D
uring an awards ceremony held at Arkansas High School Wednesday, Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson told AHS's Advanced Placement Scholars remaining on the path to college success wouldn't necessarily be an easy one, but it's definitely attainable.
"Arkansas has made education affordable," he said. "Now, it might take some grants, it might take some really hard studying, getting some special scholarships, Pell Grantsbut anyone can make it through. We have affordable education in Arkansas. Everyone can go to college."
Sixty students received a total of $10,800 in cash awards for their top scores on the school's advanced placement exams, with some students receiving as much as $500. State Rep. Prissy Hickerson, Sen. Jimmy Dickey, Chancellor Chris Thomason of the University of Arkansas at Hope-Texarkana and Texarkana Mayor Ruth Penney-Bell also attended the ceremony.
Arkansas High offers 21 AP classes this fall, including one in computer science, an initiative Hutchinson has been pushing throughout the state. Diana Lowe, the school's advanced placement coordinator, said the governor's leadership and focus has brought new opportunities to the AP students.
"Arkansas High School has directly benefited with additional computers and teacher training for our AP computer science course," she said. "There is no doubt his leadership education has brought the State of Arkansas to the forefront."
Just over 40 percent of AHS seniors took AP courses last year, an achievement Hutchinson said encourages students to go to college and shows them it can be done affordably.
"Some of these are juniors and they already have 12 hours of college credit already," he said. "You have that under your belt as you go into your senior year, you could actually have the first year of college paid for before you ever started."
The AP program is implemented by College Board, and allows high school students to take college-level courses for both high school and college credit. Arkansas High is also one of two schools in Arkansas to offer the AP Capstone Diploma, which requires students to take gifted and talented class in 9th grade, an advanced placement seminar class in 10th grade and an AP research class in 11th grade. Their senior year, these students are prepared to list the achievements on their college applications, and have learned how to conduct college-level research.
Each school in Arkansas is required to offer at least four AP courses, and Hutchinson said Arkansas High's offering 21 courses was truly giving students what they needed to reach their goals after graduation.
"It gives them a taste of college and shows them they can do it and really will increase the participation in post-secondary attainment," he said.