New Teen Taunt: You Call Those Advanced Classes?

But Alexander Carter, the Brentsville principal, has his mind made up. "I believe Cambridge is the most rigorous academic program that exists," Carter said. "The AP program is, 'Show what you know.' The Cambridge program is, 'Show us what you can do with what you know.' "

Experts say the debate says more about students than the programs.

"It's splitting hairs. It's like, can you honestly say that Georgetown Day is better or worse than Sidwell Friends?" said Denise Pope, a lecturer at Stanford University's School of Education and author of a book about stressed-out teenagers. "A lot of this is a competition over who can suffer the most. The person who can withstand the most stress and lives to tell about it is the winner."

But people still try to find ways to measure which is best. In presentations to parents considering the Cambridge program at his school, Carter hands out the findings of a recent survey showing that at a large state university in Florida, the average first-year GPA of Cambridge students was 3.46, compared with 3.12 and 3.10 for students who took AP and IB courses in high school, respectively.

No exhaustive study has been conducted to determine which program is best -- and especially what "best" would mean, according to officials in the programs. Some high schools offer one program, and others offer a choice.

AP advocates contend that their program has the upper hand because its tests are widely recognized among U.S. universities.

At Georgetown University, freshmen can get credit if they score a 4 or 5 on an AP exam after a one-year course. But IB students can get credit there for doing well on their IB exams only after taking two-year IB courses.

"Most people in my chair will say that IB is wonderful. I am not one of those," said Charles Deacon, Georgetown's dean of undergraduate admissions. "The AP program has been in effect for a very long time. It's got a very rigorous curriculum design, and it covers the subject matter we want to see, and it's scored on a rigorous basis, whereas in IB, it's not quite as rigorous."

What about Cambridge? Deacon wants to see more Georgetown applicants who have participated in the program before he puts it on par with AP or IB. "A lot of the schools that are doing it, we never get applications from. When it gets to the Winston Churchills or Thomas Jeffersons, then you know you've got something for you," Deacon said, referring to two of the region's most prestigious public high schools.

Lauren Sclater, 17, of Prince William has experience with two programs. After spending her first two years at a high school with an IB program -- Gar-Field Senior High in Woodbridge -- she transferred to an AP school this year as a junior: Osbourn Park High, near Manassas. She switched after learning that one of her top college choices might not offer as much credit for IB as it does for AP.

To friends who ask her to compare the two, Sclater replies that IB is harder because "the exam questions are wordier" and "they play tricks on you."

"I took pride that I was good enough to be in the IB program. Anybody can be in AP," she said, adding that her clique of friends would often feign despair over how much work they were saddled with.

"I would be like, 'So I have this, this and this to do tonight,' and their jaws would drop. And I would just say back, 'Eh, I'll get through it,' sort of playing it off and pretending like it was nothing," Sclater said of her IB days. "But I kind of knew in the back of my mind, 'Oh, my goodness, I have a lot of stuff to do.' "

For MacGregor, the world's No. 2 on the Cambridge English language test, her program has paid off. She has been accepted to the University of Virginia, and she won a prize for her performance on the test: a gift certificate worth more than $100 for Amazon.com.

Does IB or AP offer the same for its top students? That would be a big no.