<p>I always felt like the AP and CLEP tests had many superficial questions mixed with an occasional but obvious “gotcha” question in specific subject areas. Whereas the college math teachers I’ve had tended to have multi-layered problems or questions that synthesized topics from opposite ends of the book. The professor may or may not help guide you to the answer, but they always forced students to dig deeper or really make sure you could problem solve (3-6 longer questions for a test vs standardized test 40+ questions in the same amount of time). My high school AP calc (at a private boarding school) did not expect this same level of mathematical maturity, so only the self-disciplined students who went beyond the format of the class tended to fare well entering college math courses (note: I was not one of those!).</p>