Frutis

One issue to consider is the fact that not all AP students take their course's test. The College Board estimates that about 2/3 of students enrolled in an AP course take the course's AP test.[33] On the other hand, a study of University of California system students found that only about 55% to 60% of AP students took their course's exam.[34]

However, "It has recently become clear . . . that these estimations of overall participation rates mask the variability in participation rates across AP examinations."[35] For example, one study of math and science AP courses showed that participation rates were 52.7% for AP Chemistry, 53.6% for AP Physics, 57.7% for AP Biology, and 77.4% for AP Calculus.[36] The largest study on this topic found similar participation rates (49.5% for AP Chemistry, 52.3% for AP Physics, 54.5% for Biology, and 68.9% for Calculus).[37] History exams tend to have slightly higher participation rates (57.9% for AP European History, 58.5% for AP World History, and 62.8% for AP U.S. History), and 65.4% of AP English students took either the AP English Language or AP English Literature exam.[35] This same study found that for "core AP subjects (i.e., no arts or language subjects)", the overall test participation rate was 60.8%.[35]