Carey on limited AP courses at rural schools

The Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire issued a policy brief this week on rural school districts'  limited AP course offerings.  Don Gagnon and Marybeth Mattingly reported these key findings in their brief :

And this shows AP Success for Districts in the Most and Least Affluent Quartiles, by Urbanicity.


The authors speculate on the reasons for these disparities:

Rural districts may find it difficult to offer rigorous coursework because of insufficient numbers of capable students, lack of appropriate teacher staffing, or other logistical concerns owing to small, isolated populations.  Regardless of the causes, the result is that fewer rural students leave high school having experiencing college-level coursework or having earned college credits.  

Other posts about the challenges facing rural schools are here and here.