Course of Study by Grade
Course of Study
Credo's course of study is shaped by a clear understanding of who adolescents are and what they need to grow. The teenage years bring rapid changes: students begin to reason abstractly, question received ideas, and seek both independence and belonging as they form their own identities. Rather than treating these changes as obstacles, Credo builds its curriculum around them. Early coursework emphasizes careful observation and clear thinking, while later years ask students to weigh competing ideas, grapple with ethical questions, and take ownership of their learning through independent inquiry.
At its heart, Credo offers a true liberal arts education, one that aims to develop the whole person rather than train students narrowly for a single path. Alongside literature, history, mathematics, and the sciences, students make art, perform, work with their hands, and spend time outdoors, with the arts, practical crafts, movement, and community service treated as essential parts of their education rather than extras. In the liberal arts tradition, this breadth is the point: it teaches students to see connections across disciplines, think flexibly, and bring curiosity to whatever they encounter. A student who struggles in one area may find confidence in another, and capacities built in a workshop or on a wilderness trip often strengthen work in the classroom. The result is graduates who are capable, curious, and balanced, prepared not only for college and careers but for thoughtful, engaged lives.
-
As freshmen dive into the new experiences of high school, they are also plunging into physical and hormonal changes of adolescence, and newly into the realm of abstract thinking. Students’ experiences of inner polarities provoked by these changes are reflected back to them in the carefully chosen school curriculum. For example, in physics, students study the polarity of heat and cold; in environmental science, the drama of plate tectonics; in art, black and white drawing. The objective is to train exact powers of observation and recollection so that the students can experience the steadiness of their own thinking in the often-confusing world around them.
The eight morning lessons anchoring the ninth grade are:
- World Geography
- History through Art
- Descriptive Geometry
- Number Theory: Permutations and Combinations
- Biology: Comparative Anatomy and Physiology (lab science)
- Chemistry: Organic Chemistry (lab science)
- Physics: Thermodynamics (lab science)
- Environmental Science: Geology (lab science)
In addition, students take the following semester, quarterly, or year-long courses:
- World Language: Spanish or Mandarin
- English
- Math: Algebra 1 or Geometry
- Visual & Practical Arts
- Music
- Physical Education and Health
-
Students are called upon to exercise powers of comparison, weighing contrary phenomena to determine their value and significance, and their origin. In chemistry, the reactions of inorganic elements and the introduction of chemical nomenclature and equations in physics, the principles of mechanics; in earth sciences, the complex processes involved in weather and climatic patters – all these reveal the possibility of equilibrium arising out of the balancing of extremes. Students discover that in the balancing of opposites new forms can arise, whether in clouds and tides or new chemical compounds. The objective is to help students find their own balance in natural and human phenomena.
The morning lessons anchoring tenth grade are:
- Research Paper
- Ancient World History
- Modern World History
- English:Poetics
- Biology: Embryology (lab science)
- Chemistry: Inorganic Chemistry (lab science)
- Physics: Mechanics (lab science)
- Environmental Science: Oceanography (lab science)
In addition, students take the following semester, quarterly or year long courses:
- World Language: Spanish or Mandarin
- English (semester)
- Math: Geometry
- Visual and Practical Arts
- Music
- Physical Education and Health
-
New depths in the inner life of thoughts, feelings and deeds arise. Existential questions may come. Students feel called to find their own paths in life. Students investigate the invisible through subjects that draw them into areas not accessible to the senses. This requires developing a new confidence in abstract thinking. In literature, this journey is captured in the study of Parzival and the Grail legends. In chemistry, students study the development of the periodic table – an insight based on intuition, and in physics, the invisible world of the atom and of electricity. In Projective Geometry, the meeting point of parallel lines at infinity can be thought, but never reached in the world of the senses. The objective is to strengthen analytical and abstract thinking: Why are things this way? Why did the events of history take this course? Even deeper questions – those of destiny, purpose in life, and social responsibility also find their way into the classroom.
The morning lessons anchoring the eleventh grade are:
- English: Medieval Literature/Parcival
- English: Shakespeare
- World History: Medieval History and Beyond
- Projective Geometry
- Biology: Botany (lab science)
- Chemistry: Elements and Matter (lab science)
- Physics: Electricity and Magnetism (lab science)
- Environmental Science: Astronomy (lab science)
In addition, eleventh grade students take the following semester or year long courses:
- World Language
- Math: Algebra 2 or Precalculus
- U.S. History & Ethnic Studies (year-long)
- American Literature (semester)
- American Government (semester)
- A choice of Elective Offerings
-
Senior year recapitulates the themes of the high school, as well as the Waldorf k-8 curriculum. In the culminating morning lesson, Human Development, students are made conscious, for the first time, of the Waldorf developmental approach – of why they learned what they learned when they learned it. Students examine the relationship of humanity with the world. Studying the Transcendentalists, they live with the thoughts of great writers who have questioned man’s place in the world. Subjects synthesize many themes. Assignments in World History, History through Architecture, Biomimicry and Senior Essay call upon students to synthesize disparate disciplines. All students work with a mentor to present a senior project.
The morning lessons anchoring twelfth grade are:
- Globalization
- Senior Portrait in Oil or Clay
- Human Development
- Biology: Zoology and Human Evolution (lab science)
- Chemistry: Biochemistry (lab science)
- Physics: Light and Optics (lab science)
- Environmental Science: Biomimicry (lab science)
In addition, twelfth grade students take the following semester or year long courses:
- English
- Math: Precalculus, Functions, Stats, & Trig, or Calculus (optional)
- Economics (semester)
- World Language (Optional)
- Art or Music (Optional)
- Elective Offerings (Optional)
- Senior Project