New diploma seals require 75 to 650 hours of work experience
Indiana approved sweeping changes to its high school requirements in 2024, and starting with the class of 2029 all Indiana students will have the opportunity to add stackable endorsements to their diplomas — the state calls these “seals” — showing readiness for a certain path after high school, whether that is college, public service or employment. Depending on the seal, students could be required to complete anywhere from 75 to 650 hours of work experience, from an internship of a few hours a week to a rigidly structured apprenticeship.
At Providence Cristo Rey, a Catholic school on the south side of Indianapolis that exclusively serves low-income families, every student is placed into an internship worked one day a week during school hours. Suriah Pinner, a 17-year-old junior, takes a bus each Tuesday to Carmel, where she works about six hours in the accounting department at Integrity Fiber, a paper and recycling company. Accounting is not her goal — she wants to attend medical school and become a general surgeon — but she said the placement broadened her view. “Now I get to see a different range of options, and really weigh what’s good for me and what’s not,” Pinner said.
State officials say the changes make it possible for more schools to think creatively about what a student’s success could look like and shift resources to accommodate them. Paul Ketcham, Indiana’s assistant secretary of education, told Mirror Indy in September that the new diplomas are meant to unlock programs that school schedules previously blocked. “What diplomas now do is signal to the field, ‘It’s OK to think outside the box. It’s OK to be creative. It’s OK to be bold and take chances because we want you to give kids opportunities,’” Ketcham said.
Students and schools both have incentives attached to the seals. Students who complete the employment honors plus seal, which requires the highest amount of work hours, become eligible for direct admission into union apprenticeships. Students who complete the enrollment honors plus seal must finish at least 75 hours of work experience, often alongside college credit, and are automatically accepted into the state’s public universities, including Purdue and IU. Under the new funding model, schools get $2,495 for each student who completes the highest level of employment or enrollment seal.
Schools that have already implemented these programs could benefit from being ahead. Ketcham told Mirror Indy earlier this year that the state plans to introduce what he called a “lighthouse” model, identifying schools that have successfully offered work-based learning and promoting their tactics statewide. “By finding those lighthouses across the state of Indiana regionally, other schools can beg, borrow, and steal pieces that work for them,” he said.
Part of the state’s goal in requiring more work-based learning is to help students get a head start on pursuing their passions. Some students are already far along the path the seals will formalize. Malak Abo Salha, an 18-year-old Warren Central senior, had been interested in medicine since she was young. When she found out about an opportunity to learn more about healthcare by working in a local optometrist’s office a few hours a week, she jumped at the chance. Since August, she has left school early on Thursday afternoons to work at the eye clinic, helping administer vision tests and eye exams. Preparing to help with an eye exam for the first time was stressful, but it was also exciting, and the experience has only made her more sure that she wants to pursue a career in medicine. “It just shows me how my future is gonna be,” Abo Salha said.
Officials are adamant that work-based learning stay flexible, because not every student falls in love with their placement. That way, students can figure out what they like and don’t like without locking themselves into a path they’ll ultimately hate. At Victory College Prep, a charter school on Indianapolis’ southeast side, all students complete an internship their senior year. The application process starts junior year, and students are matched with a local employer that partners with the school. Staff try to match students to a job that lines up with their interests, but that is not always possible. What often happens, too, is that a student may find they’re not as passionate about a career as they thought — a student may take an internship at a local medical clinic, only to discover they’re scared of needles. Rahul Jyoti, Victory College Prep’s director of readiness, does not view a mismatch as a failure. Instead, he said, it is a low-stakes way to find out what you do and don’t like — and maybe save some time and tuition money down the road. “All of them are going to have a job someday,” Jyoti said. “It’s still a good experience to be at an internship, whether or not it’s perfectly aligned to what you want to do.”
Transportation is the practical constraint. Studies show it is one of the biggest barriers to work experience for high schoolers, many of whom are not old enough to drive or do not have cars. Even when students have their license, having a car of their own is another matter. Providence Cristo Rey and Victory College Prep bus students to their internships. At Warren Central, a large public school, money is tight and the state does not directly fund transportation to jobs and internships, according to Steve Rogers, director of the school’s Walker Career Center. Since January 2023, the center has driven students to off-site internships using a van donated by a local dealership, with funds from the Warren Arts and Education Foundation, a nonprofit that supports the district, paying a driver. Students find their own way home. It is a bit of a scramble to find funding, but providing transportation has made off-site work experiences possible for a lot of students. “Kids getting to the job is the biggest hurdle, so we eliminated that hurdle to get this working,” Rogers said.
Schools also prepare students for the workplace itself. At the southside Catholic school, the wages students earn from working help cover their tuition because Providence Cristo Rey exclusively serves low-income families. New students at Providence Cristo Rey attend a week-and-a-half work bootcamp called Corporate Office Readiness and Enrichment, covering everything from organizing an Outlook calendar to eye contact, handshakes and public speaking, ending with a job fair where students meet employers and put what they’ve learned to the test. Expertise in communication and professionalism are also called soft skills — those skills are generally important to career success, but not taught directly, since it’s assumed people will pick it up through experience. Providence Cristo Rey students can be as young as 14, and for students that age, being taught how to communicate and behave in a professional environment is key, so those skills can develop naturally once they have gotten some experience. Stephanie Hood, director of the school’s corporate work study program, said those soft skills are what differentiate students. “That’s what sets students apart, the soft skills that they learn,” Hood said. “They’re having conversations. They’re seeing how adults interact.”
Just being in that environment can completely change how a student feels about themselves and their future. When Pinner first started working as a first-year student, she was shy and found it hard to talk to her colleagues or speak up in meetings. Three years in, she is far more confident, talking with ease with her mentor and others at work, and she enjoys getting to explore a different side of her personality. “I could be a whole different person at work,” she said. “I could really be the adult I want to be.”
Mirror Indy reporter Carley Lanich contributed to this story. Claire Rafford covers higher education for Mirror Indy in partnership with Open Campus. The story was originally published by Mirror Indy and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.