Advanced Placement standards cause budget headaches for schools

BY PATRICIA MAZZEI
Posted on Thu, Apr. 09, 2009

To understand the dueling forces of improving school grades and shrinking budgets for South Florida school districts this year, look no further than Advanced Placement courses.
High school grades will start moving away from the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test next year, putting more emphasis on the rigorous, college-level AP courses. At the same time, schools may have less money for teacher bonuses, textbooks, classroom materials and student exam fees to fund the AP.

The dilemma could force the cash-strapped Miami-Dade and Broward school districts to divert funds from other programs into AP -- or risk a steep drop in high-school grades.

''It makes no sense,'' said Melissa Gleissner, a parent at West Broward High School in Pembroke Pines who has been e-mailing parents about the possible cuts. ``They're contradicting themselves.''

WHO FUNDS WHAT

The state gives school districts money to train AP teachers and to buy textbooks and supplies, from high-tech calculators and lab equipment to tape recorders for foreign-language students. It also rewards teachers with a $50 bonus for each student who scores a three or higher on the AP exam, which is graded on a five-point scale.

School districts now cover the cost for AP exams -- $86 per test for classes ranging from comparative government to calculus to computer science. That amounted to about $2.3 million in Miami-Dade and $1.9 million in Broward this year.

In the worst-case scenario, a dip in state AP funding could lead to students having to pay their exam fees, said Beatriz Zarraluqui, administrative director of Miami-Dade's division of advanced academic programs -- though that would be a last resort.

''Those students whose parents can afford to pay for the exams will be able to take them,'' she said. ``And those whose parents unfortunately don't have the means will not.''

The Florida Senate's budget proposal calls for decreasing funding for training and instructional materials -- which state lawmakers also trimmed last year -- by half, and to pare down the teacher bonus to $40 per student who scores higher than a three on the AP exam.

The House budget plan does not decrease AP funding. The two legislative chambers eventually have to hash out a compromise budget.

Lawmakers from both chambers have touted their budgets as holding state funding per student steady. But to do so, they reshuffled and slashed several pots of education money.

Cuts could lead to fewer class sections, or to schools no longer purchasing supplemental books, like additional novels in AP literature classes.

Despite the popularity of teaching AP courses among teachers, some fear the lower bonuses would attract fewer educators to lead the classes, which typically require longer grading and planning hours. Last year's cuts eliminated well-attended summer AP training institutes for teachers in Miami-Dade.

''A lot of teachers won't want to teach AP unless we support them properly,'' said Cynthia Park, Broward's director of advanced academic programs.

Jenny Krugman, Southern region vice president for the College Board, which produces the AP program, credited bonuses and other state funding with AP flourishing in Florida over the last decade.

''What you end up with is a teacher who's motivated to recruit youngsters into AP that might not ever be allowed in,'' she said.

College Board studies have shown that AP students do better in college, even if they don't score higher than a three on the AP exam, and tend to graduate in four years, resulting in savings for their families -- and the state.

NEW GRADING SYSTEM

Schools are looking to ramp up their AP offerings to score higher on the grading system lawmakers signed off on last spring, intended to result in better-rounded grades less dependent on the FCAT.

School grades will take into account the graduation rate, students' scores on college-entrance exams and enrollment in AP and other rigorous courses -- instead of mostly being based on ninth- and 10th-grade FCAT scores.

The Miami-Dade and Broward school districts originally backed the new grading plan. But the number of failing schools is expected to swell under the new rules, at least until schools adapt to them. And adapting requires money, so schools officials had hoped that legislators would push the new formula back a year and spare district budgets.

No such luck.

The legislative session ends May 1, and no bills to push back the grading system have been filed.

Broward Superintendent Jim Notter said last week that adjusting to the grading system would cost about $10 million. Between $2.5 million and $3.5 million of that would go to beefing up AP, which now costs the district about $9.6 million in tests, training, textbooks and materials.

The Miami-Dade school district has not put a firm price tag on the new rules yet, Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said.

Broward has axed $130 million from its $2 billion budget in the past year and a half. Miami-Dade has cut more than $300 million from its $5.5 billion budget.

If the AP trims go through -- still a big if -- both districts could choose not to pour money into adapting to the grading formula, as several Broward School Board members have suggested.

But that would likely not sit well with parents, students and teachers who would be saddled with the pressure -- and stigma -- of lower school grades.

''It's scary,'' said Marsha Mansfield, who has two children at West Broward High. ``I envy my friends whose children are leaving the public-school system this year.''
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