So if you quadruple the number of exams taken, the number passed will... ?

I was browsing a few old files in preparing to clean up my hard drive, and noticed this one... 

In 2006-2007, a huge push was made to get more students to take AP courses, because (I love this) students who take AP courses are more likely to graduate than those who don't. So being in AP courses obviously motivates kids to stay in school. Move along, logicians -nothin' to see here. Principals were given incentives to increase AP enrollment as much as possible.

What harm could it do? Even if a bunch of kids who didn't really belong in the course were in it, the ones who did belong would still get what they needed, right? And the kids who didn't belong would realize that and either drop out or struggle through.

But wait, there's more. If a senior is taking a core course - say, in math, English or science - that is also an AP course, they generally must pass that class to graduate. Principals are also highly incentivized to increase the graduation rate. So flunking, say, 8 or 10 seniors who don't belong in your AP course is  (a) a great way to never teach another AP course, and (b) futile, since the administration will find a way to pass them in the final 3 weeks of school anyway.

Given that, if you teach an AP course at my school, you have two options: (1) teach the course as a regular AP course, lose 1/3 to 1/2 of the class within 8 weeks, resign yourself to having those students stay lost for the next 30 weeks and thus learn absolutely nothing in your course, but give them a C anyway, or  (2) water down the content to the point that everybody learns a little something but only the most diligent have any hope of passing the exam, and then only by doing a lot of independent study.  For the past 7 years, AP Statistics was taught using option 2, and no one has passed the exam. I chose option 1. We'll find out in mid-July if I did any better.

But meanwhile, it seems clear that a lot of teachers choose option 2. (After all, who wants to teach a class every day in which half of the students have given up weeks ago, but know they're going to pass anyway?) Here's what that does to the number of students passing the AP exam:

In the first year (2007), exams passed increased by 9% while exams taken increased by 350%. After that, exams passed declined significantly, and is now at 60% of the number it was at prior to flooding the classes with unprepared students.

Addendum: I did have a student pass, which I'm told is the first time in 7 years anyone from MHS has done so. However, I only had one other student get a 2, with the other 18 in the class getting a 1. I was somewhat disappointed with this result, and would have loved to take another shot at it in 2011-12. Nonetheless, I did prove that Option 1 at least provides a few students the chance to pass the course. I'm convinced that if all AP classes were run that way, fewer unprepared students would take the course, but a much higher percentage would pass.

Another in a long, long line of excellent examples of unintended consequences. Although in this case, it should not have been (and wasn't, by some) unanticipated consequences.