The Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) High School Course Bulletin is now available on the MCPS web site for the first time in a searchable and interactive format. This is the first interactive online course bulletin for high school students in the region, perhaps the nation.

The new format enables parents and students to become more active and informed partners with guidance counselors in planning the high school academic program.

Students and their parents can search the extensive database of courses in a number of ways, such as by course title, type (e.g. honors), discipline (e.g. math), and key words in course descriptions. They can then shop for courses and add them to a printable four-year planning work sheet. In addition, families have access to information that is always current, as updated course information is added throughout the year and is accessible from any Internet-connected computer.

Another capability of the online course bulletin is the ability to link to a wide variety of resources related to high school course selection and to college and career planning. Students develop a better understanding of the thinking and planning process necessary at the college level as they build their academic program with more long-term goals in mind.

The new course bulletin also has proved to be a great time saver for MCPS staff. Data input and editing to put together the bulletin that used to take weeks now take just days. In fact, a 50 percent reduction in production time for the course bulletin is estimated for the first year, with even greater reductions expected in subsequent years.

The new High School Course Bulletin (2005-2006) can be found at the link below. Non-interactive PDF versions for this year and last year are available on the new Planning Tools page of the course bulletin web site. Print copies continue to be available at each high school.