Mat-Su school district adds 2 new diploma options, drops 4Cs

What you need to know:

• The Mat-Su school board this week approved the elimination of the 4Cs class from high school graduation requirements and added two new optional diploma tracks.
• The credit associated with the 4Cs class will instead count as a general elective. The class has also been removed from district middle schools. The Honors and Honors with Distinction diplomas will require 27 credits, compared to the district’s standard 25.5, and include additional core and advanced classes.
• Officials said the 4Cs class was dropped because most students no longer need it and because the district lacks enough teachers to staff it. An advisory class will be offered instead. The Honors diploma options were added to recognize students who complete extra work, they said.

PALMER – A series of high school graduation updates approved by the Mat-Su school board this week eliminates a required class designed to help students stay on track and creates two new diploma options for students who take additional classes.

The changes were proposed by Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District Superintendent Randi Trani and approved unanimously by the school board during a regular meeting Wednesday. They follow a May update that reduced graduation requirements for students enrolled in the district’s Mat-Su Central correspondence program by eliminating several specialized course mandates.

The latest update slightly changes the district’s standard 25.5-credit high school diploma requirements by removing the class known as 4Cs – Credit, Career, College and Community – and placing that credit into the general electives pool, according to the policy.

The 4Cs class was first added to the district’s middle and high schools during the 2021-22 school year to help students get back on track after COVID-related school shutdowns.

An advisory class will remain available over the 2025-26 school year for middle and high school students who need extra academic support, school officials said. The class will be mandatory for sixth-grade students to help them adjust to middle school, according to an announcement.

The update also creates two new diploma options for high-achieving students, increasing credit requirements to 27 through additional core subject studies and advanced classes. The new diplomas will be available for the class of 2026.

A new “Honors” diploma increases the required advanced coursework credits from one to three, reduces required general elective credits from 8.5 to five, and adds 0.5 credits each in social studies and physical education, along with an additional full credit in science.

Requirements for a new “Honors with Distinction” diploma mirror the extra core credits in the Honors diploma while dropping elective requirements to zero and increasing the advanced coursework requirement to eight credits.

“No student has to do either of these, but if a student did, we want to formally recognize their extra work,” Trani said during a meeting last month.

The additional advanced coursework required for the Honors and Honors with Distinction diplomas may include college credits, Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate classes, world language studies, Junior ROTC, or career and technical education classes, according to the policy.

District officials will develop an implementation plan for the new diplomas over the summer, including details on how college or career and technical classes will integrate with the new credit requirements, they said.

Students who attend rural schools such as Su-Valley Jr./Sr. High School or Glacier View School, where in-person advanced class options are limited, will be able to take qualifying classes online, they said.

About 20% of students who graduated from Mat-Su schools this spring would have qualified for the Honors or Honors with Distinction diplomas had they been available, officials said in a statement.

Offering an Honors diploma is common in districts across the U.S., school officials said. For example, some districts in Minnesota and Arizona offer such diplomas, while an Honors option is a state-directed requirement for districts in Ohio.

-- Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsusentinel.com