AP Human Geography

The Advanced Placement examination in Human Geography was introduced in the 2000-2001 school year by The College Board. The AP Human Geography examination and its associated course is the equivalent to a semester long introductory human geography course at the college level. Many years of planning and development, by academic geographers and geographic educators, went into the creation of the examination.

Upon successful completion of the AP Human Geography examination (the thirty-eight different AP examinations are offered in May to match the school year), a student typically receives course credit for the completion of an undergraduate introductory course in human geography. This reduces the number of units a student must take in college.

The AP Human Geography examination includes seventy-five multiple-choice questions and three free response essays, which are read by a large team of professional geographers.

During the 2004-2005 school year, mare than 14,000 high school students took the AP Human Geography course and that number is growing at approximately ten percent each year. (Bailey, 71)

All AP tests are scored on a scale of 1-5, with five being the highest possible score. Scores of 3 and above usually indicate passing scores and college credit.

The goals of the AP Human Geography course and exam are for students to be able to:

• Use and think about maps and spatial data
• Understand and interpret the implications of associations among phenomena in places
• Recognize and interpret at different scales the relationships among patterns and processes
• Define regions and evaluate the regionalization process
• Characterize and analyze the changing interconnections among places

The course topics include:

1. Geography: Its Nature and Perspectives
2. Population
3. Cultural Patterns and Processes
4. Political Organization of Space
5. Agriculture and Rural Land Use
6. Industrialization and Economic Development
7. Cities and Urban Land Use

Each one of these sections is responsible for 13-17 percent of the multiple choice questions (except the first, which only composes 5-10% of the questions).

Despite the popularity of the course and the number of high school students being introduced to geography at the college level, the examination does not seem to be bringing a plethora of students desiring to become geography majors to geography departments in the United States. It is likely that many students are taking the course simply to obtain the extra college course units, reducing time and cost of their university career.

Hopefully, over time AP Human Geography will result in additional interest in the discipline as more schools, teachers, and students become familiar with the opportunity.

Work Cited

Bailey, Adrian J. "What Kind of Assessment for What Kind of Geography? Advanced Placement Human Geography." The Professional Geographer. 58(1), 2006, pages 70-77.