AP classes (and most US first year college classes) are well below the standard of a typical senior year academic high school subject in France (and I suspect,

AP classes (and most US first year college classes) are well below the standard of a typical senior year academic high school subject in France (and I suspect, though don't have direct experience, that this is true of most other European countries as well). The key difference between the two systems is that far fewer people (rough guess is like 1/3 to 1/2 of kids) graduate from academic high school in those countries. Take a look at the basic admissions requirements for Swiss universities (this happens to be the one I could find the most easily). Most of the Swiss universities listed in this table require either 5 AP tests or 2 years of college for students from the US to be considered. https://www.swissuniversities.ch/en/services/admission-to-universities/countries/usa/ https://www.swissuniversities.ch/en/services/admission-to-un... A basic US high school diploma is garbage not worth the paper it's printed on -- there isn't any sort of national standard, and the state school leaving exams just test basic literacy.