History UsefulNotes / AmericanEducationalSystem

This can lead to amusing situations when a BrilliantButLazy student drops out at age 16, promptly gets his/her GED, and has a diploma equivalent 2 years before their peers. Theoretically they could get an Associate's Degree while everyone else is graduating, but this is much rarer, hence the "lazy" part. A real-life example of this is current [[UsefulNotes/MLBTeams Washington Nationals]] star Bryce Harper, who took and passed his GED at 16 so he could enter junior college early, thus getting a head start on a professional baseball career.[[note]] Under MLB rules, U.S. players are eligible for the draft upon high school graduation. Harper chose junior college because of another draft rule—a player who enrolls in a four-year college is ineligible until three years after enrollment or turning 21, whichever is sooner. Junior college players, on the other hand, are always eligible. This meant that Harper could be drafted at age 17 with a year of college under his belt.[[/note]] To prevent students from gaming the system in this manner, some states require a GED candidate to be at least 18 years of age.[[note]]Harper's home state of Nevada is obviously not one of them.[[/note]]

Advanced Placement (usually abbreviated AP) tests can be taken by high school students in May. They are administered by the College Board, the same organization responsible for the [=SATs=] (the College Board ''also'' offers a ''different'' test that serves much the same purpose, the College Level Examination Program or CLEP test ... confused yet? If you're thinking about taking one, contact the college you're interested in to see which they prefer). The format of the test varies widely with the subject (ranging from calculus to psychology), but usually features multiple-choice and essay portions. Each test uses a five-point grading scale, with 3 being "Qualified" and 5 being "Extremely Qualified". Many high schools offer AP courses designed to prepare students for the associated AP Test, and some will pay the $87 testing fee.

Colleges will often offer credit for certain courses if an acceptable score on a related AP test is offered; very selective schools will only offer credit for a 5, while some schools will accept a 3. Some schools, usually private schools, have credit caps. This means that students are only permitted to use a certain number of AP credits for college credit, although AP scores may be used to place out of lower-level classes. These credit caps often come in one of two forms. One is an overall credit cap limiting the total number of credits that can be gained via AP testing. Another is a cap on the number of credits that can be gained in the subject area of one's major, while having no cap on the number of AP credits a student can use to fulfill other requirements.

Note that some schools are able to offer many more AP classes than others -- don't visit a school that's [[SaveOurStudents falling apart and has the highest drop-out rate in the state]] and expect to find the Russian Language and Culture course on the curriculum, although they might have English, World History, U.S. History, Calculus, and other more basic subjects.

It is the rule, not the exception, for a high school to have sports programs. School athletes tend to be at or near the top of the PopularityFoodChain, especially if they're on a winning team and the sport they play is basketball and/or football. A sizable chunk of a school's budget will be devoted to supporting its athletic programs, much to the ire of teachers and the more academically inclined. Student athletes are nominally required to maintain a certain GPA in order to stay on the team, and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that student athletes have better than average disciplinary records and academic performance. However, there is often a lot of pressure placed on teachers from coaches, the administration, and the community to give athletes special favors in the grading department. Sometimes, even school districts will be redrawn in order for a high school to get at a hot prospect for its team. All of this is especially true in rural communities, where the high school football field or basketball court is often, along with [[UsefulNotes/AmericanChurches the church]], one of the main focal points of community life (as seen in ''FridayNightLights''). The most popular sports at the high school level are usually [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball football]] and UsefulNotes/{{basketball}}, although most schools also have [[UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball soccer]], UsefulNotes/{{ice hockey}} (mostly in New England and the Great Lakes states), wrestling, volleyball (mostly a girls' sport in the US, with California a partial exception), lacrosse (mainly in the eastern states), baseball and track programs.

Students may choose their entire curriculum. While there are certain standards that must be met in order to graduate, students have a great deal of leeway in when and how to meet those standards. Graduation requirements vary from institution to institution; some schools let you take whatever classes you want whenever you want; others have a very strict core curriculum and set "tracks" for majors, though most schools are somewhere in between. This is where the trig and calc students from high school move on to the even more complicated maths or start learning to apply that trig and calc while building things, and the creative writing students of old have taken up law or begun the process of becoming teachers.

* A '''public school''' (sometimes called a "traditional public school" and "district-run public school" to disambiguate them from charter schools. [[note]] You'll also hear the term "government school" from either a conservative StrawmanPolitical or someone trying to be transatlantically unambiguous[[/note]] "Public School" is the American term for a school run by the government and funded by taxes. This is [[SeparatedByACommonLanguage what the British call a]] "state school", a term used only in a post-secondary context in the US. Every American youth has the privilege to receive taxpayer-supported education in a public school, and it is the default form of schooling for the vast majority.

* A '''private school''' is a school run by private individuals that requires students to pay tuition. Private schools usually follow the same model as public schools do, but there can be some variation depending on the philosophy behind it. Test scores are often higher than in public schools, although many allege that this is because they are able to select the brightest students with the best access to learning materials, while the public schools have to take everyone else. Private schools fall into several categories:
** '''Preparatory schools''', or prep schools, are elite private schools designed to prepare teenagers for college life. They usually have an advanced curriculum, are very selective, and very expensive. Many are also {{boarding school}}s. This is what most people think of when they hear "private school." Prep school students are stereotyped as being rich snobs, often [[BlueBlood "old money"]] -- this is where we get the slang term "preppy" from. These schools are essentially the [[TransAtlanticEquivalent American equivalent]] to [[UsefulNotes/BritishEducationSystem U.K. "public schools."]]

The SAT score formerly consisted of 800 points for math and 800 for reading, making a [[HundredPercentCompletion perfect]] score 1600. Recently, a writing portion has been added, for another 800 points. If the writing portion is used, that makes the possible perfect score 2400 points. In 2016, the perfect score will again become 1600, as the writing score will be reported separately from the main test. The test is frequently retuned so that the national average score falls around 500 points per section. Most colleges, however, still use the old system for admissions, and the minimum score for admission tends to fall between 1100 and 1300 for the math and reading sections combined[[note]]Nearly all colleges say they don't have a minimum score requirement, and technically this is true, but you're not going to find many incoming freshmen with an SAT much under 1100 unless the school's policy is to admit everyone who applies, and if by chance you do find someone with an 800 at an Ivy League school, then that student wowed the admissions committee in some other way... probably by being Chip Buffington IV, who will be residing in Buffington Hall[[/note]]. Some colleges include minimums in math or reading as well as the total score. In areas where the SAT is popular (generally the East Coast), students might also take a PSAT (Pre-SAT) as a practice in the 10th Grade (and possibly again in the spring). This test is also used as a qualification test for the National Merit Scholarship.

A key difference between the SAT and the ACT is how they're graded, at least for now. In the ACT, if you get a question wrong, it doesn't add anything to the score. If you get something wrong in the SAT, then it takes ''away'' from the overall score. In 2016, the guessing penalty will be eliminated from the SAT.

There are also numerous prep courses devoted to preparing students for the SAT and ACT. Some tutoring services are run through schools, but many students go to private classes and tutors after school to take practice tests and learn test-taking strategies. Sort of like an American version of Cram School. Combined with the test fees, the fees for attending test prep courses can make standardized tests very expensive for many families.

Most schools have two proms — one for juniors, one for seniors — although some (particularly smaller schools) have a single junior-senior prom[[note]]often in combined proms, the junior class has to do all the work (come up with a theme, decorate, hire a band) while the seniors just get to show up (they had to do all the work the year before)[[/note]]. The senior prom is usually considered more important, although at some, it's junior prom that's the really big deal, with senior prom being more of a chance for a last fling with your friends before graduation. On a similar note, in fiction, Prom is seen as a night for high school couples to "go all the way." The reality is less impressive; teens who are inclined to do it have probably already done it.

Of course, this is all seen in the case of an Active Shooter situations (cases where the perpetrator is killing with no pattern or method to his or her victims). These are the most common to be featured in media, but it goes without saying that not all school shootings are Active Shooter events. Weapons are brought to school with intention to kill specific victims for any numerous reasons. In some cases, shootings at schools may be related to criminal activity, and while may occur on school grounds, may not occur in the school building (another critical part of an Active Shooter event). [[RuleOfCautiousEditingJudgement The reasons these are not covered as much are best discussed someplace else.]] Many school systems have taken practice of employing a school officer, typically a fully deputized police officer of some kind, to assist in security matters. This is OlderThanTheyThink. The first police response in UsefulNotes/{{Columbine}} were made by an on duty school resource officer, who engaged in a brief firefight with the shooters before they retreated inside, less than 5 minutes after the shootings occurred.

American colleges are delineated between community colleges (sometimes called Junior Colleges) and four-year colleges. Community colleges will focus on Associate's Degrees and various certification programs, which usually take only two years to attain, while four year colleges will focus on Bachelors' Degrees (which, as the name suggests, usually take four years) and have post-graduate programs available. However, some community colleges also have Bachelor's programs (the actual degree being conferred by a cooperating senior college or university, classes offered on the community college campus), and many four year colleges have certification programs (which may be incorporated into a degree).

Four-year colleges refer to incoming students as freshmen, second-year students as sophomores, third year as juniors, and fourth year as seniors. Anybody on their last year before graduating can also be referred to as a senior, although students may teasingly refer to those who have been there for 5+ years as "Super Seniors." This is not the same as being "kept back" in primary or secondary school and does not carry much of a stigma; a student may abort a half-completed major to start over on a new one, may take a sabbatical, or may suffer other impediments to their progress, such as money problems or illness. For instance, California's San Jose State University has an Animation department which is so under-staffed and so over-attended (due to its proximity to Creator/{{Pixar}} and Creator/IndustrialLightAndMagic) that its students are only allowed to take ''one animation course a semester,'' resulting in a ''seven-year'' program whose graduates take longer to obtain their Bachelor's degree than their contemporaries take for their Master's. Similarly, not finishing college at all has nowhere near the stigma that dropping out of high school does. Bill Gates, one of the world's richest people, dropped out of Harvard at 19 to found Microsoft. In fact, open disdain for college degrees has become fashionable in some corners of Silicon Valley.

Students may declare one or more majors and minors, indicating the course of study they will pursue. This is typically done at the end of the sophomore year. Students who have not yet indicated a major are referred to as underclassmen. Having more than one major is called ''double-majoring'' (having more than ''that'' may be possible, but is ridiculous), and is usually very difficult (you must meet ''all'' the requirements of ''both'' majors). Having a minor is, at many colleges, strictly optional; it consists of taking a defined subset of the courses required for the major.

School funding is both complicated and politically sensitive. The US has the highest per-pupil spending for schooling in the world. A large part of funding of schools is based on property taxes for the area where the school is located. If you guess that means school districts in poor areas have a lot less money than those in rich areas, you'd be absolutely correct. Even worse, the gap is self-creating: the quality of local public schools is by ''far'' the most influential criteria on the cost of housing and real estate, and thus property tax, in any given area. In fact, many rich suburbs and gated communities were created partly because parents wanted their kids to have the best free education money could buy, and bought it. To help keep things in balance, some courts have ordered various corrective remedies, such as taking all the money in the state and averaging it out. In some places, the state will add money, taken from the general fund or from other taxes. Some states use whatever funds come from the state lottery. And some will use federal grants based on other criteria. A few states use alternate taxes, such as income taxes (in Ohio, using property taxes to fund schools has been ruled illegal per the state constitution.) State aid allows school systems in some poorer areas, notably some in Maryland and New Jersey, to spend far more per pupil than school systems in some wealthier areas; however, the promised improvement in school outcomes has not occurred.

While religious instruction is mandatory (even for non-Catholic students), as are uniforms, Catholic schools otherwise have the same curriculum as public schools (the biology classes teach evolution, sex-ed classes are fairly comprehensive and don't bash gays, and proselytizing is kept to a minimum), and they have a reputation for providing a very high-quality education for their price. In addition, the Church heavily subsidizes its schools, allowing them to have lower tuition and grant more scholarships. These two factors make them a popular choice not only among Catholic families, but among those parents who don't want to send their kids to public school but don't want to spend too much money or invest their time in homeschooling. The image of nuns beating students with yardsticks is a common stereotype of how Catholic schools are taught, but this [[TwoDecadesBehind hasn't been true (at least in the US) for decades]]. This is where the [[CatholicSchoolGirlsRule American version of the "schoolgirl fetish"]] has its roots.

** '''Alternative schools''' are those schools that specialize in providing an alternative to mainstream education styles. Many specialize in having smaller, more intimate classes and less focus on standardized testing, although there are some that go further and make fundamental changes to the curriculum, such as Waldorf, Montessori, and Sudbury schools. Increasingly, a number of public school districts have started experimenting with alternative methods.

These policies quickly became highly controversial, with many people, particularly students and social scientists, feeling that they go too far and violate the First Amendment. A report by the Secret Service stated that schools were taking false hope in such security measures, and that they wouldn't do anything to deter another massacre. Metal detectors? The kids could just be shot at as they wait in line. Scrutiny of goths and loners? The Columbine killers were neither, so singling out those two groups would allow real killers to fly under the radar. Zero-tolerance policies? They concluded that such policies may actually backfire, as they could very well drive an unstable student over the edge by getting him or her suspended or expelled for a minor infraction.

Parents, however, could choose to move to other areas if they didn't like their neighbors or the schools their kids would have to go to, or put their kids into private "segregation academies" (''Brown v. Board of Education'' didn't apply to private schools). Oftentimes, they did just that, in a phenomenon known as "white flight" that saw white middle-class families moving into the {{suburb|ia}}s, leading to the decline of many an inner city due to falling tax revenue -- which only caused more people to leave, furthering the decline.

It is the rule, not the exception, for a high school to have sports programs. School athletes tend to be at or near the top of the PopularityFoodChain, especially if they're on a winning team and the sport they play is basketball and/or football. A sizable chunk of a school's budget will be devoted to supporting its athletic programs, much to the ire of teachers and the more academically inclined. Student athletes are nominally required to maintain a certain GPA in order to stay on the team, and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that student athletes have better than average disciplinary records and academic performance. However, there is often a lot of pressure placed on teachers from coaches, the administration, and the community to give athletes special favors in the grading department. Sometimes, even school districts will be redrawn in order for a high school to get at a hot prospect for its team. All of this is especially true in rural communities, where the high school football field or basketball court is often, along with [[AmericanChurches the church]], one of the main focal points of community life (as seen in ''FridayNightLights''). The most popular sports at the high school level are usually [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball football]] and UsefulNotes/{{basketball}}, although most schools also have [[UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball soccer]], UsefulNotes/{{ice hockey}} (mostly in New England and the Great Lakes states), wrestling, volleyball (mostly a girls' sport in the US, with California a partial exception), lacrosse (mainly in the eastern states), baseball and track programs.

Each school district will have its own School Board. The ''number'' of boards is set at the state level -- some have one per county, some have one per city, some major cities have one for the whole metro area, {{Hawaii}} has one school district and board for the entire state, and [[HollywoodNewEngland Vermont]] has (depending on how you count two schools of different grade levels that share a campus and part or all of their identity) more school boards than public schools [[note]]Vermont's public schools, incidentally, are some of the most highly-rated in the country, perhaps due to the fact that community oversight is on them around the clock.[[/note]]

Fraternitiess choose their new members once or twice a year, always in the fall and, more rarely, in the spring. The application process is called ''rushing''. An applicant will choose to rush anywhere from one to several frats, who will then accept or reject the applicant. Once selected, the new member is called a ''pledge''; he or she may be subject to a difficult, dangerous, and/or embarrassing {{initiation ceremony}}. These ceremonies are another sticking point between frats and college administrations, as they have been known to devolve into hazing and outright abuse (as famously portrayed in ''AnimalHouse'').

School funding is both complicated and politically sensitive. The US has the highest per-pupil spending for schooling in the world. A large part of funding of schools is based on property taxes for the area where the school is located. If you guess that means school districts in poor areas have a lot less money than those in rich areas, you'd be absolutely correct. Even worse, the gap is self-creating: the quality of local public schools is by ''far'' the most influential criteria on the cost of housing and real estate, and thus property tax, in any given area. In fact, many rich suburbs and gated communities were created partly because parents wanted their kids to have the best free education money could buy, and bought it. To help keep things in balance, some courts have ordered various corrective remedies, such as taking all the money in the state and averaging it out. In some places, the state will add money, taken from the general fund or from other taxes. Some states use whatever funds come from the state lottery. And some will use federal grants based on other criteria. A few states use alternate taxes, such as income taxes (in Ohio, using property taxes to fund schools has been ruled illegal per the state constitution.)

Grades out of 100% translate into a letter grading system. Passing grades are A, B, C, and D, although some districts do not use the D grade. A failing grade is an F. Plus and minus are used to show distinctions between grades; some students and their parents are [[AluminumChristmasTrees surprised to find]] that there's such a thing as an F- (usually a grade of 50 or below). A student's grades in high school translate into a grade point average, or GPA, according to a formula. By most systems, the highest GPA possible is a 4.0. [=GPAs=] are of great interest to colleges; they also determine class rank. The two students with the highest class ranks are the valedictorian and salutatorian, who usually have to make a speech at graduation.[[note]]Students who earn these positions will probably regard it as "GET to make a speech" instead, though it's possible for bookish-but-exceptionally-shy students to dread the traditional graduation speech... while those who are in no danger of being in that position probably dread them also, but for different reasons.[[/note]]

For many students, while they may have had rudimentary classes in grade school, high school will be the first time they take a serious foreign language course. They are offered in all high schools, because most colleges have a foreign-language requirement. Spanish and French are the two standards; other popular options include Italian, German, and Chinese (given the large ethnic communities with those backgrounds). Foreign language classes are fairly expensive, what with audio tapes and whatnot, so the number of languages a school offers is a decent gauge of how much funding it has. Modern foreign language education got its start in UsefulNotes/{{Florida}} (particularly UsefulNotes/{{Miami}}) in TheSixties, when UsefulNotes/{{Cuba}}n exiles sought to have their children learn Spanish in school; before that, there was a period from UsefulNotes/WorldWarI (when anti-[[UsefulNotes/ImperialGermany German]] paranoia saw the effective destruction of German-American culture) to the early '60s when foreign languages were not taught in public schools in any form, and in fact speaking anything other than English in the classroom was seen as unpatriotic and a sign that one was rejecting assimilation.

At many high schools, particularly [[TeenGenius motivated]] or [[MeddlingParents pressured]] students are permitted to take a subset of college courses. These courses are dubbed "dual enrollment" as the student can apply the class towards both their high school and college diplomas. These courses are often taken remotely, but certain programs exist that may allow students to actually spend part of their day on a local college campus. Though rare, occasionally a student will end up receiving an Associate's Degree before their high school diploma.

It is the rule, not the exception, for a high school to have sports programs. School athletes tend to be at or near the top of the PopularityFoodChain, especially if they're on a winning team. A sizable chunk of a school's budget will be devoted to supporting its athletic programs, much to the ire of teachers and the more academically inclined. Student athletes are nominally required to maintain a certain GPA in order to stay on the team, and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that student athletes have better than average disciplinary records and academic performance. However, there is often a lot of pressure placed on teachers from coaches, the administration, and the community to give athletes special favors in the grading department. Sometimes, even school districts will be redrawn in order for a high school to get at a hot prospect for its team. All of this is especially true in rural communities, where the high school football field or basketball court is often, along with [[AmericanChurches the church]], one of the main focal points of community life (as seen in ''FridayNightLights''). The most popular sports at the high school level are usually [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball football]] and UsefulNotes/{{basketball}}, although most schools also have [[UsefulNotes/AssociationFootball soccer]], UsefulNotes/{{ice hockey}} (mostly in New England and the Great Lakes states), wrestling, volleyball (mostly a girls' sport in the US, with California a partial exception), lacrosse (mainly in the eastern states), baseball and track programs.

Most schools offer both boys' and girls' sports. This is due to Title IX, a law passed in 1972 which mandates that schools offer sufficient athletic opportunities to female students. Controversy arises from the fact that schools with limited budgets are often forced to cut boys' sports in order to establish and maintain equivalent girls' sports programs (the general perception, more often than not, is that boys' sports are more worthy of attention). The benefit is that programs and opportunities for girls (and for women in college) have become dramatically better, and the results play out on the international stage — the United States is a powerhouse in international women's sports. For example, while the US men's national soccer team has long been viewed as a joke by the rest of the world (although nowadays, it's seen as a middle-tier team), the women's soccer team has won three FIFA Women's World Cups and four Olympic gold medals in the last twenty years. The main sports for female athletes tend to be basketball, soccer, softball, track, volleyball, field hockey, lacrosse (again, especially in the eastern US), ice hockey (again, mostly in its US heartland of the northern tier of states) and, of course, [[TheCheerleader cheerleading]].

For the record, the status of cheerleading as a legitimate sport is a point of controversy in many school districts. On one hand, there are those who feel listing it as a sport is an excuse for schools to de-fund other women's sports programs while still maintaining compliance with Title IX. On the other hand, there are those who feel that not calling it a sport is an insult to the strenuous activity that cheerleaders do and the risk that they put themselves in — statistically, cheerleading is the most dangerous athletic activity in high schools, even more so than football.[[note]]''You'' try landing all those flips without breaking your neck.[[/note]] Some schools dodge the issue entirely by making their cheer squads co-ed, though there is a strong stigma against male cheerleaders in such schools — oftentimes, they're stereotyped (unfairly) as either AmbiguouslyGay or, conversely, having joined the squad just to [[AllGuysWantCheerleaders get laid]].

Some states, notably Texas, have school districts that are organized and act independent of municipal governments. This is done to prevent conflicts of interest between schools and cities and also for demographic reasons. It often leads to Gerrymandering, either for political, demographic, or (usually) for [[SeriousBusiness varsity sports]] reasons. On the other hand, Virginia has no "school districts" as such—public K–12 education is operated by a subdivision of a local government (city, town, or county) known as a "school division" (though, like the rest of the country, Virginia has local school boards).

Some states, notably Texas, have school districts that are organized and act independent of municipal governments. This is done to prevent conflicts of interest between schools and cities and also for demographic reasons. It often leads to Gerrymandering, either for political, demographic, or (usually) for [[SeriousBusiness varsity sports]] reasons. On the other hand, Virginia has no "school districts" as such—public K–12 education is operated by a subdivision of a local government (city, town, or county) known as a "school division".

College sports are SeriousBusiness in the United States, a multi-billion dollar enterprise with considerable investment by the television {{networks}}, the professional leagues and corporate sponsors. Some schools have teams so successful that the reputation of the team is stronger than that of the school it plays for. Playing well for a big team is often a surefire way to get noticed by the professional leagues. Schools with sports programs in NCAA Divisions I and II (but not Division III) are allowed to employ athletic scholarships — in exchange for a student playing on the team, the school will pay for that student's education, often in full. Big sports schools have "recruiters" that are sent to high schools (and sometimes even [[http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/blog/dr_saturday/post/13-year-old-commits-to-USC-and-pancakes-for-b?urn=ncaaf,217861 middle schools]]) to entice promising players to come and play for their team. College sports often produce rivalries comparable to the EnglishPremierLeague — witness the vitriol slung between fans of Ohio State and Michigan (called the greatest rivalry in North American sports by Creator/{{ESPN}}), or Duke and UNC, or Auburn and Alabama, or UCLA and USC, or...

It is the rule, not the exception, for a high school to have sports programs. School athletes tend to be at or near the top of the PopularityFoodChain, especially if they're on a winning team. A sizable chunk of a school's budget will be devoted to supporting its athletic programs, much to the ire of teachers and the more academically inclined. Student athletes are nominally required to maintain a certain GPA in order to stay on the team, and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that student athletes have better than average disciplinary records and academic performance. However, there is often a lot of pressure placed on teachers from coaches, the administration, and the community to give athletes special favors in the grading department. Sometimes, even school districts will be redrawn in order for a high school to get at a hot prospect for its team. All of this is especially true in rural communities, where the high school football field or basketball court is often, along with [[AmericanChurches the church]], one of the main focal points of community life (as seen in ''FridayNightLights''). The most popular sports at the high school level are usually [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball football]] and UsefulNotes/{{basketball}}, although most schools also have [[TheBeautifulGame soccer]], UsefulNotes/{{ice hockey}} (mostly in New England and the Great Lakes states), wrestling, volleyball (mostly a girls' sport in the US, with California a partial exception), lacrosse (mainly in the eastern states), baseball and track programs.

Fraternities often have nicknames: Delta Delta Delta, for example, will probably be called "Tri-Delt". They always have reputations (e.g. "mostly Hispanic women", "mostly biology students", [[BreadEggsMilkSquick "mostly alcoholic date-rapists"]]), and they almost always have rivalries and/or partnerships with other fraternities. They are almost always single-sex organizations (hence the delineation between fraternities and sororities), and until ''very'' recently, were just as likely to be all people of the same race or ethnic group. There ''are'' some coed Greek organizations (sometimes called "societies"), but these are pretty rare. Fraternities and sororities have developed a reputation for [[WackyFratboyHijinx partying and drinking alarming quantities of alcohol]], especially if they are not affiliated with a particular professional or religious attachment. This is largely TruthInTelevision, and has caused some college to ban all Greek organizations from the campus. Remember, college is where many Americans will be both 1) exposed to alcohol and 2) away from parents or other authority figures who are likely to enforce the 21-year-old drinking age mandated by law. Furthermore, any American college student who waits until 21 to drink was actively trying to avoid it — anyone who wants to drink at college is going to have no trouble finding an of-age buddy to buy them beer.

This leads into another aspect of college culture — the politics. Since the student protests of TheSixties, colleges and academia in general have been a [[StrawmanU popular strawman target]] for conservatives, being stereotyped as hotbeds of flaky leftist politics pushed by radical professors and student groups. While this is sometimes TruthInTelevision, most colleges are also home to rival conservative groups, some of which may wield considerable influence. In particular, religious colleges and less elite state colleges have been known for their conservatism. For every {{Berzerkeley}}, there is a JimJonesUniversity. Modern universities have also been criticized from the left for the aforementioned college sports detracting from academics and the focus on corporate-friendly majors like computer science and engineering at the expense of liberal arts, the shift from stable tenure-track faculty positions to lower-paid adjuncts, as well as the massive debt that students take on to finance their educations.

Colleges in the United States may be public or private, as with primary and secondary schools, but these terms are used slightly differently at the tertiary educational level. A "public" university derives ''some'' of its funding from the state (about 20-25%, in the case of the University of California system), and scrapes up the rest through tuition/patents/hitting up alums for money/etc. Private universities rely solely on tuition/patents/hitting up alums for money/etc. Public universities (also called state universities[[note]]The general rule is, if it has "University of [STATE]" or "State University" as part of its name, it's probably public. However, the University of Pennsylvania is a tricky exception, as it is a prestigious IvyLeague school that's not funded by the state of Pennsylvania. In the other direction, the same is true for Rutgers University, which was once a private college but is now the public university system of UsefulNotes/NewJersey; its full, formal name is "Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey", but that's in the fine print.[[/note]]) generally tend to be less expensive than private universities, though this is not always the case. Neither public nor private universities are required to take everyone (with the exception of community colleges; see below) — you must apply, and admission can be very competitive indeed. However, public universities are usually easier to get into than private universities, if for no other reason than they are usually larger and can therefore afford to accept a larger number of students. Students are also much more likely to go to their home state's university for various reasons — they may have grown up cheering for the sports team, their parents are likely alumni, and tuition is often drastically reduced for in-state students (even if the students themselves aren't taxpayers, their parents are, after all). The ease of gaining entry to a private university is variable, as the tuition is often drastically higher, and the minimum standards are usually stricter (even, [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections oddly enough]], [[{{Nepotism}} if your parents own it]]).

In reality, however, many people transfer to a four-year college after getting their two-year Associate's degree to a four-year school, to upgrade to a Bachelor's. It's often suggested, especially in the current economy, to recent high school grads that they go as cheap as possible with their Bachelor's degree, as unless it's from an elite IvyLeague school, most employers and post-graduate programs won't care about what college you got it from as long as it's properly accredited. Others feel that a four-year education isn't worth the time or money. Others still take courses for a vocational skill. Unlike the European master-apprentice system, most trades are now taught in community colleges. Auto repair, electricians, paralegals, plumbing, police, fire, emergency medical technician, cooking, and some forms of nursing are commonly but a few of the courses done at community colleges. Thus, college is more or less necessary for anyone but unskilled laborers.

Student athletes aren't allowed to be paid directly by the schools — the argument is that their education is payment enough, and that paying them in cash would allow richer schools to buy up all the best talent. Cases of Division I schools being punished by the NCAA for slipping money or perks to players under the table are all too common. However, there have been calls to change this, the argument being that college sports stopped being "amateur" a long time ago — there are massive amounts of money involved, many college teams have [[ProductPlacement sponsors]] and TV deals, and the entire system is essentially a "farm" for the big leagues, so it is argued that not paying the athletes is tantamount to exploiting them. Indeed, at [[http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/26/us/northwestern-football-union/ at least one university]], players have attempted to unionize. The fact that college sports has gotten big enough for such a debate to happen in the first place, of course, has itself raised concern among academics, who feel that the transformation of many colleges and universities into "sports schools" has detracted from their academic mission. This was the main reason why the IvyLeague schools, which had once been sports powerhouses, all but withdrew from the NCAA in TheFifties. The NCAA has been listening to these concerns, implementing [[http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/17/ncaas-stricter-academic-rules-what-does-it-mean-for-your-team/ new standards]] in 2011 regarding academic performance of student athletes — if a team doesn't graduate at least half of its players, then it's disqualified from post-season play.

Finally, homeschooling is often used by parents who feel that their children aren't being challenged by any of the schools they go to, for those who have children engaged in a hobby or early career (many child and teenage actors go this route in order to keep up with production schedules), or for those who believe the "gear-in-the-cog" mentality is counterproductive and not suited for children. In any event, [[HomeschooledKids children who are homeschooled]] are often stereotyped as socially awkward shut-ins who have trouble functioning in the outside world due to having not been educated in a classroom environment, interacting with a wide variety of other people. When faced with this argument against homeschooling, parents will usually retaliate that learning social skills from other kids who haven't learned them yet themselves is a horrible idea, and it ''is'', in fact, possible to make friends and socialize outside of school. (Many HomeschooledKids fit this stereotype, many don't.)
** Many homeschool parents put their kids in '''co-op''' (short for co-operative), which is like a weekly or twice a week public school for homeschoolers, with homework taking the place of the class for the rest of the week. Some co-ops will teach the core subjects and leave electives up to the parents (this setup is pretty much inevitable for small co-ops), while some co-ops will offer both electives and core subjects. \\

* A '''public school''' (sometimes called a "traditional public school" and "district-run public school" to disambiguate them from charter schools. [[note]] You'll also hear the term "government school" from either a conservative StrawmanPolitical or someone trying to be transatlantically unambiguous[[/note]] is the American term for a school run by the government and funded by taxes. This is [[SeparatedByACommonLanguage what the British call a]] "state school", a term used only in a post-secondary context in the US. Every American youth has the privilege to receive taxpayer-supported education in a public school, and it is the default form of schooling for the vast majority of them.

This can lead to amusing situations when a BrilliantButLazy student drops out at age 16, promptly gets his/her GED, and has a diploma equivalent 2 years before their peers. Theoretically they could get an Associate's Degree while everyone else is graduating, but this is much rarer, hence the "lazy" part. A real-life example of this is current [[UsefulNotes/MLBTeams Washington Nationals]] star Bryce Harper, who took and passed his GED at 16 so he could enter junior college early, thus getting a head start on a professional baseball career.[[note]] Under MLB rules, U.S. players are eligible for the draft upon high school graduation. Harper chose junior college because of another draft rule—a player who enrolls in a four-year college is ineligible until three years after enrollment or turning 21, whichever is sooner. Junior college players, on the other hand, are always eligible. This meant that Harper could be drafted at age 17 with a year of college under his belt.[[/note]] To prevent students from gaming the system in this manner, some states require a GED candidate to be at least 18 years of age.[[note]]Harper's home state of Nevada is [[CaptainObvious obviously]] not one of them.[[/note]]

Colleges in the United States may be public or private, as with primary and secondary schools, but these terms are used slightly differently at the tertiary educational level. A "public" university derives ''some'' of its funding from the state (about 20-25%, in the case of the University of California system), and scrapes up the rest through tuition/patents/hitting up alums for money/etc. Private universities rely solely on tuition/patents/hitting up alums for money/etc. Public universities (also called state universities[[note]]The general rule is, if it has "University of [STATE]" or "State University" as part of its name, it's probably public. However, the University of Pennsylvania is a tricky exception, as it is a prestigious IvyLeague school that's not funded by the state of Pennsylvania. In the other direction, the same is true for Rutgers University, which was once a private college but is now the public university system of UsefulNotes/NewJersey; its full, formal name is "Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey", but that's in the fine print.[[/note]]) generally tend to be less expensive than private universities, though this is not always the case. Neither public nor private universities are required to take everyone (with the exception of community colleges; see below) — you must apply, and admission can be very competitive indeed. However, public universities are usually easier to get into than private universities, if for no other reason than they are usually larger and can therefore afford to accept a larger number of students. Students are also much more likely to go to their home state's university for various reasons — they may have grown up cheering for the sports team, their parents are likely alumni, and tuition is often drastically reduced for in-state students (they are taxpayers, after all). The ease of gaining entry to a private university is variable, as the tuition is often drastically higher, and the minimum standards are usually stricter (even, [[ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections oddly enough]], [[{{Nepotism}} if your parents own it]]).

College sports are SeriousBusiness in the United States, a multi-billion dollar enterprise with considerable investment by the television {{networks}}, the professional leagues and corporate sponsors. Some schools have teams so successful that the reputation of the team is stronger than that of the school it plays for. Playing well for a big team is often a surefire way to get noticed by the professional leagues. Schools with sports programs in NCAA Divisions I and II (but not Division III) are allowed to employ athletic scholarships — in exchange for a student playing on the team, the school will pay for that student's education, often in full. Big sports schools have "recruiters" that are sent to high schools (and sometimes even [[http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/blog/dr_saturday/post/13-year-old-commits-to-USC-and-pancakes-for-b?urn=ncaaf,217861 middle schools]]) to entice promising players to come and play for their team. College sports often produce rivalries comparable to the EnglishPremierLeague — witness the vitriol slung between fans of Ohio State and Michigan (called the greatest rivalry in North American sports by {{ESPN}}), or Duke and UNC, or Auburn and Alabama, or UCLA and USC, or...

It is the rule, not the exception, for a high school to have sports programs. School athletes tend to be at or near the top of the PopularityFoodChain, especially if they're on a winning team. A sizable chunk of a school's budget will be devoted to supporting its athletic programs, much to the ire of teachers and the more academically inclined. Student athletes are nominally required to maintain a certain GPA in order to stay on the team, and there is plenty of evidence to suggest that student athletes have better than average disciplinary records and academic performance. However, there is often a lot of pressure placed on teachers from coaches, the administration, and the community to give athletes special favors in the grading department. Sometimes, even school districts will be redrawn in order for a high school to get at a hot prospect for its team. All of this is especially true in rural communities, where the high school football field or basketball court is often, along with [[AmericanChurches the church]], one of the main focal points of community life (as seen in ''FridayNightLights''). The most popular sports at the high school level are usually [[UsefulNotes/AmericanFootball football]] and UsefulNotes/{{basketball}}, although most schools also have [[TheBeautifulGame soccer]], UsefulNotes/{{ice hockey}} (field hockey is a girls' sport at most schools), wrestling, volleyball (mostly a girls' sport in the US, with California a partial exception), lacrosse (mainly in the eastern states), baseball and track programs.

Most schools offer both boys' and girls' sports. This is due to Title IX, a law passed in 1972 which mandates that schools offer sufficient athletic opportunities to female students. Controversy arises from the fact that schools with limited budgets are often forced to cut boys' sports in order to establish and maintain equivalent girls' sports programs (the general perception, more often than not, is that boys' sports are more worthy of attention). The benefit is that programs and opportunities for girls (and for women in college) have become dramatically better, and the results play out on the international stage — the United States is a powerhouse in international women's sports. For example, while the US men's national soccer team has long been viewed as a joke by the rest of the world (although nowadays, it's seen as a middle-tier team), the women's soccer team has won the FIFA Women's World Cup twice and the Olympic Gold Medal four times in the last twenty years. The main sports for female athletes tend to be basketball, soccer, softball, track, volleyball, field hockey, lacrosse (again, especially in the eastern US) and, of course, [[TheCheerleader cheerleading]].

This can lead to amusing situations when a BrilliantButLazy student drops out at age 16, promptly gets his/her GED, and has a diploma equivalent 2 years before their peers. Theoretically they could get an Associate's Degree while everyone else is graduating, but this is much rarer, hence the "lazy" part. A real-life example of this is current [[UsefulNotes/MLBTeams Washington Nationals]] star Bryce Harper, who took and passed his GED at 16 so he could enter junior college early, thus getting a head start on a professional baseball career.[[note]] Under MLB rules, U.S. players are eligible for the draft upon high school graduation. Harper chose junior college because of another draft rule—a player who enrolls in a four-year college is ineligible until three years after enrollment or turning 21, whichever is sooner. Junior college players, on the other hand, are always eligible. This meant that Harper could be drafted at age 17 with a year of college under his belt.[[/note]] To prevent students from gaming the system in this manner, some states require a GED candidate to be at least 18 years of age.

This leads into another aspect of college culture — the politics. Since the student protests of TheSixties, colleges and academia in general have been a [[StrawmanU popular strawman target]] for conservatives, being stereotyped as hotbeds of flaky leftist politics pushed by radical professors and student groups. While this is sometimes TruthInTelevision, most colleges are also home to rival conservative groups, some of which may wield considerable influence. In particular, religious colleges and less elite state colleges have been known for their conservatism. For every {{Berzerkeley}}, there is a JimJonesUniversity. Modern universities have also been criticized from the left for the aforementioned college sports detracting from academics and the focus on corporate-friendly majors like computer science and engineering at the expense of liberal arts, the shift from stable tenure-track faculty positions to lower-pad adjuncts, as well as the massive debt that students take on to finance their educations.