Regents Examinations

In New York State, Regents Examinations are statewide standardized examinations in core high school subjects required for a Regents Diploma to graduate. Regents diplomas are optional and typically offered for college-bound and non-disabled students. Most students, with some limited exceptions, are required to take the Regents Examinations. To graduate, students are required to have earned appropriate credits in a number of specific subjects by passing year-long or half-year courses, after which they must pass Regents examinations in some of the subject areas. For higher achieving students, a Regents with Advanced designation, and an Honor designation, are also offered.

The Regents Examinations are developed and administered by the New York State Education Department (NYSED) under the authority of the Board of Regents of the University of the State of New York. Regents exams are prepared by a conference of selected New York teachers of each test's specific discipline who assemble a test map that highlights the skills and knowledge required from the specific discipline's learning standards. The conferences meet and design the tests three years before the tests' issuance, which includes time for field testing and evaluating testing questions.

NYSED also sometimes refers to elementary and intermediate grade statewide standardized tests as Regents Examinations.

"At the close of each academic term, a public examination shall be held of all scholars presumed to have completed preliminary studies…To each scholar who sustains such examination, a certificate shall entitle the other person holding it to admission into the academic class in any academy subject to the visitation of the Regents, without further examination."

The legislature’s intent in establishing the Regents Examination system is described in the ordinance. The central idea of the legislation was to create an educational control system that could be used to regulate the flow of funds to the well established academy system of schools that existed throughout the state of New York. This goal would be accomplished by:

The new class of students would be called the “academic class,” and those students who qualified for admission to it by sustaining a process of examination would be known as “academic scholars.” Academic scholars, and the institutions with which they were affiliated, would receive recognition and privilege under New York’s school funding formula.

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