Times Observer file photo Beginning with the Class of 2023, students will have more pathways to graduate high school.

For a time, it looked like the state was going to require all students looking to graduate high school to pass three Keystone exams — Algebra I, literature and biology.

But Warren County School District officials now have options starting with the Class of 2023 beyond just passing those tests.

Act 158 of 2018 made the change.

“There’s five different graduation pathways,” Eric Mineweaser, the district’s director of curriculum, instruction, assessment, said during board committee meetings Monday night.

He said the state had stressed the exam path but “kept pushing it off and delaying that” until another way came through to allow students to graduate. “(We’ve) been keeping a very close eye on that,” Mineweaser stressed, tracking every student in the district.

Passing all three Keystone exams is one of the five pathways. A second is passing one Keystone but having a composite score over a certain threshold, called the Keystone Composite Pathway.

A third allows students to take an alternate assessment and the district is having students take the ASVAB test as part of that pathway.

One specifically highlights career readiness, using certifications earned to meet the graduation requirement. Mineweaser said there are a “pretty decent number of students going to graduate through this pathway.”

The fifth is called the “Evidence Based Pathway” and is more flexible than the others, including items such as minimum GPA, a service learning project or a letter guaranteeing full-time employment.

“This is the worst case scenario,” Mineweaser said. “This is the one we don’t want to do.”

As the Class of 2023 approaches the end of their junior year, the district will continue to be “very strategic.”

“You only have to meet one pathway,” Mineweaser said. “The state is just giving us an opportunity for our students to have a variety of ways to graduate.”

“It’s going to be tricky,” he added, and “continue to watch our juniors and make sure we get them through one of those pathways. (It’s) very, very important.”

E-HALL PASS PROGRAM DISCUSSED

Mineweaser told a board committee that the district is looking to implement an electronic hall pass system at Beaty-Warren Middle School for the remainder of the year.

Students will sign out on their student device and staff “can see how many are out at one time.”

Mineweaser said they believe it to be a “good opportunity” try before considering such a system for the entire district.