FLVS Advanced Placement Scores Continue to Climb
Every year, millions of students all over the world participate in Advanced Placement (AP) courses that culminate in a test during the month of May. Students can earn college credits based on the score they earn on the AP tests. Florida Virtual School (FLVS) students are no exception – many accept the challenge of these rigorous, college-like courses and sit for the big tests each spring.
FLVS has been on an upward trajectory of performance in both the FLVS Full Time and FLVS Flex schools in recent years. FLVS Flex has outperformed the nation and the state since 2015. FLVS Full Time has steadily improved and for the last two years has outperformed the state and closed the gap in comparison to the nation.
In 2019, the percentage of FLVS students earning a qualifying score on an AP test increased to 63.4 percent for FLVS Flex and 54.4 percent for FLVS Full Time. The national average for students earning a qualifying score on the same set of courses offered by FLVS is 56.9 percent and the average for the state of Florida is 50.8 percent.
Overall Qualifying Percent Four Year Trend |
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| Nation* | Florida* | FLVS FT | FLVS Flex | |
| 2014 | 58.7% | 49.4% | 35.0% | 56.7% |
| 2015 | 57.5% | 50.4% | 36.0% | 58.5% |
| 2016 | 57.1% | 49.0% | 45.6% | 57.9% |
| 2017 | 55.8% | 48.2% | 44.5% | 61.0% |
| 2018 | 56.6% | 49.4% | 51.0% | 61.6% |
| 2019 | 56.9% | 50.8% | 53.4% | 63.4% |
*These figures include only the courses offered by FLVS to provide an accurate comparison.
Both FLVS Full Time students and FLVS Flex students have the option to take AP courses. Our AP courses are designed much like other FLVS courses, working through lessons and attending live lessons with other students and teachers. These courses are tightly aligned to the College Board standards. As a result, our AP students do very well on the AP tests!
FLVS AP courses can meet the needs of students, schools, or districts that want to engage in the rigorous College Board curriculum but don’t have enough students to form a full class or can’t find a teacher with the right credentials. The AP teachers at FLVS are certified in their subject areas and offer a personalized learning experience to FLVS students all over the world.
Learn more about earning college-level credit with our online AP courses.
Ready to enroll? Visit our high school course list to view all of our courses.
Post by Dr. Alicia Parker, FLVS Senior Manager, Evaluation & Measurement
Excellent information! Thank you. Now I think I’ll sign my daughter up for AP courses next year. Btw at what grade can students start earning college credits for AP courses?
HI Jana! I hope all is well! For our AP courses, students want to make sure they have met the course pre-reqs before they take the course. Most students take AP courses in 11-12th grade, but we do advise some advanced students to take an AP course as early as 9th grade. AP Human Geography, AP Art History and AP Psy are common AP courses that students may start as early as 9th grade if they are ready for the college level reading/writing that it entails! Thanks!
Here is some additional information from College Board in regards to age and grade level: https://secure-media.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/ap/appropriate-grade-levels-for-ap-courses.pdf Thanks!
If you fail the test do you get some of your grade taken away? Also, what does the test entail?
Hi Faith! I hope all is well! When students take FLVS Flex AP courses and complete the course with us, the grade that they earn in the course is the grade issued on our transcript and is not impacted by the exam grade. The AP Exam is separate and dictates if a student will earn college level credit. Generally students who earn a 3-5 on the AP Exam can earn college credit depending on the college they attend! Hope this helps!
I noticed that it says that 5 questions were posted but only 2 are viewable. Is that because you removed the rest like you removed mine? Also, the statistics that you presented on your previous page are clearly dishonest. FLVS students do not consistently perform 6% better than the National average on AP tests. FLVS Flex students are starting to gain that edge but those students also receive some other type of education which cannot be ruled out as a confounding factor. That graph could be showing that homeschooling students perform 6% better than the National average.
Hi there! You can find more information about how FLVS students perform on AP test score at https://www.flvs.net/community/facts-about-online-education. Hope this helps!
It doesn’t actually, because FLVS is not being forthright with how they present their statistics on Which of their students are taking these AP tests. Their own data listed on another page shows that Full Time FLVS students score well BELOW the national average of AP tests. It is the FLVS Flex students- students who are homeschooled or in traditional schooling and using FLVS as a supplement- who score well on AP tests. Statistically, this shows that it is NOT FLVS courses that are raising their scores, but their other form of education. If FLVS courses were the success factor, it would be raising the AP scores in the full-time group as well.
We recognize that the type of student, learning environment, curriculum, instruction, and a host of factors all play a role in student success as well as test performance. If you would like to speak to our Assessment and Accountability team regarding research in this area, we encourage you to reach out to to the team at research@flvs.net. Thank you!
I am curious to see a history and comarison of achievement results on the AP Statistics test only. Please provide.