Graduation Basics
The official completion of all required high school coursework and state requirements.
What is graduation?
A unit earned when a student successfully completes a course.
What is a credit?
The average of all your grades combined into one number.
What is Grade Point Average (GPA)?
The student with the second-highest GPA in the graduating class.
Who is the salutatorian?
A plan or route a student follows to prepare for education after high school.
What is a college pathway?
The official document awarded to a student after meeting all graduation requirements.
What is a diploma?
The standard measure of time a student spends studying a subject, usually one year.
What is a Carnegie unit?
The chart that shows how letter grades convert into numbers (A = 90–100, etc.).
What is a grade scale?
Classes that are more challenging than regular courses and may earn extra GPA weight.
What are honors courses?
A career-focused program in high school that prepares students for technical careers.
What is CTAE (Career, Technical, and Agricultural Education)?
Required academic classes students must pass to graduate (such as math, English, science, and social studies).
What are core courses?
A program that allows students to retake a failed course to earn the required credit.
What is credit recovery?
A student’s academic position compared to others in the same graduating class.
What is class rank?
College-level courses taken in high school that may earn college credit after passing an exam.
What is Advanced Placement (AP)?
The official record of all high school courses taken and grades earned.
What is a transcript?
Courses students choose based on interests, such as art, music, or technology.
What are electives?
Extra academic support provided to help students improve skills or pass a course.
What is remediation?
A student who is meeting the requirements needed to graduate on time.
What is on track?
An internationally recognized, rigorous academic program offered in some high schools.
What is International Baccalaureate (IB)?
Academic support or additional classes required before moving forward in a subject.
What is remediation?
Moving from one grade level to the next after meeting academic requirements.
What is promotion?
A final exam is required in certain high school courses that may count toward the final grade.
What is an End of Course (EOC) exam?
The student with the highest GPA in the graduating class.
Who is the valedictorian?
A program that allows high school students to take college classes and earn both high school and college credit at the same time.
What is Dual Enrollment (DE)?
The combination of credits, required courses, assessments, and GPA needed to officially complete high school.
What are the graduation requirements?