The College Board will introduce object orientation into the Computer Science AP test in 2003-2004, using Java as the delivery language. This is a big deal. Java is the logical choice for an instructive object-oriented programming language that's also a practical and valuable industry skill, just as Pascal was for earlier Computer Science concepts (yes, this means the AP test will continue to use Pascal until 2003). More importantly, this assures that many high school CS students will assuredly be taught on Sun technology for many years.

I can tell a little story about my taking the CS AP exam in Spokane, Washington. I won't, but I will say to all high school students thinking of taking this exam without a prep course: The students taking the prep course get to see the sample code from the test ahead of time. You'll be expected to have studied it, so make sure you talk to the appropriate people to get a copy. It's an easy test and great for self-study, but it does take enough time to complete that you don't want to spend test time reading code if you can avoid it. (At least, that's what it was like when I took it five years ago.)