Increasing Access to Advanced Coursework
Research finds that students who enroll in and complete advanced coursework are more likely to be ready for post-secondary education than students who don’t, which is why BEST NC has consistently supported an automatic placement policy for advanced math. State policy, first passed in 2018 and updated in 2019, guarantees that students who score at the highest level on End-of-Grade or End-of-Course tests in grades 3 and above have access to advanced learning opportunities or advanced math courses the following year.
In 2025, the General Assembly expanded this nation-leading policy to include English Language Arts, guaranteeing the same automatic enrollment for the state’s highest-performing readers and writers beginning with the 2025-26 school year.
Automatic Enrollment in Advanced Math Coursework is Making a Difference for North Carolina's Students – What's Next?
Research finds that students who complete a high school level math course in 8th grade are significantly more likely to be prepared for and experience post-secondary success; while students who do not complete a high school level math in 8th grade are less likely to graduate from high school and matriculate into post-secondary education.
BEST NC, in partnership with the Collaborative for Student Success (CSS), interviewed stakeholders, educators, and legislators from across the state about the adoption, immediate successes, and hopes for the future of the North Carolina’s nation-leading advanced math auto-enrollment policy.
Research also suggests – and BEST NC agrees – that this strategy can be successfully applied to more subjects than just math, like science. BEST NC will continue to promote and support research and legislation engineered to increase student access to advanced coursework.
Access to Rigor = Opportunity to Grow
Prior to passing legislation, enrollment in advanced coursework was primarily driven by teacher recommendation instead of student performance. Meaning well, some students would not receive a recommendation for placement in an advanced math course the following year. These decisions would often rely on misconceptions about how students respond to increasingly difficult coursework.
However, Research finds that a more challenging course of study actually leads to more long-term success for students, contrary to rhetoric suggesting students may not be “up for” the challenge. A 2006 study tracked the academic performance of students with similar math abilities and found that student who were placed in more difficult math courses in middle school were much more likely to successfully complete college-prep level math courses in high school than their peers.
In 2018, BEST NC’s research and support led to House Bill 986, establishing North Carolina’s first automatic enrollment policy. This groundbreaking policy required that any student scoring at the highest level on a mathematics end-of-grade or end-of-course test be placed into the next advanced math course, removable only with a parent’s written consent. The following year, Senate Bill 500 extended that guarantee down into grades three through five through advanced learning opportunities, formalized the pathway into high school-level math for qualifying eighth graders, and added annual legislative reporting on which eligible students were and weren’t placed.
I am particularly grateful for BEST NC’s work on automatically enrolling students into advanced math courses. Because of the work of BEST NC, that promising reform is now spreading nationwide.
Mike Petrilli
President
Thomas B. Fordham Institute
We’re going to see a workforce where kids are going to be more qualified to do the jobs of the future.
Representative Ed Hanes, Jr. (D)
NC House District 72 (2013-2018)
North Carolina General Assembly
A lot of people look at this bill as something that’s just common sense that should be done for everybody. Nobody should be excluded. This is the absolute best piece of legislation I’ve done.
Representative Chris Malone (R)
NC House District 35 (2013-2018)
North Carolina General Assembly
Identifying Gaps in Compliance
Not every student in every North Carolina district has been given access to the advanced coursework they are guaranteed via the state’s auto-enrollment policy. Explore the heat map below to learn what percent of eligible students are being placed in advanced coursework in each district.
Expanding Access to Advanced Coursework to Include English Language Arts
Expanding a policy that previously applied only to mathematics, students who score at the highest level on English Language Arts (ELA) assessments will now be automatically enrolled in advanced coursework the next year. North Carolina was the first state in the nation to implement automatic enrollment for advanced math coursework and is now the first state to expand this policy to ELA.
The expansion originated in Senate Bill 507, “Auto Enrollment in Advanced ELA Courses,” and was carried forward in the 2026-27 state budget signed by Governor Josh Stein on July 7, 2026. It applies beginning with the 2025-26 school year.
This mirrors findings from other states. A 2025 peer-reviewed study published in the American Educational Research Journal examined a similar automatic enrollment policy in the state of Washington and found that advanced ELA enrollment increased meaningfully for historically underrepresented students, with no significant harm to GPAs or graduation rates.
Legislation
Session Law 2025 Senate Bill 507
RESOURCE LIBRARY
Related Resources & Programs
Select one of the options below to learn more about that aspect of our work.
Legislation
Session Law 2025 Senate Bill 507
Legislation
Session Law 2019-120 Senate Bill 500
Legislation
Session Law 2018-32 House Bill 986
Agency or Organization
The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction (NC DPI)