Course Descriptions

What are course descriptions? Why keep them?
Schools publish course descriptions for the courses they offer to help students decide whether to sign up for a class, as well as to help anyone (including college admissions officials and potential employers) who wants more information about their courses.

The quality of high school courses given can vary a lot even within a single school. Most textbooks include much more information than can possibly be covered in a single year and high school teachers often have freedom to pick and choose which parts they will use with their students. Several years ago, I was tutoring a public school student in English. Her literature textbook included classics by Shakespeare, Mark Twain, O. Henry, Dickens, and more. It included a variety of modern pieces from various parts of the world. It also included pieces by Dr. Seuss: The same Dr. Seuss that many children read in kindergarten or first grade. Her public school English teacher had assigned reading material by Dr. Seuss.

While college admissions officers, employers, and others may assume that a public school is providing a decent education, some will have more questions about a homeschool education. Part of the purpose of the course description is to help outsiders get a tiny glimpse of the type of courses your child has taken as a homeschooled student. Is your child getting a top-quality education? A general hands-on education? A modern education covering the world? A classic education? Or a barely literate, reading-Dr.-Seuss-in-high-school kind of education?

Course descriptions are NOT required by Florida law for home education students, but smart homeschool parents will keep them for their high school students (as well as middle school students who are doing high school work).

Course descriptions may never be needed for your high school student, but then again they might. In my experience, when needed, they are needed NOW. It's a good idea to keep them as you go along even if you might not ever need them. They are certainly much easier to keep as you go along rather than trying to back track and figure out what your kids learned a few years ago.

One caveat: Do not send course descriptions to college officials unless they ask to see them. When I volunteered for a college admissions committee, the Dean of Admissions told parents that extra paperwork could be all it took to get a tired committee member to put a file on the reject pile.


Creating Course Descriptions

1. Courses from other sources
If your child takes courses from another source (a public school, FLVS, another online program, a co-op class, etc.), that source may have a course description, perhaps in a syllabus, that you can copy and paste. Don't feel the need to re-do all of their work.
On the other hand, published course descriptions don't always match what is actually covered in a particular class; feel free to edit it if needed.

2. Your courses
Plan. Review. Confirm.
I recommend beginning the course descriptions, if possible, before your student actually begins a course of study. Record the plan of study. Consider reviewing the description midyear to see if the plan needs to be edited to better reflect what is actually being studied or to redirect the course of study to better fit the plan. Then at the end of the course, review the description again and do a final edit to make sure the description is accurate.


The final document will likely be several pages long with at least a paragraph for each course taken throughout all of high school. It's okay if the courses listed do not resemble typical public school classes. I know from years of volunteering with a college admissions committee that courses that aren't typical can stand out in a very good way. Don't feel compelled to copy schools even at the high school level. Do be sure to edit and spell check and make the course descriptions look well done before sending them to anyone official--poorly edited documents will raise questions that well written ones won't.

How to Compose Course Descriptions
This is not a legally-required document. There's no standard format that must be used. But the following shows information that is commonly included in the description of each class taken.

• Subject area (This is a very general subject as Science, History, or Fine Arts.)
• Course number (These are optional. The numbers from the FL Dept of Education’s course directory for public schools are a good option to use to help Florida schools or colleges understand what was studied. You can pick the number that best matches what was studied. If no course titles matched, use the “transfer credit” number for that subject area. For courses taken at a local college through dual enrollment, use the college’s course number.)
• Course title (The FL Dept of Education’s course directory can help in picking course titles that colleges will recognize. Keep the titles simple and do not list them by textbook names. For example, use the title "Algebra 1" and not something like "Saxon Algebra 1" or "Teaching Textbooks Algebra 1;" too specific a title may confuse officials.
  If your student takes any dual-enrollment college courses, I recommend using the official titles of the course with the word "College" included in each to make it clear that they were college courses as well as later listing the college from which they were taken).
• Credit earned (1.0 for a full-year course or 120 hours of instruction; 0.5 for a half-year course or at least 60 hours of instruction.
  For dual enrollment college courses, it is best to check with the Florida Dept. of Education's course equivalency list for the high school credit to use for college courses taken; some semester college classes are considered equivalent to one semester of high school credit, while other college semester classes are considered the equivalent of a full-year high school class. The list is updated yearly.)
• Text(s) or other resources used. (List textbooks or workbooks if used. Feel free to use other materials such as reference books, other books, journals, websites, videos, etc.)
• A description of the topics covered. (For courses using a textbook or workbook, this may come from chapter titles. For others, it may be a list created or used by you.
  If the class was from a school or college, you may want to list the name of the school.)
• Notable projects, activities, etc. are listed (if any apply. This section can include lists of labs done, any major projects or assignments, etc.)
• Awards earned, if applicable.
  
  Some samples of course description entries are listed below.
  
  Created your course descriptions but want help polishing them? We provide consulting.
  
  Cheryl Trzasko
  [email protected]