@twinsmama: We can agree to disagree, and our children chose their schools for varying reasons. In our case, one of those reasons was to avoid the AP rat race at all costs, and Choate was vocal about their stance on what we mutually agree is a substandard curriculum. If APs were the best Choate had to offer, we would have run in the other direction. Well-taught APs are available anywhere in the U.S, even in AZ. That is not what our son was looking for in a boarding school. If anyone chooses a BS whose AP curriculum is the best they have to offer, they are looking for or valuing something other than what we value or were looking to escape by allowing our child to go to BS.
I only have experience with one high school. At Choate, AP courses were absolutely not the most rigorous available and were not taught by the best teachers. If they were, BS would have offered nothing better than our local LPS, and we would have opted to have our son home for an additional four years at much less cost. Please note, that CK DID sit for AP exams; I am not arguing that there could be some benefit to AP scores at some colleges, just that the AP courses are a waste of BS time, talent, and money at Choate. Choate agrees with that and no longer offers an AP curriculum. Anyone who values AP courses and teaching methodology will not find a good match at Choate. We chose a school whose regular curriculum and academic mission far exceeded what he could have gotten from AP courses at home. Not every family is looking for the same thing out of BS.