USA - Education System

The United States facilitates top notch resources and qualitative education for wide variety of curriculums that enables students to pursue their extra edge.

For every student aspiring education in USA it is essential to be aware of the structure of educational system in USA. The system comprises of 12 years of primary and high school education, which is mandatory for getting admission in any graduate college, university, or for any professional and technical schools. It is not compulsory to accomplish these 12 years of elementary education within United States. Therefore students from overseas are also welcomed for higher education in United States.

Primary/Elementary School
Usually the education for Americans starts at around 5 years of age. The tenure of primary schooling will be about five to six years. In this level students will be completing five grades of their education. Students have choice to select their education held either in public schools, or private schools, or home school.

High/Secondary School
Upon completion of five grades of education in primary school, students will enter high/secondary school. The tenure of secondary school will be about six to seven years, by which students will be completing their 12 grades. After completion of their secondary education successfully students will be obtaining a high school diploma, which gives eligibility to get admission in any college or university. International students applying for graduation in U.S should have an equivalent grade of this diploma.

Undergraduate School
After achieving high school diploma, students will join colleges or universities to pursue their undergraduate course of study. They offer two types of degrees:

• Bachelors Degree: It is a four years long-term program, in which most of the students in US pursue their undergraduate program. Certainly, bachelor’s degree earns considerably more than another equivalent degree. The course of study is called the 'major', which comprises of the main or special subjects. Know more about Bachelor’s degree .

• Associate Degree: It is a two years diploma program, awarded by community colleges, junior colleges and business colleges for completing the under graduation. It is equivalent to the first two years of bachelor’s degree (four-year degree). This degree can be valid to transfer into third year of four-year school eventually for the completion of bachelor’s degree program. The first year is called ‘freshman year’, second year is called ‘sophomore’, third year is called ‘junior’ and fourth year is called ‘senior’. Know more aboutAssociate Degrees. For pursuing undergraduate program in USA, international students need to have a minimum score on the SAT +TOEFL .

Graduate School
Typically, graduate degree is a two-year program that is specialized on a specific subject like, arts, science, and philosophy. Students holding bachelor’s degree will be eligible to continue their further education by pursuing any master’s degree. Yet there are certain exceptions for pursuing graduate degrees like MBA. To pursue Master’s degree for international students, many universities ask for a minimum score on the TOEFL+ GRE and TOEFL+ GMAT for MBA. Graduation education includes, law, medicine, M.B.A., and Ph.D. (doctorate) etc.

Doctorate
To continue the comprehensive course of study, a student can pursue a Doctorate degree, which is also called as a PhD. This degree will be pursued to learn more and place special focus on the major subject a master’s graduate. The tenure of completing PhD degree may take around 3 to 6 years, depending on the selected program. Many universities consider master’s degree as the gateway to obtain doctorate. This is not compulsory for some other universities, where students can get PhD admission with bachelor’s degree.

Academic Year
Generally, the school calendar in USA starts in August or September, which is continued through May or June. For the convenience of international students many courses are designed in such a manner that students can join the program in different terms resembling to semesters (two-term calendar), trimesters (three-term calendar), or quarter (four-term calendar) systems.

Transfers
Education system in US allows students to transfer to another university with the same graduation within a reasonable time period. Students have the opportunity to enroll in any university before finishing their degree and their credits will be used in the new university to complete their degree.

Credit System
A credit system is an organized method of presenting the educational program by accumulation of credits to its components. Students in USA will complete their degrees on the accretion of their credits between 130 and 180 credits. There are various parameters to depict credits for higher education, which may include workload, learning outcomes and contact hours of the students. In certain cases, ‘units’ or ‘semester hours’ are used instead of credits. For every course of study students will earn a particular number of credits per semester. Professors and advisers assist the students in organizing their course schedule for their academic year.

Grades
US education system employs chronic evaluation method for every course of study adopted by the students and assigns grades for them. These grades will be assessed based on several inquisitions that manipulate final grade such as, class attendance, marks scored in examinations, laboratory reports, assignments and other relevant proceedings. The following are the common percentage “letter grade scale” for classes taken at U.S. colleges:

About GPA
Students will complete their degrees with a Grade Point Average (GPA). The entire grades obtained from the whole degree program will be known as cumulative grade point. Usually many universities will measure through the GPA scale of 4.0 and few use a scale of 5.0. Calculate your GPA this way. Get the values assigned for your grades for each course. Usually there will be 4 points for ‘A’, 3 points for ‘B’, 2 points for ‘C’. Multiply them with the number of credits they worth. Finally total all the multiplied values and divide them with sum of actual credit values.
For example: 27 divided by 9 = 3.0 GPA (from the below table)

However, GPA grading varies from India’s grading system, some organization like WES (World Education Services) converts Indian education grades into GPA system of USA. If your university facilitates conversion scale from percentage to GPA, make use of them.