For the past three years, the class of 2015 has had different graduation requirements than the classes before them, but few know why or how these changes were made. In total, the class of 2015 and beyond has had 20 extra graduation requirements added to their schedule, through various additions and removals of required courses. The class of 2015 and beyond has, since their freshman year, been required to take 10 more mathematics credits, 10 more science credits, five credits of economics and five credits of personal finance for graduation, but hasn’t been required to take the five credits of life skills and the five credits of speech that the classes before them had, and the elective credit requirement has decreased by 10.

 The Colorado Department of Education (CDE) decides what the most basic graduation requirements are. “You really just want to prepare students as much as possible for real life experiences,” said FRHS counselor Mrs. Julie Flemister. The individual school districts then can add to those classes required by the Department of Education, to better fit what they think the students need. “I think the intent of the new graduation requirements was to make sure that students are more prepared for the jobs that are out there,” said Mr. Peterson, a counselor at FRHS. “These updates happen in response to the needs of society and the economy.”

There has been conflict with some FRHS students claiming to have difficulty fitting in all the classes they want to take, given the new graduation requirements, the less electives needed to graduate and taking seven classes instead of the eight that the other schools in Poudre School District allow. “There’s no doubt that there are students where that creates a conflict for them,” said Peterson. “There is an ever growing trend for students to use summer school to meet their graduation requirements. Advanced students are using those to help.  They tend to favor summer classes because of the compressed format, and as a counselor, I fully understand and support it.” This year summer school will be held at Rocky Mountain High School from June 5 to July 2, 2014 and more information about registration will be available at all high schools after March 24, 2014. “Philosophically, I feel uncomfortable for students using their family’s money to meet graduation requirements via summer school. It creates an equity and access issue.”  Said Mr. Nicholas Peterson.

“I would say it is harder to get your electives in if you’re really trying to expand your knowledge of what you want to do after high school,” said Flemister. “It’s just about what you want to do; if you want an off period you can fit it in.” This is not the first time the amount of classes or the schedule changed. During the 2011- 2012 school year, FRHS had eight classes a day instead of  the current seven, There was a block system put in place, where every Monday and Thursday would have periods one, three, five and seven, and every Tuesday and Friday would have periods two, four, six and eight, with Wednesday’s schedule switching every other week. “The reason we went to that was for the school to achieve 75% efficiency,” said Peterson. “The district wasn’t calculating advisory as a part of the 75% plan, so they forced the school to have an eighth class. The school advocated for advisory to count, so it went back to the old schedule.” The 2011-2012 school year had been the first year where eight classes were offered, all years prior to that had only offered seven classes. “The thinking behind the Fossil system is it gives students a little bit more time for a more in-depth approach, and allows for us have our advisory program” said Peterson.

One main difference in the FRHS schedule compared to other schools is when students are allowed to take an off period. “You can only take 70 credits at a time, and that can leave very little discretion for a student.” said Peterson. “65 credits are electives, But in my observation, I am seeing an encroachment, student choices are being predefined by graduation requirements. But in fairness, when we say that at FRHS we only have seven classes at a time, other schools don’t require students to have a full schedule. We just distribute it differently.” At FRHS students aren’t allowed to have an off period during their freshman or sophomore year, whereas many other high schools don’t require for a student to ever have a full schedule. “Take Loveland; students have to fight to have a full schedule, otherwise they are forced to have an off period. Students literally have to advocate for themselves, very strongly, otherwise an off period or two is the norm. So what you run into, are students roaming the campus with nothing to do. At FRHS we are much more down to business.” Because students are only allowed to have off periods during their junior and senior year, most likely students are old enough to have their driver’s license and a car, so they can leave campus if they wish.

Students in the class of 2015 simply have 20 more credits to graduate, but there are many classes that count as credit for various requirements. There are nearly 20 science classes that all count as credit, over 10 classes that all count as physical education requirements, and nearly 40 classes that all count as language arts credit. “Poudre district is unique,” said Peterson. “There are many opportunities for students to make the requirements, if you look at the website (www.frhscurriculumguide.org), you can see all of the classes you can take that address those requirements. I think it’s good for people to see what other options there are to address all those grad requirements.”