New high school course requirements

TYLER-Starting this fall Texas high school students will be getting a break on course requirements. This break is courtesy of the state's education chief and a bill state lawmakers passed last May.

Under this new bill all high school students, not just incoming freshman, will take more electives and fewer required courses. Students with no longer be required to take two semesters of computer technology, a semester of health education and a semester of physical education.

In place of those four semesters of course requirements, students will be able to take more electives. And officials with the Texas Education Agency in Austin say they believe the requirements will benefit students in the long run.

"They are more able to squeeze in all of the things that they would like to take that might lead them down a career path," Spokesperson for the Texas Education Agency, Suzanne Marchman, said.

With all the changes officials tell us the number of credits that students are required to have in order to graduate did not change.