TJ adds volunteer hours requirement and DPS removes the world language requirement for students.
Artwork by Mia Nogueira
Rumors about a change in graduation requirements have been buzzing around TJ, and the good news is that there are no new requirements; however, there are a few suggestions, and some minor changes were made last year.
Regarding volunteer hours, the administration is making it a requirement for every freshman to do 10 hours of community service per year by the time they graduate from Thomas Jefferson High School. “It’s been shown that there is a strong correlation between student achievement and academic achievement,” said Assistant Principal Scott Lessard. This plan is in the design stage, with a room being built to handle community service related information and forms. For now, forms that record service hours can be found in TJ Counselor Erin Thompson’s office.
However, there was a change made to the graduation requirements last November with which students may not be familiar. TJ changed its world language and science requirement in November of the previous school year. “There is no language requirement [for graduation]. However, there are many colleges that have language requirements, so we still highly encourage it [taking a language class],” said Erin Thompson. The science requirement is a little more complicated. It requires students to take three years of science, and two of the three years need to be lab sciences such Earth Science, Biology, Chemistry, or Physics, as opposed to anatomy.
These requirements are the same for all grades at Thomas Jefferson. “[These changes were made] to better prepare students for the post-secondary options, whether it’s the workforce, or college, or a career they might be interested in to make them more prepared to go out into the world after high school,” said Thompson
Students who want to take an AP class at TJ have it a little easier than some other high schools do. As opposed to letting only select students take AP classes, they are an option for any Spartan. “We get our AP potential – our honors potential – from the PSAT, but we also open it up to other students who may not be the best test takers to know if they can handle that workload. So we have students from every which way taking honors or AP,” said Thompson. There is also the benefit of a good AP test score, which can earn college credits at a much lower price.
The administration feels that adding community service as a requirement for being a Spartan will make TJ a more inviting school and the community will benefit from the volunteering students.
