At its Aug. 28 meeting the Board of Education reviewed changes to its high school graduation requirements and its alternative credits policies.
Under a law passed in 2021, high schools must begin offering ethnic studies courses in the 2025-26 school year, and students in the class of 2030 will be the first ones subject to the graduation requirement. Beginning with the Piedmont graduating class of the 2029-2030 school year, students will be required to take a one-semester course in ethnic studies.
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an agreement this June making personal financial literacy a required course to graduate high school in California. The semester-long course must be offered to all California high school students by the 2027-28 school year and be part of the graduation requirements for the class of 2031. Beginning with the graduating class of the 2030-31 school year, Piedmont students will be required to take a one-semester course in financial literacy.
Alternative credits toward graduation
The district clarified language around its dual enrollment and alternative credits policies, adding more “guardrails” and standardization to the process should a student want to take classes outside of Piedmont or Millennium High Schools. Until now, policies were different between PHS and MHS, said Assistant Superintendent for Educational Services Ariel Dolowich, and this was an attempt to standardize the practice.
Dolowich and Superintendent Jennifer Hawn emphasized that students must have prior administrative approval before taking outside courses, that no more than four courses can replace high school coursework, and a student may not take more than two courses per year. (On occasion in recent years, families have clashed with school counselors over what constitutes an approved institution and some have neglected to get prior approval for coursework taken elsewhere.)
At the same time, Hawn said, “we want to encourage students to take college courses.” The guardrails here are meant to protect the PHS transcript — “the gold standard”.
This was a first reading of the policy changes. The Board is expected to formally approve the changes at a later date.