The Top 50 AP Schools In Iowa
About the Iowa AP Index
Calculating the AP Index
Every public and nonpublic high school in Iowa accredited by the state Department of Education and that administered AP exams in May 2023 was invited to participate in the 2024 AP Index. Schools had the opportunity to decline participating in the 2024 AP Index.
The Iowa AP Index for a given high school is the ratio of AP exams taken by its students (any grade) divided by the number of its graduating seniors.
| Number of AP exams taken |
| Iowa AP Index = |
|
| Number of graduates |
The number of AP exams administered per school and number of graduating seniors per school were provided by the Iowa Department of Education or the school. The number of graduates for a high school, as reported by the Iowa Department of Education, includes all students who received a diploma in the 2022-2023 school year from a public school.
For reference, an AP Index of 1.00 means that the number of AP exams for that school equals the number of graduates. A high AP Index reflects that a school offers AP courses and has developed a culture that supports student participation in AP courses and exams. The Iowa AP Index provides a fair comparison of AP opportunity across school size.
The 2024 Iowa AP Index is based on the AP exams taken in May 2023 and school graduates in May/June 2023. 190 Iowa schools had at least one student take an AP exam in 2023.
This included 158 public schools and 32 nonpublic schools.
The Iowa AP Index for all public high schools in Iowa
We calculated a 2024 AP Index score for all the accredited public schools in Iowa based on all exams taken by Iowa public school students in 2023 and 2023 Iowa public school graduating seniors.
2024 Iowa AP Index
for all Public
High Schools in Iowa |
|
17,327 Exams Taken |
|
| = |
|
= 0.52 |
|
33,259 Graduates |
|
For comparison, the 2023 AP Index for all Iowa accredited public high schools was 0.51. Thus, the 2024 Iowa AP Index for all public schools indicates a slight decrease in AP participation in the state compared to 2023. The overall trend had been increasing from 2005-2019 and appears to have begun increasing again after a national decrease since 2020. The Iowa AP Index also was not published in 2020 and 2021.
References
From the College Board
AP Central
From the Iowa Department of Education
The Iowa Department of Education's Education Statistics
Iowa Senior Year Plus program, Iowa Department of Education