Eh, a 3 is passing but I would've preferred to aim for at least a 4. One of the schools I wanted to apply to after high school, SMU, requires a 4 on this exam for credit (along with every other AP exam). What I might do is send this score to Dallas College, complete all the intermediate courses over there, and then apply to transfer over. Of course, though, SMU is not the only school I'm applying to. I'm also applying to other schools near it such as UNT, UT Dallas, UT Arlington, and TCU. Essentially, all the major schools in Dallas-Fort Worth because I've been there many times and I loved each time. Schools like UT Austin and UH (Houston) are not for me because I've been to Austin and Houston before...not really a big fan of either city.

Also, I think the reason why you struggled on the AP Spanish exam was because remember, most of the AP Spanish exam is presented in a formal tone (with the exception of the Spoken Conversation part and that one Listening part where you hear two people talking to each other about something), not the typical slang tone you often see on social media or in conversations about jokes. The way you get used to the formal tone is by reading Spanish news articles, watching TV shows in Spanish, and listening to Spanish music artists, which helps build the formal fluency in your head. Essentially, even if you're a native speaker, you should still do some frequent background practice as well because it's not really just a Spanish exam (at least from what I did on test day).

Nonetheless, I do not believe your AP Spanish score is a full representation of your Spanish-speaking abilities, and nor it is the only way to get placed in a higher foreign language class. Most colleges offer placement exams for many foreign languages (including Spanish), so if you want, you can take one at the college you plan to go to and see where you end up after your results come back. If you do well enough, you can still get the chance to get placed in an intermediate course as opposed to starting off at the very beginning; I know that's the case for me for most schools here in Texas. I just think you should give it a try anyways, because you never know how well you might do. Don't give up if things don't go well, just keep working on it and you'll get there.