AP Classes, High Scores Surge At Raritan High School In Hazlet

HAZLET, NJ — In the past year alone, Raritan High School in Hazlet has seen a 63 percent increase in the number of students recognized as AP scholars.

AP scholar tests are competitive, prestigious exams taken at the end of a student's junior or senior year in high school. Many colleges and universities count them as college course credits. That means a student who gets a 3 or higher on an AP exam has tested out of freshman English, biology, calculus, history and so on at the college level.

AP scholar status is granted to students who receive scores of 3 or higher on three or more AP exams, explains Raritan High School principal Andrew Piotrowski.

In 2017 Raritan High School had 27 students who qualified. That number was 35 in 2018 and it leaped to 57 students this year. In total, Raritan High had 81 students this year recognized as AP scholars, getting an average score of 3.17 on the 2019 AP exams.

The AP program at Raritan is extremely successful, considering the district had only 11 AP scholars in 2014.

Students who receive a 3 or higher are also designated AP scholars. Raritan High also had one student who achieved national AP scholar status. That is an extremely elite designation granted to students in the United States who receive an average score of at least 4 on all AP Exams taken, and scores of 4 or higher on eight or more of these exams. It is difficult to achieve.

Raritan High is also one of a handful of schools in the state that offers the AP Capstone diploma, which was developed by the college boards. Raritan has two students who qualify for that.

Raritan High offers 26 AP classes. Here is the full list:

Computer Science
Art History
Literature & Composition
Language & Composition
Statistics
Calculus AB
Calculus BC
Biology
Environmental Science
Physics I
Physics II
Seminar
Research
Chemistry
U.S. History
U.S. Government & Politics
Computer Science
Psychology
Human Geography
World History
Italian
Spanish Language
Computer Science Principles
Studio Art 2-D Design
Studio Art Drawing
Macroeconomics (added this year)