Advanced Placement Exams Taken in the Humanities
- Students took 2,008,352 AP humanities exams in 2020, far outstripping each of the other academic fields—arts, behavioral/social sciences, math/computer science, and natural sciences (Indicator I-12a). Humanities exams represented 43% of all AP exams taken,1 due largely to the high levels of exam-taking in English (869,458 exams in English language and literature combined), U.S. history (472,697), and world history (302,942).2
- In 1996 (the first year with available data), students took 468,320 tests in humanities subjects, compared to 363,135 in all other subjects combined. From 1996 to 2017, the number of AP exams taken in the humanities increased to 4.6 times its original level, then plateaued from 2017 to 2019. From their comparatively smaller numbers in 1996, exams taken in other fields increased much more dramatically from 1996 to 2019. The number of behavioral/social science exams taken in 2019 was 13 times the number taken two decades earlier, while tests in the other science fields increased to about six times their 1996 numbers.3
- In all fields, AP exam-taking declined by 7–8% (depending on the field) from 2019 to 2020, reflecting the challenges the COVID-19 pandemic presented for schools and test takers.
- The rate of humanities AP exam-taking among high school students also increased substantially from 1996 to 2017, indicating that the growth in exam-taking exceeded the increase in student population (Indicator I-12b). The number of humanities exams taken per 100 students rose from slightly more than three in 1996 to almost 13 in 2017. As in the case of the number of exams taken, the rate plateaued from 2017 to 2019 and then declined in 2020 (to just under 12 per 100 students).
- From 1996 to 2017, the number of exams taken increased substantially in each of the three broad humanities subject areas—English language and literature, history, and languages and literatures other than English (LOTE; Indicator I-12c). History (art, European, U.S., and world) experienced the greatest gain, almost 400%. In 2019, English experienced its first ever decline in exam-taking over the time period charted here, and 2020 brought an even more pronounced drop. For the other two subject areas, no appreciable decline in exams taken was observed until the advent of COVID. (Indicator I-12d depicts the trend in the rate of exam-taking for each of the broad humanities subjects.)
- In 2020, history replaced English as the most-taken type of AP exam for the first time (in records going back to 1996). An important driver of the growth in history exam-taking was the introduction of the world history exam in 2002. This exam grew rapidly in popularity, from 20,955 tests taken the first year the exam was administeredto a high of 313,317 in 2019 (with a decline to 302,942 in 2020). As a result, world history exams accounted for half of the growth in history test-taking from 2002 to 2020.
- The increase in LOTE exam-taking from 1996 to 2020 was fueled by substantial growth in the number of exams taken in Spanish language and literature, which have always accounted for a large majority of LOTE exams (79% in 2020).
- A majority of humanities subjects saw an increase in the rate of exams taken from 2014 to 2019 (Indicator I-12e). As was true in the long-term, over this shorter time period Spanish and world history experienced substantial increases. That five-year period also saw a marked increase in the rate of exam-taking in Chinese, albeit from a much smaller base. The greatest decline, 11%, was in the rate of exam-taking in European history.
- The accessibility of AP courses in the humanities, as measured by the number of schools with students who took the exam, increased considerably for some subjects in recent years (Indicator I-12f).4 The greatest increase in access was for the Chinese exam, with 22% more schools in 2019 than in 2015. Spanish literature and world history also saw substantial increases. For several other subjects the exam was less accessible in 2019 than five years prior. European history experienced the greatest decline (6%).
- For White and Hispanic/Latino students, and for students who identify as being of two or more races, the share of humanities exams taken was roughly proportional to their representation among the secondary school population in 2019 (Indicator I-12g). The share of humanities exams taken by students of Asian ancestry was markedly higher than their share of the student population, while the share of exams taken by Black American and American Indian/Alaska Native students was smaller than the shares of the student population these students represent. A similar pattern was observed in the other academic fields, with the exception of STEM (excluding the behavioral/social sciences), where the share of tests taken by Hispanic students was substantially smaller than these students’ share of the school population. (In interpreting these findings, it is important to keep in mind that the number of exam offerings is greater in the humanities than in the other broad subject areas. The racial/ethnic distribution of exam takers also differs substantially by humanities subject. Please see Supplemental Table I-12g for details.)
Endnotes
- 1Excluding Seminar and Research.
- 2Even though the humanities field encompasses a larger number of subject exams than the other academic fields (as they are defined here), most of the humanities exams are taken by relatively few students (e.g., in 2020, only 5,850 students took the Latin exam, as compared to 145,540 who took the chemistry test). In speaking about academic fields (humanities, arts, etc.) or broad subject areas within the humanities (e.g., languages and literatures other than English), the appropriate units are exams taken (rather than students), because each student may have taken more than one exam in a field in a given year. Publicly available information does not indicate how many students took more than one humanities exam (e.g., the European history exam in addition to the more commonly taken English exam) in a given year nor the extent to which the taking of multiple exams has contributed to the increase in AP exam-taking in the humanities.
- 3The Humanities Indicators began compiling data for arts exams later than for the other fields. We hope to be able to extend the arts trend back to 1996 with the next update of this topic.
- 4This measure calculates the change over fewer years than previous measures, because in 2015 the College Board made a change to the way it counts participating schools: it began including schools that did not order or administer AP exams but had students test at other schools.
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2020, “Program Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2020, “Program Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021); and National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics 2020, “Table 105.30. Enrollment in elementary, secondary, and degree-granting postsecondary institutions, by level and control of institution: Selected years, 1869–70 through fall 2029,” (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2020, “Program Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2020, “Program Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021); and National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics 2020, “Table 105.30. Enrollment in elementary, secondary, and degree-granting postsecondary institutions, by level and control of institution: Selected years, 1869–70 through fall 2029,” (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2019, “Program Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021); and National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics 2020, “Table 105.30. Enrollment in elementary, secondary, and degree-granting postsecondary institutions, by level and control of institution: Selected years, 1869–70 through fall 2029,” (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2019, “Program Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
Source: College Board, AP Program Participation and Performance Data 2019, “National Summary Report,” (accessed fall 2021); and U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Digest of Education Statistics 2019 (Tables 205.20 and 205.30) and Digest of Education Statistics 2020 (Table 203.50), (accessed fall 2021). Data analyzed and presented by the Humanities Indicators ().
The College Board gives students the option of identifying as “American Indian/Alaska Native,” “Asian,” “Black,” “Hispanic/Latino,” “Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander,” “White,” or “Two or More Races,” or “Other”—or not identifying at all. The Humanities Indicators has combined “Asian” and “Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander” to permit comparison between the racial/ethnic composition of those taking AP exams and the composition of the secondary student population generally (the National Center for Education Statistics employs the broader category of “Asian & Pacific Islander” in describing the race/ethnicity of the country’s high schoolers).
The “Other” category was omitted from this analysis because only one student identified as such.
