More North Carolina high school students are taking an advanced placement class for college credit this school year than ever before.
High school students can earn college credit by taking Advanced Placement, or AP, classes if they receive a passing score on a standardized exam for the course.
Officials said 93,000 North Carolina students are taking at least one of those courses this year. That's an all time high that surpasses pre-pandemic levels. In fact, that number has grown by nearly 25 percent over the last decade.
At the same time, a greater share of Black and Latino students are participating in - and succeeding - in these classes.
In North Carolina, participation for those students is growing faster than it is nationally, which is closing gaps.
State education officials credited this growth to efforts to remove barriers for students. For example, state funding now covers the cost of students' final exams.
