Closing Achievement Gaps
MMSI works to improve AP participation and performance and promote college readiness, especially among students typically under-represented in AP classes and math and science careers.
MMSI staff work closely with teachers and counselors in Massachusetts public high schools to identify, recruit and support a diverse group of academically motivated students to enroll and succeed in AP classes, particularly African-American, Hispanic, low-income and female students.
The program is proving successful in closing access and achievement gaps across the Commonwealth:
• Among all math, science and English AP tests taken by Massachusetts public school students last spring, only 10 percent were taken by African-American and Hispanic students. Among the 21 MMSI schools, minority students represented more than half of all test-takers in these AP subjects.
• In the first cohort of MMSI schools, qualifying scores among African-American and Hispanic students more than doubled (104%) over two years, compared to increases of 30% statewide and 28% nationally during the same period.
• MMSI schools represent only 13% of all Massachusetts schools with African-American AP test-takers (21 out of 165) but yielded 30% of passing scores among Black students.
• Passing scores on AP math and science exams among female students nearly doubled (94%) in two years among the first nine MMSI schools, compared to an 8% two-year gain among females in Massachusetts and 9% across the U.S.