A12
Some British schools have prayers and religious teaching, but US public schools are not allowed to include prayers or to teach particular religious beliefs.
In the US, children must go to school from the age of 5 or 6 to between the ages of 14 and 16, depending on the law in the state where they live. In the UK, all children have to go to school between the ages of 5 and 16. In some parts of the UK, PRESCHOOL or NURSERY education is provided by the local government for children aged 3 and 4. In the US, parents have to pay for nursery education.
**State and Private Schools**
In both the US and the UK, most children go to schools that are provided by the government. In the US these are known as PUBLIC SCHOOLS, and in the UK they are known as STATE SCHOOLS.
In the UK, some children go to schools that their parents pay for. These are called private schools, but the most famous ones, such as ETON, HARROW, WINCHESTER, and RUGBY, are called PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Public schools are often BOARDING SCHOOLS, where students live as well as study. Some British people think that children at public schools get a better education than children at state schools.
Some children in the US also go to schools that their parents pay for, which are called PRIVATE SCHOOLS. Private schools in the US are often run by church groups, when they are known as PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS, but there are private schools, especially on the East Coast, that are considered to be very good, such as the Hotchkiss School, Andover Academy, and Choate Rosemary Hall.
**Subjects**
In the US, national, state, and local governments decide what subjects will be taught in the schools, so children in different states and even within the same state may be taught slightly different things. Most schools, however, teach very similar subjects.
In England and Wales the subjects taught in schools are listed in the NATIONAL CURRICULUM, which was introduced in 1988, and lists in detail the subjects that all children must study. Children are tested at the ages of 7, 11, 14, and 16 to see if they have reached a particular level of achievement in those subjects. The National Curriculum does not apply in Scotland, where each school decides what subjects it will teach.
In the US, students do not take national examinations as the British do. Students in HIGH SCHOOL usually take examinations in the subjects they are studying at the end of each SEMESTER, and their marks in their courses are based partly on these examinations and partly on other tests, HOMEWORK, and work done in class. The marks a student gets in his or her courses are added together, and then divided by the number of classes the student has taken to produce the student's GRADE POINT AVERAGE, or G.P.A. The highest G.P.A. possible is 4.0, which is equal to getting an A in every class.
Students who have passed enough courses GRADUATE from high school at the end of the twelfth grade, and receive a HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA from their school at a graduation ceremony which is held at the end of the school year. American students who want to go to university must take a test called the SAT or another test called the ACT, and some universities ask students to take tests in several subjects as well. Students give their test scores, G.P.A., and a record of their other achievements to a university when they apply to go to that university.
At age 16, students in England and Wales take GCSE examinations in subjects that they have been studying for two years. The GCSE examinations involve a final examination as well as CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT, a way of judging a student's level of achievement by looking at their coursework (=work that they do during the course). The marks students get in their examinations help them decide which subjects to study for A-LEVEL, if they are not planning to leave school. Students who take A-levels study for two years and take A/S level exams after the first year, and A2 level exams at the end of the second year. Universities select their students on the basis of the A-level results. In order to go to a good university and study a popular subject such as medicine or English, students usually need to get grade A or B in all their A-levels. For less popular subjects, they do not need to achieve such high grades.
**Social Events and Ceremonies**
In US high schools there is a formal ceremony for graduation (=when the students have completed their