Tennessee education leaders are preparing for schools to be shut down for the remainder of the year, so they’ve come up with a list of emergency measures to make sure students — particularly high school seniors — aren’t penalized by COVID-19.
The State Board of Education proposes loosening graduation requirements, including decreasing the number of credit hours needed to graduate.
Executive director Sara Morrison, says the state wants to maintain its high expectations, but must adapt to the reality of the situation.
“This is to accommodate … some of our block schedule students, who wouldn’t even begin some of their graduation requirements until the last quarter of the year,” says Morrison. “So this change is to accommodate some of those scheduling situations where the credits would not be possible.”
Tennessee high school students are required to have a minimum of 22 credit hours to graduate. If approved, the proposal would decrease the requirement to 20 credits.
The board also wants to freeze grades for high school courses. That means students would be able raise their grades before the summer, but they wouldn’t be lowered below what they had as of March 20.
“We’ve identified the need to have a statewide approach through grade calculation for the purpose of post-secondary entrance, placement and scholarship decisions,” says Morrison. “This is something that is really important in terms of ensuring parity for students who are entering our post-secondary institutions across the state.”
The board is convening Thursday for a final review of the proposed rules and to vote on them.
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