White students still accounted for most AP tests taken - 85.5 percent - and Latino students, who make up 8.9 percent of Utah high school students, accounted for 5.4 percent of exams taken.

But the College Board noted that while the state's Latino student population grew 29 percent over the past five years, their participation rate in AP testing rose 50 percent, from 237 in 2002 to 476 in 2007, a finding Utah Office of Education officials consider good news.

The board's report noted 14,096 Utah students took a total of 22,609 AP exams in 2007 and that 14,891 of those tests came in with a score of 3, 4 or 5, good enough to earn college credit.

That gave the state's public school students an overall pass rate of 65.9 percent, compared with the national pass rate of 57.2 percent.