Creating a Transcript
The transcript is a concise (usually one page)
statement of what your teen has learned during his or her high school years.
The transcript includes course titles, year studied, credits awarded, and
grades earned. How can you compress all that learning into only one page? Here
is one example of a partial transcript
Official
Transcript
Tranquility
Academy
|
|||||||
Student
Data
Ima Teen
123 Happy Lane
Happy, NJ 08550
DOB: 8/1/92
Gender: F
|
School
Data
Tranquility Academy
123 Happy Lane
Happy, NJ 08550
Telephone: 609.123.4567
Parent: Ima Parent
|
Junior
Year Report
Date Issued: 6/3/2013
Total Credits: 23
G.P.A.:
4.0
|
|||||
course
|
credit
|
2010-2011
Freshman
|
2011-2012
Sophomore
|
2012-2013
Junior
|
|||
English
|
|
|
|
|
|||
World Literature
|
1
|
A
|
|
|
|||
American Literature
|
1
|
|
A
|
|
|||
AP Eng. Lang & Comp*
|
1
|
|
|
A
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|||
Mathematics
|
|
|
|
|
|||
Algebra I (8th grade)
|
1
|
A
|
|
|
|||
Geometry
|
1
|
A
|
|
|
|||
Advanced Algebra
|
1
|
|
A
|
|
|||
Statistics
|
1
|
|
|
A
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|||
Science
|
|
|
|
|
|||
PHY 111: Physical Science Concepts**
|
1
|
A
|
|
|
|||
BIO 114: Environmental Science Concepts**
|
1
|
A
|
|
|
|||
CHE 101: General Chemistry I**
|
1
|
|
A
|
|
|||
CHE
102: General Chemistry II**
|
1
|
|
A
|
|
|||
Biology
w/Lab
|
1
|
|
|
A
|
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|||
* APEX course
** Mercer County Community
College Course
|
Grading System
A=Mastery
B= Comprehension
C=Basic Understanding
|
||||||
Since you're the "school," you can
organize the transcript however you like. If you need inspiration, a Google
search of "sample high school transcript" will generate millions of
hits. Whichever format you choose, you'll want to include identifying
information about your student--his/her name, address, date of birth, and
graduation date--and information about your homeschool--school name, address,
phone, name of parent/guardian overseeing the student's education, date
that the transcript was generated, and an explanation of your grading system.
If your student takes a community college or online class, include those credits on your master transcript. In the sample transcript above, those types of classes were denoted with asterisks. Your teen will also want to request that brick and mortar or cyber schools send official transcripts as part of a college application.
Two questions that often arise around
transcripts are:
1. How do I decide what constitutes a credit?
The term "credit" can be a little
confusing. Traditionally, it is a measure of time: how much time did a student
spend in "contact" with, or being "instructed" by, a
teacher. High schools and colleges use slightly different calculations to
determine credit hours; there is also variation among States and even among
school districts. To keep things simple, I usually think of one credit as the
equivalent of work done in a high school class that meets for about an hour for 5 days/week
for one academic year (September-June). This approach can be used for science
and math courses with a more standard and narrowly defined content (e.g.
Algebra--if you cover the material in a standard textbook, it's worth 1 credit
whether it takes you 1.5 years or 0.5 years) and Humanities courses with no
standardly defined content (e.g. English I: you determine how much work --number of books
read/stories written/speeches orated/plays performed-- equals 1 credit).
2. How do I decide which credits to include?
College admissions officers often begin to evaluate credits by separating them into 3 broad categories: academic subjects (English, Science, Math,
Social Studies, Foreign Language), electives (Industrial, Visual, and
Performing Arts), and physical education. In NJ, at a minimum, public high
school students are expected to complete the following credits:
· 4
English
· 3
Math (1 Algebra, 1 Geometry, 1 additional that builds on Alg. and Geo.)
· 3
Lab Science (1 Biology, 1 Chemistry, Physics or Environmental Science, 1
additional)
· 1/2
Financial, Economic, and Entrepreneurial Literacy
· 1
World History
· 2
U.S. History
· 1
Visual/Performing Arts
· 1
21st Century Life & Careers
· 1
World Languages
· 3/4
credit per year Health & Physical Education
· 4.5
Electives
Some homeschoolers find it helpful to use these or similar
labels when documenting learning on a transcript. So, for example, the trips
you took to colonial Williamsburg, Plimouth Plantation, Independence National
Historical Park, Valley Forge, and Washington D.C. could all contribute toward
a credit entitled "U.S. History I."
No comments:
Post a Comment