PORTLAND, Ore. — One of Portland's high schools will be among a few dozen schools throughout the country to offer an advanced placement African American studies class as school resumes for the fall, according to Portland Public Schools Superintendent Guadalupe Guerrero.
Leodis V. McDaniel High School will be one of 60 schools across the U.S. to offer the first AP African American Studies course in the college-track program's history, Guerrero said. McDaniel will also join Grant and Franklin high schools in offering an AP African Diaspora seminar.
The fall 2022 launch of the course is intended to be a pilot program, testing the course at a limited number of schools for two years before expanding to all interested high schools.
Students in the class will study a variety of fields, including literature, arts and humanities, political science, geography and science to explore the experiences of African Americans, according to the College Board, the organization that oversees the nationwide AP program.
The curriculum has been in development for nearly a decade.
The course "will introduce a new generation of students to the amazingly rich cultural, artistic, and political contributions of African Americans," Travis Packer, a senior vice president at the College Board, said in a statement. "We hope it will broaden the invitation to Advanced Placement and inspire students with a fuller appreciation of the American story.”
Course framework will be posted online in spring 2024 before the class launches nationwide for anyone to review.
Advanced placement courses typically offer college-level curriculum and credits to challenge high school students who have already exceled at their course work. Students must score highly enough on a test in order to earn college credit. AP African American Studies will be the 39th advanced placement course offered by the College Board, joining other options like calculus, human geography, art history and music theory.
The pilot program comes at a time when discussions of racism in the classroom are becoming more controversial, and educators are under increased scrutiny from Republican lawmakers over how these subjects are addressed in schools.
