Students across New York will begin taking their Regents examinations tomorrow, and the state’s education department seems to be concerned that enough of them won’t pass. 

The Board of Regents today voted to make it easier for students to forgo the requirements for the Regents diplomas and receive alternative diplomas, due to ongoing concerns about Covid. 

In the latest proposed easing of graduation requirements, students who fail to meet the minimums for Regents diplomas will become eligible for local diplomas. Students may request “special determination” to graduate with local diplomas if they fail their Regents exams or miss the tests due to “illness … or other restrictions attributable to Covid.”

Local diplomas are usually reserved for students with disabilities, who have individualized education programs. The requirements for this degree are less intense than those for the Regents diploma. 

The Regents diploma traditionally requires passing at least five Regents exams with a score of 65 or higher on each.

To earn a local diploma, a student must earn at least a 52 on both the English and math Regents examinations and “otherwise demonstrate competency” in other required subjects. 

Last year, fewer than 870 students graduated with local diplomas, according to state data cited by Chalkbeat. More than 64,000 students graduated with either a Regents diploma or a Regents diploma with advanced designation, indicating high performance.

This is the third measure the state has taken toward easing graduation requirements for New York students this spring. Following the Buffalo massacre, which took the lives of ten black New Yorkers, the state canceled the American history Regents exam, determining that its content could be upsetting.

The state also announced that students would be able to appeal failing Regents exam scores. Any score of 50 or higher on a given exam may be appealed if the student is receiving a passing grade for the equivalent course in school.

This newer proposal will apply to students who “do not qualify” for the earlier appeal measures. The new measure, unlike the appeals process, does not require a Regents score of at least 50 or a passing grade in the class.

To be considered for the local diploma, students under these circumstances must prove that they have “​​earned credit in all courses of study.” Students who are unable to sit for their Regents examinations due to “illness … or other restrictions attributable to Covid” are also eligible for the local diploma. 

Increased eligibility for local diplomas hearkens back to much earlier, pre-pandemic school policy, when students could elect to study for either a Regents diploma or a local diploma.

“There’s been a long history now of trying to require all students to pass five Regents exams … in order to get any diploma in New York state,” the director of education policy at the Manhattan Institute, Ray Domanico, says. “This has led to a whole host of problems.” 

The Regents diploma was introduced in the 19th century as a certificate after a four-year course of study that prepared students for college. Students took Regents exams throughout high school. Exam topics included Virgil’s “Aeneid,” moral philosophy, German, and trigonometry, among other subjects.

Local diplomas were granted to students who did not meet the rigorous requirements of the Regents diploma but fulfilled graduation requirements standards set by their local school districts. 

In 1979, the local diploma requirements were formalized by the state: Students needed to complete standard high school coursework and pass Regency Competency Tests, exams that assessed proficiency in core subjects at a lower level than the Regents exams, in order to receive a local diploma.

In 1995, New York began phasing out the local diploma in favor of applying Regents standards for all students. By 2012, only students with disabilities were eligible for local diplomas.

However, students have not been able to keep up with the higher demands of the Regents diploma. The state, as has happened this year, has found itself revising the standards for the Regents examination — “watering it down” as Mr. Domanico puts it — so that students can pass.

“They have to stop this and go back to some type of two-tierd system,” Mr. Domanico says — perhaps a Regents diploma and a local diploma. Mr. Domanico advocates for one diploma commensurate with college preparedness and a second diploma commensurate with workforce readiness.

“A Regents diploma should indicate a higher level of achievement … and a local diploma should indicate that the student has successfully completed the requirements for high school graduation,” he says.

The Board of Regents is in the process of a longer review of diploma standards, as it considers “different avenues” for students to demonstrate readiness for graduation.