Senior year is about far more than grades, academics and college applications. Senior year is a time when students bond with one another, and lifetime memories are made. One of the most important of these memorable moments is high school graduation.

However, for senior McCall Coleman, fond memories of graduation among fellow classmates will be absent.

Coleman, whom some of her friends affectionately refer to as a “jeanior” (combination of junior and senior), moved to Briar Woods High School from Texas in late October of 2010. With the transfer mid-year, Coleman fell somewhere between a junior and a senior, due to different credit requirements between her old school, Brandeis High School, and Briar Woods.

Coleman said, "In Texas, I am still considered a junior, but because of the credit difference, I can graduate [this year] here."

She is two credits away from receiving a Basic Diploma, which complicates her situation. To be considered a full-time student, according to discussions Coleman had with Briar Woods High School Guidance and Administration, you must be taking five classes. However, if Coleman were to attend Briar Woods next year, she would only need two classes to fulfill the requirements for a Basic Diploma.

In place of taking superfluous classes, Coleman opted for the dual enrollment program that Loudoun County Public Schools offer. However, this program was not without its own string of complications. Typically, Loudoun County Public School students that are involved in the dual enrollment take their classes at Northern Virginia Community College (NVCC). However, Coleman was unable to enroll in the program with NVCC without significant financial burden, being as she is still considered a resident of Texas and will be until November of 2011. So, in yet another attempt to graduate this year, Coleman registered for online courses through Western Texas College of Snider, TX. Coleman takes two courses, an English course and Government course, to fulfill the necessary senior year requirements for the Basic Diploma.

However, despite all the steps that Coleman has taken to work with Loudoun County’s system to graduate early, she will not be able to walk at graduation on June 18, 2011, with her fellow seniors. Coleman’s final “class” for her online courses is June 28: 10 days after the Briar Woods High School graduation ceremony is scheduled to take place at the Patriot Center. Because she will not be officially finished with her course work until 10 days after the ceremony, Coleman must walk in the supplementary graduation ceremony held in August: a ceremony she may not be able to attend as she will be in the process of moving back to Texas to start college.

"I don’t think it’s fair that I can’t graduate since it’s only 10 days after [the rest of the senior class]," Coleman said.

David Royhab, Guidance Director at Briar Woods, said, "Students who are not scheduled to graduate by the date [of graduation] are not considered seniors. You have to finish graduation requirements by the date of graduation."

Royhab also explained that, though to us graduation may be just a commemorative ceremony, it means more to the school. The information on the numbers of graduates are reported to the state and, for this reason, everyone who walks at graduation must have completed their graduation requirements.

"I would have rather stayed in Texas for junior and senior year and been able to graduate with my friends there than graduate here [in August], not knowing anyone I’ll be graduating with," Coleman said.

Despite Coleman’s wishes, the Loudoun County policy is such that if requirements for graduation are not fulfilled entirely by the date of the ceremony, students will not be able to participate in the ceremony.