach you what you need to know is outright wrong.

Again, this is from my experience.
I took AP Calc BC as a sophomore, then went on to take linear algebra as a correspondence course junior year, Calc 3 and Diffy Q as a senior at a local college. I took stats in college. I had no problem whatsoever.
I took AP Chem as a sophomore then analytical chem as a senior at a local college without any issue. I got a degree in chemical engineering and chemistry without too much difficulty (other than late nights because I would fall asleep too much in lecture )
I took AP Bio as a junior. In my second year at college I took the required biomolecular engineering class (for ChemE) and was bored to sleep (literally).
I took AP Physics B (non-calc based) as an online class junior year. In the honors calc-based physics I did struggle some, but in the non-honors class second semester, I was bored enough to rarely come to class.
I took AP Micro and Macro econ as an online class senior year. In my fourth year at college, I took intermediate microecon. I worked more often on Senior Labs than listened in class and breezed through.

So, AP Classes can definitely replace college classes. If you put the time into it in high school, it can be of value later.
Are there people who struggle with college classes, even if they took AP Classes? Absolutely.
There is no across the board answer. If you are the least bit unsure, it might be wise to retake the class (and risk an easy A).

Note: I do not advise sleeping, skipping, or working on other classes in college.

Side Note: I do agree with others that [(#AP (or IB) Tests Taken in a year)/(students graduating)] is not a very indicative measure of a school.

2¢

[Abra Cadabra IV]

#231 is team 2429, and #346 is team 589.

[jmanela]

#580 Andover High School 2834 Bionic Barons

[miketwalker]

Team 1902 has numerous schools involved since they are 4H, but the main public schools appeared on the list (#166 Winter Park, #414 Lake Brantley, #686 Timber Creeek)

[Rick TYler]

Looking at the list, I'd say at least half of the top schools in Washington have FRC teams. Redmond High is #684 and makes up more than half the Exothermic Robotics Club, which competes in VRC and FTC, but not FRC.

[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by PaW

My other son attends Interlake High School (Saints Robotics FRC 1899 & Rick Tyler's favorite adopted VEX team ) did well on the Newsweek survey at number 18.

I'll say they are my favorite adopted team. Some of the FRC 1899 students joined our club, built a VEX robot, and took it to VRC Worlds where they ended being an alliance captain. Nice kids and good robot builders to boot.