Are AP classes less challenging than in the past?

[Anonymous]

I noticed that my 16 year old niece is taking an AP class at her high school. She is the most unmotivated, under performing student that I know. She has always had to make up classes in the summer. Nice young lady though.
My question is this: There are so many kids taking AP classes now that one has to ask if they are the same as they used to be?
An AP Biology class is supposed to mimic college Biology 101, for example. I just could not see my niece getting through a college level class anywhere.
When I was in school, no one dared to take AP anything unless you were sure that you could handle it. Now there are kids taking 4-5 AP classes, and lots of extracurricular activities. In college with my first year load, there was no way that I could have been editor of the school newspaper, and a cheerleader, and on varsity soccer, and play piano. So my guess is that the weakness is in the courses.

[Anonymous]

The English teacher at TC Williams who wrote for the Post a lot wrote about this a couple of years back. His feeling was that more and more kids are being encouraged/pushed to take AP classes even if they are not prepared for them because schools want their numbers to be up. The more AP classes the students take, the better it looks for the school, even if when students take the actual test, they don't pass. Even Jay Matthew's Challenge Index is based on testing and one of his criteria is how many students take AP/IB tests within a school. The school's ranking will be higher the more tests that are given, regardless of whether the students pass the test or not. So, yes, in order to teach all these students of varying ability, I would assume AP classes have to be "dumbed down" somewhat. It would be interesting to know if your niece passes the AP exam.