TIMSS AP students AP students didn't do much better than international average on TIMSS Calculus Date sent: Tue, 17 Mar 1998 08:56:17 EST Send reply to: core-net@TUCC6.TUCC.Trinity.Edu From: Dave TNCLE To: Multiple recipients of list Subject: TIMSS & "AP" Students Originally to: core-net@TUCC6.TUCC.Trinity.Edu, CESNEWS@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU I thought some of you might be interested in the response I received from the College Board to a question about the performance of AP students on the recent TIMSS tests. First my question, then the response. Dave Shearon Nashville, TN > ---------- > From: Dave TNCLE[SMTP:DaveTNCLE@aol.com] > Sent: Monday, March 16, 1998 2:42 PM > To: wcurry@collegeboard.org; parbolino@collegeboard.org; > cgill@collegeboard.org; fwright@collegeboard.org > Cc: ap-agent1@ets.org > Subject: TIMSS Results & AP Students > > Bill O'Neal with ETS suggested I contact you with my question: > > Does the College Board have any comment or analysis yet about the > recently > announced high school results from the Third International Math & > Science > Study? As you probably know, that study showed American students > trailing > foreign counterparts in math and science and, worse, even our advanced > students not matching up to their counterparts. > Subj: RE: TIMSS Results & AP Students Date: 98-03-16 17:35:29 EST From: WCurry@collegeboard.org (Curry, Wade) To: WCurry@collegeboard.org (Curry, Wade), PArbolino@collegeboard.org (Arbolino, Philip), CGill@collegeboard.org (Gill, Charlotte), FWright@collegeboard.org (Wright, Frederick), DaveTNCLE@aol.com ('Dave TNCLE') CC: ap-agent1@ets.org Hello, Mr. Shearon, Since the calculus questions, according to Chan Jones who trained the TIMSS scorers, were much easier than the average questions on the Calculus AB exams, it was surprising that the AP Calculus students performed only a little better than the international mean. It was shocking that AP Physics students did not do better than the mean. Since the study did not attempt to get a random sample of AP students, perhaps that is the problem. We have thus far been unable to obtain further information about the size or nature of the sample. A recent study at 20 selective US universities (14 state universities, Yale, Duke, Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, Tulane, and Boston College) indicates that students exempted from a course on the basis of an AP grade in Physics or Calculus outperform in the next higher level course those students who take the course equivalent to AP at the university. About 75% of those receiving AP 5s and 4s earn As or Bs in the next course. Those in Physics C and Calculus BC are extraordinary students; 93% are in the top fifth of their class, and the mean SAT Quantitative score is 715. Arthur, Those are levels of AP courses. Don't know about Physics C, but I understand Calculus BC is the equivalent of a full two-semester college calculus course. Date sent: Thu, 19 Mar 1998 16:34:08 EST Send reply to: core-net@TUCC6.TUCC.Trinity.Edu From: Dave TNCLE To: Multiple recipients of list Subject: TIMSS & AP Students Originally to: CESNEWS@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU, core-net@TUCC6.TUCC.Trinity.Edu For those of you who may have been following this exchange: Subj: TIMSS Results Date: 98-03-18 17:18:06 EST From: clwright@ets.org (craig wright) Reply-to: clwright@ets.org To: DaveTNCLE@aol.com Dave: Your message regarding TIMSS results was forwarded to me. I have not seen anything in the TIMSS results that isolates students in AP Calculus or AP Physics. My understanding is that "advanced mathematics" students for TIMSS were those taking AP Calculus, calculus, or precalculus. Similarly, for physics, "advanced science" students were those taking AP Physics or physics. In mathematics there is a big difference between students in precalculus and students in an AP Calculus course; it is important to note that some questions on TIMSS were calculus questions. I would be very interested in any information that you have seen that identifies AP students as a separate group in the TIMSS results. Craig L. Wright Associate Examiner in Mathematics Assessment Division Educational Testing Service Princeton, NJ 08541 (609) 683-2642 clwright@ets.org