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Students in a basement computer lab scribble the code they’ll need to access data from two-dimensional sets before testing that code on their monitors. Upstairs, a class of juniors and one sophomore are simplifying trigonometric expressions on a practice test. Elsewhere, students are wrapping up a unit on 20th century social movements, comparing contemporary literature with historical accounts.
Advanced Placement courses are taking off at New Bedford High, with more students sitting for the college-level exams and a higher percentage of students passing the tests.
Last year saw a 32% increase in the number of AP exams taken, and the percentage of students who passed increased.
New Bedford High’s percentage of passing scores — 66% — beat peer districts like Fall River, Brockton, and Greater New Bedford Voc-Tech. It even outpaced some suburban districts like Westport and Dedham. And it’s a huge improvement from the school’s 23% AP passing rate nine years earlier.
This year New Bedford High is offering 25 AP courses to its students, about twice as many as a decade ago.
Teacher Isaiah Houtman is piloting a new course in AP Cybersecurity this year after teaching AP Computer Science courses at New Bedford High for 20 years. Kibi Williams-Brown, a sixth-year teacher, introduced one of the first AP African American Studies courses in the country and is now expanding course enrollment. Teacher and alumnus Zach O’Brien, who was captivated by his AP Calculus course as a student at New Bedford High in the late 2010s, is now offering an AP Precalculus course — which had a 98% passage rate last year.
“We are trying to take advantage of these classes, and we have strong folks who can offer them,” said Principal Joyce Cardoza. “We executed well.”
Last year, New Bedford High students took a total of 891 AP exams and passed 587.
The push into AP courses is arriving alongside new Early College and International Baccalaureate programs, both of which also provide high-achieving students with opportunities to take advanced coursework. In a competitive college marketplace, enrollment is surging.
Amanda Medeiros, a junior who’s enrolled in AP Calculus, enjoyed the AP Precalculus course so much that she agreed to become a “peer mentor.” Now she supports the precalculus class with teaching and tutoring.
“I really love math,” she told The Light. “And instead of an elective, I’m getting a ton of refreshers.”
Yet New Bedford High’s AP expansion is happening at the same time as the school is slipping on other accountability measures — and fast. Only 14% of the school’s 10th graders met or exceeded grade-level expectations on the state math test last year. That’s a huge slide from less than a decade ago, when 46% met that bar.
Can the bright spot of AP tests lead to an academic turnaround of New Bedford High?
African American Studies is “here to serve our students”
When students started asking Kibi Williams-Brown about politics, race, and hair, she knew she could offer them something more than hushed and rushed after-school chats.
At first, when they questioned her about traditional black hairstyles or coverage of race in the news, she remembers telling them, “I don’t have time to go over the history of why you feel this way.”
But she became convinced that New Bedford students should have somewhere to go at school with their questions about history, race, and culture.
Students “need to see themselves in their education,” Williams-Brown said. So in 2023, she launched one of the earliest AP courses for African American Studies in the nation. And last year, 82% of students who took her course passed the exam — making them potentially eligible to earn college credit.
“Looking at our student body, this speaks to them, their lives, their history and culture,” Williams-Brown said. “Having a course like this gets them excited to come to school and have a source of pride.”
The multidisciplinary African American Studies course begins with the birth of humanity on the African continent, then winds through major moments in American history, like the Civil War and the Great Migration. It builds a throughline to explain the origin of modern social movements. The College Board, the organization that administers AP exams, began offering the exam in 2024.
“The course is a discovery,” said Williams-Brown. ”It makes it really fun for them.”
That sort of discovery would’ve appealed to a younger Williams-Brown, who graduated from New Bedford High in 2014.
“Taking this course would’ve opened so many doors,” she said. She reminisced about her first days at Vassar College, and about walking into classes without having read as much about African American history as some classmates.
Her career took her to New York City, where she worked for a dance company that promoted inclusion. During the pandemic, she ended up back in New Bedford and dipped her toe into teaching as a substitute at Keith Middle School.
“It’s a homecoming,” she said of teaching two AP courses at the high school. (AP Language and Composition is the other one.) “We all have our ‘why’ as teachers. Some of us had a hard time as teenagers and needed someone to connect to. … It feels good to be that person for students.”
More students taking more rigorous classes
New Bedford’s students tend to concentrate in academic clusters. There’s a cadre of students who take a lot of AP classes together. Others are funneled into AP classes through the high school’s “Academy of Honors,” a selective program that provides “exclusive access to various supports for these challenging courses,” including tutoring.
About 40 students are accepted into the Academy of Honors each year based on their report cards, attendance, disciplinary records, teacher recommendations, and submitted essays. One of the perks is taking AP classes as soon as freshman year.
But Williams-Brown said that the newly expanded AP offerings have been successful in “promoting to kids that have never taken an AP before.”
“We want all kids to think you can take these courses,” she said. “Some kids load up on AP courses because they’re preparing for a rigorous college, but there’s also learning for learning’s sake.”
Williams-Brown has seen that offering a class that students relate to “makes kids feel more confident” to take on an academic challenge, she said.
Houtman, the longtime computer science teacher, said he had a similar motivation for offering the new AP Cybersecurity course: it’s a field that kids are interested in and asking about.
That’s how Cardoza, the principal, summarized support for the new classes. “The goal is preparing students for fields they want to go into at the highest level,” she said.
Williams-Brown said she’s seen kids traditionally regarded as “disadvantaged” thrive in her AP classes. When they’re given the chance to pursue coursework they’re excited about, some of their “disadvantages” turn out to not really be disadvantages at all.
“Some kids in the school speak five languages. They’re constantly translating and code-switching,” she said.
“They’re already thinking so much,” Williams-Brown said. “It’s about creating a class that speaks to the skills they already have.”
Email Colin Hogan at chogan@newbedfordlight.org
