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Mountain Home students turned in the highest Advanced Placement passing rate in district history this spring, with 54.17 percent of AP students earning a score of 3 or higher.
Assistant Superintendent Judy Lawrence presented the results to the school board July 16 as part of the district’s academic report. She framed the numbers as the payoff from several years of work on preparing students for the exams rather than simply enrolling more of them.
Fewer students took AP exams this year than last, and fewer exams were taken overall. Lawrence said that was by design.
“They’re not just taking the test to take them,” Lawrence told the board. “Those are extremely hard tests, so they do have to be ready, and that’s where our teachers have really been spending a lot of time.”
The district reported its highest average AP exam scores in six years. About 55 percent of exams taken earned a passing score, which administrators said was up 12 percent from last year. A score of 3 or higher out of 5 counts as passing.
The sharpest jump came at the top of the scale. Students earned six perfect scores of 5 in 2025. This year they earned 24, a 300 percent increase.
Several of those came from the same students on different exams. One student scored a 5 on three separate AP tests.
Because of those results, 114 students will receive cash award checks totaling about $12,450, roughly $1,900 more than the district handed out in 2025.
The money starts with the state, which sends districts a payment based on student exam performance. Mountain Home used to keep those funds for training and other district uses. About two years ago it began passing the money directly to the students who earned it, an idea administrators credited to Philip Goodwin.
Students can spend the awards on anything tied to advanced learning. Sophomores and juniors appear on the award lists alongside seniors, so a student can earn checks in more than one year.
Thirteen students qualified as AP Scholars with Honors, which requires an average of at least 3.25 across at least four exams. A larger group qualified as AP Scholars by scoring 3 or higher on at least three exams.
Board member Scott Booth asked what was behind the gains, noting a clear trend over the past four or five years and a jump in AP Scholars from last year to this one.
“What do you attribute this positive change to?” Booth asked.
AP chemistry teacher Madison Ingle pointed to classroom expectations, describing the approach as “holding kids to a very high rigor” and not letting up. Ingle said his students this year were “absolutely amazing,” and that most of them were enrolled in multiple AP classes. Lawrence also credited concentrated work on teaching the material most essential to student learning.
Ingle also offered a note of caution about his own program’s numbers, saying the College Board has renormed some exams.
“There’s a national trend upward as well, but these are excellent numbers to see,” he said.
Lawrence said the district’s gains still reflect the work of its staff, since students do not simply improve year over year on their own. Superintendent Allyson Dewey added that the checks are not the main prize.
“These students aren’t just getting a check for fifty dollars or a hundred dollars,” Dewey said. “They’re receiving college credit.”
The district plans to offer AP calculus, chemistry, computer science, English language and composition, English literature and composition, environmental science, psychology, U.S. government and politics, U.S. history and world history in the coming school year. Art history may also be offered depending on enrollment.
