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SANDY -- Sixty percent of the seniors graduating from the Canyons School District next week will be getting an enhanced diploma.
The district awarded the state's first College and Career Ready diplomas to more than 1,000 graduating seniors. The Advanced or Honors diplomas required students to complete two years of foreign language and meet rigorous career and college readiness benchmark scores on the ACT college entrance test.
Diplomas by School
| School | Number of Students |
|---|---|
| Alta | 58 percent |
| Brighton | 68 percent |
| Hillcrest | 61 percent |
| Jordan | 52 percent |
Hillcrest High senior Edi Aguero worked hard in school to get the new, advanced diploma. He also did community service as president of the school club Latinos in Action and helped to start ESL classes for parents.
"It's challenging but if you put the effort in, you'll do good," Aguero said. "If you're determined to do something, I believe that no matter what obstacles there are you'll break them."
Aguero is the first person in his family to go to college, and he says he feels prepared to tackle that obstacle next.
That was the Canyons District's goal when it created the path to these advanced and honors diplomas. The district says college and career readiness is strongly linked to the classes students take in high school.
"The more rigorous the coursework, the better prepared the student," Canyons School District Communications Director Jennifer Toomer-Cook said in a statement.
The district says of the 1,356 seniors graduating under the career- and college-ready diplomas, 45 percent earned the even tougher honors diploma.
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Story written with contributions from Mary Richards.
