How many credits will your graduate have on the high school transcript?

[JazzyMom]

My daughter will have 32, since some of her courses are DE credits.  Does this seem like too many?

[historically accurate]

My one kid who graduated had 30. She also had a lot of DE. I don't think 32 is too many - it kinda is what it is. 

[8filltheheart]

I have had kids have 40+ credits.  28-32 seems the norm for advanced ps students.

[UmmIbrahim]

My first graduate ended up with 37 credits and took a fair amount of DE. Once you introduce the DE credits, the numbers do bump up a bit. 37 is not considered to be a particularly high number of credits for kids in my area. 

ETA: I didn't give 1.0 credit for each semester DE course. Something like an ECON 201 class which was just 3 credit hours I only gave 0.5 credit for. However, something like CHEM 112 which was 5.0 credit hours (a University Chemistry class) that had a lab + lecture section, I did give 1.0 credit for a semester-long course. I don't know what the standard is for listing DE on the transcript, but I just kind of used my judgement when assessing credit values.

Edited May 31, 2021 by UmmIbrahim

[EKS]

Older son had 32 and would have had more, but I counted DE as 0.5 credits rather than 1.  He also had several credits brought up from middle school.

Younger son had 39.5 credits.  He had one DE class which I counted as 1 credit, but since he completed 8th grade at a b&m school two years early (and then entered 9th grade at the public high school with age peers two years later), he had two years of high school credit during that "gap" period.  Since he ended up homeschooling again halfway through 10th grade, I kept those credits. 

That was probably way more information than you wanted!  

[Farrar]

College bound kid will have 30. He did a little bit of dual enrollment, but it's crazy expensive for us, so not much.

I honestly have seen transcripts where it starts to look padded. Like, if you're bringing in a ton of middle school credits or lots of credits that are things that are light electives it can start to bring the whole thing down. But when it's because a kid did a bunch of dual enrollment... that's fine. And that's not an unusual number.

[teachermom2834]

Mine all had about 32. I think that is totally in normal range for advanced kids. Some of the public school kids even get more because there are popular summer programs that grant de credit on top of their school year courses.

We could have had more. I did things like lump what could have been two English credits into one because it was cleaner and I didn’t feel like dc were missing anything by not explicitly granting two credits of English every year. I didn’t always give a credit for every co-op class if it was just kind of an extra for us. I didn’t put drivers Ed on even though the public schools do. We didn’t bring up middle school credits.

So 32 could have easily been more and I  know some people do list everything (which is fine too). So 32 is really fine and some will have more so it won’t seem like padding. 

In our case I don’t feel like the things I left off would have made my kids’ look stronger. It would have been more clutter on the transcript. But that is entirely individual.

[kokotg]

My first two will both come in around 30. First one had lots of dual enrollment; the second will only have a few DE classes, but I'll give him more music credits (oldest we mostly counted music as an EC, but music is a much bigger part of second kid's life and school day) so it will come out about the same in the end. 

[Momto6inIN]

My first 3 kids all have 25-27 credits. I count a DE course as 1 credit on their high school transcript because it replaces 1 high school course. But when they get to college and it's on their college transcript, it counts for 3 (or 4 or 5 or whatever) credits.

But I don't think 32 sounds like too many, although like a PP said if the extra were all coming from middle school credits as opposed to DE credits, I might think it was being padded.

[Kristini2]

Mine graduating this year will also have 32. We didn’t pull up anything from middle school, but DE credits add up fast since I was told to give a full credit for each course they take.

[Dmmetler]

40+ here, but that was mostly due to 68 college credits.  No school even commented on it, so I don’t think you have to worry. 

[lewelma]

My son had 24 = 6 classes*4 years. But then I started seeing all these higher numbers from kids. So I created some classes out of self study that he did. So I think I got it up to 28.

[mom2scouts]

DS is graduating with 28.5 credits. I think if you have more than a few DE credits, it would be easy to get to 32.

[Aloha2U]

Does anyone include credit for self-study courses specifically for CLEP exams?

[Melissa B]

On 6/2/2021 at 11:51 AM, Mom21 said:

Does anyone include credit for self-study courses specifically for CLEP exams?

I was just thinking about this myself. My son is going to be the first of my children to take CLEP exams.

I am planning to give him a half credit each for the two math CLEPs because otherwise he will not have the four math credits needed to apply to our state universities. He will do the Modern States prep classes and he will do additional prep at home with me to justify the credits.

So his transcript will have a half credit of College Algebra and a half credit of College Mathematics. 

The other CLEPs I will not give credit for because he will have had a class beforehand - government, American history, etc. and he does not need any additional credits in those subjects.

[Aloha2U]

@Melissa B: What made you decide on a 0.5 credit instead of 1 credit each? It is my understanding that you could award a full credit for each. Also, have you considered designating those other courses as honors for passing the CLEP exams? 

https://www.homehighschoolhelp.com/blogs/4-ways-to-earn-high-school-credit

Edited June 4, 2021 by Mom21

[Melissa B]

On 6/4/2021 at 1:22 PM, Mom21 said:

@Melissa B: What made you decide on a 0.5 credit instead of 1 credit each? It is my understanding that you could award a full credit for each. Also, have you considered designating those other courses as honors for passing the CLEP exams? 

https://www.homehighschoolhelp.com/blogs/4-ways-to-earn-high-school-credit

If he had actually taken the class DE or if we had even worked through a college algebra text for 100+ hours at home I would have awarded him a full credit. For myself, I'm not comfortable giving credits for testing out of a subject. The modern states class is a four week review. We will do enough additional study on top of that for me to be comfortable giving him a half credit only because he needs these credits to apply to university. If he didn't I would leave them off. Hopefully he will also test out of College Comp I and II using CLEP simply based on his skills without taking any classes specifically labelled as college level English classes. That will not show up anywhere in his high school transcript as he will already have enough English credits.

I know in the link it says that each college class equals a high school credit, but in Florida the state has put out an equivalency list and most classes are actually a half credit (though College Algebra is one that equates to a full college credit when taken DE).

All of his classes next year are outsourced. I am just listing them on his transcript the same as they are listed on the websites. Some are presented as honors classes and others are not. I'm not going to raise a class to honors status for passing the CLEP. However, if I were teaching it at home I would be comfortable naming it as honors if he passed the CLEP. ☺️

[Melissa B]

Looking at my children, it is the public schools that are padding the transcripts. Lol

DD1 - 24.5 high school credits (117 college credits through DE) homeschooled 

DD2 - 29.5 high school credits (70 college credits through DE) homeschooled

DD3 - 36 high school credits (75 college credits through DE) public schooled 9th & 10th, homeschooled 11th & 12th

DS1 - 30 high school credits (60 college credits through DE) homeschooled (planned only, as he is entering 10th)

[regentrude]

2 minutes ago, Melissa B said:

Looking at my children, it is the public schools that are padding the transcripts. Lol

DD1 - 24.5 high school credits (117 college credits through DE) homeschooled 

DD2 - 29.5 high school credits (70 college credits through DE) homeschooled

DD3 - 36 high school credits (75 college credits through DE) public schooled 9th & 10th, homeschooled 11th & 12th

DS1 - 30 high school credits (60 college credits through DE) homeschooled (planned only, as he is entering 10th)

what does constitute a college credit in your area? 
Here it is one hour for a full semester. With 117, you'd almost have a Bachelors (128 - 16 cr hrs for 8 semesters). I know different states/systems have different definitions.

Edited June 6, 2021 by regentrude

[Melissa B]

23 hours ago, regentrude said:

what does constitute a college credit in your area? 
Here it is one hour for a full semester. With 117, you'd almost have a Bachelors (128 - 16 cr hrs for 8 semesters). I know different states/systems have different definitions.

Ours is the same. She could have graduated with her bachelor's in one semester if she wanted an English degree. However, as she had a full tuition scholarship she chose to go into advertising instead.

ETA: Actually ours are a little less. Most four and five credit hour DE classes equate to one high school credit, but many of our three credit hour DE classes are only given a half credit of high school credit - nearly all humanities/social studies/history classes are only given a half credit.

 

 

ACCAgenda02142020-AppB.pdf

Edited June 7, 2021 by Melissa B

[Aloha2U]

10 hours ago, Melissa B said:

I know in the link it says that each college class equals a high school credit, but in Florida the state has put out an equivalency list and most classes are actually a half credit (though College Algebra is one that equates to a full college credit when taken DE).

This is a good point. In my state (wherein a semester = 1 credit, so two semesters/full year = 2 credits), every 2 credits taken at the college, the student receives 1 credit. For example, if a student takes a 3 credit COMM 101 class, they will get 1.5 high school credits.

[kokotg]

Incidentally, I asked DH, who teaches at a highly ranked, well-funded public high school, how it works at his school. They have 7 periods, one of them for lunch--no 8th period or anything like some schools do--so most kid there graduate with 24 credits. Some do DE, but it's not particularly common (a lot of strong math students do multi-variable calc and linear algebra senior year through Ga Tech, but it's online at their home schools--I guess that would get them to 25). They offer some special programs like a veterinary science track and an agriculture program, but those happen as regular electives. So just for anyone who's feeling like their kids should have 30+ credits for selective colleges, know that there are plenty of well-prepared public school kids who don't have a super high number. 

[lewelma]

On 6/3/2021 at 3:51 AM, Mom21 said:

Does anyone include credit for self-study courses specifically for CLEP exams?

No, but I did for studying for the IMO. I gave him a half credit in each of Advanced Geometry, Combinatorics, and Number Theory in addition to the half credits I gave him for the intermediate classes through AoPS. He just did so much self studying and so much content that I felt it should be reflected in some way on his transcript.  And in hindsight, I should have given him more as he placed out of three undergrad combinatorics classes, and walked into Grad level combinatorics in university. And he was set to do the same with Number Theory and Geometry when he decided to switch to Physics.