A question about education requirements

[CornField]

Today I was listening to Talk of Iowa on NPR (I think that was the show) I heard that Iowa high schools are starting to up their requirements to 4 years of English and 3 years each of math and science. Has this not always been the case? I had these high school requirements back in the late 1980s in Oklahoma (along with at least 2 years of foreign language). Were these requirements several years ago in Iowa that were changed and are now being changed back or is this something new?

[haroldgiowa]

1. 1972 requirements Keokuk

2 years Math
2 years History
3 years Language Arts
2 years Science
1 Semester Comparative Government Senior year
4 years Physical Education

16 hours credit for graduation 9 and 1/2 credits from above and the rest in elective courses. Most in my school had enough credits after their junior year, but could not take Comparative Governments until they were a senior.

Foreign language was not required but recommended for college prep. Plus four years of all the above.

[9119495]

2. Iowa has always had a long tradition of local control so...

there were no state requirements. Large urban districts tended to have more requirements because they could afford the teachers and generally had more college bound students.

The requirements are being increased, but that doesn't mean students didn't take the classes before. In my district, 80+% of students take 3-4 years of math even though the requirement is only 2 years.

To me, if the curriculum isn't rigorous and the grades are inflated, there is not much point to increasing requirements. However, if the requirements are to be increased, additional funding for staff should be made available. The problem is that with local control (which is a good thing), state representatives from areas where increases in requirements do not happen are not going to vote money for districts that do increase requirements.

[CornField]

3. Thank you for the perspective

While I didn't attend a huge high school in Oklahoma, it was close to a metro area. It makes sense that with local control districts provide the best courses they can and cannot always provide for the upper maths and sciences. I think the news was disconcerting for me because I'd always heard how the public schools here in Iowa were so much better than in other states (especially my home state of Oklahoma). The information presented in the news program simply did not jive with what I'd been told previously.

I guess this might also be the push for extended ICN classrooms across the state. Those students who needed/wanted upper-level courses would have the opportunity without busting smaller district budgets.