“Grand Canyon Diploma” Would Graduate Students Early

Posted by Lorren on March 31, 2010

While looking at today’s Arizona Republic, I saw that Arizona plans to graduate some of its student’s early with a “Grand Canyon Diploma”. To get this diploma, students would have to take a rigorous exam. They could then go to community college or train in a vocational school.

Officials said that this would increase the high school graduation rate, which is currently at about 70%. Of course, if you make something easier to obtain, that will increase the results. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll get a better education out of it.

If the problem is that kids are bored in school, give them a challenge. Let them enroll in community college classes and get high school credit for it. Make sure that advanced placement courses are available. I took my first college course as a junior in high school; it was a biology course, and it was taught by a teacher who worked both for the community college and for the local school district. In my senior year, I took two community college courses in the morning, then I’d drive to my high school and take colleges in the afternoon.

The Grand Canyon diploma would not prepare students to enter four-year colleges. Shouldn’t that be a requirement of a high school diploma, that you are ready to tackle higher education? I think that more than a few of these people would be disappointed later on when they find out that they can’t get into college. We never know what the future will hold; my husband didn’t start college until he was more than 30 years old.

Are some kids in high schools held back academically by the schools? I would say so. I’m not sure what classes are offered at high schools around here, but if they’re not challenging enough, that could be a problem. That would also be a reason to allow dual enrollment in college courses while in high school. However, high schools don’t necessarily produce such a high quality of graduates as it is. The reason why Arizona stopped requiring homeschoolers to take standardized testing was because they were kicking the pants off public school students.

Graduating students early is not the answer. Offering them more challenging courses (letting them dual-enroll in a community college or offering AP classes) is a better answer.