What Are A-G and CC Courses? A High School Counselor Breaks Down What Parents Need To Know
Last Tuesday, I sat across from Maria and her 10th-grade son Javi in my high school counseling office at 4:15, the room still smelling like the microwave popcorn I’d burned at lunch. Maria leaned forward, crumpled Javi’s transcript in one hand, her chipped nail polish picked raw at the edges, and said exactly what I hear at least twice a week: “We just got this email saying he doesn’t have the right A-G and CC courses for San Diego State. What does that even mean? We thought all his classes counted.”
Javi slouched in his chair, hood up, staring at a black scuff on the toe of his sneaker. He’d taken Photography 1 to fill his art credit, and his part-time freshman advisor had signed off on it, saying it checked all the boxes. I pulled up the official UC A-G course portal for our school, and there it was: the Photography 1 Javi took was listed as a general elective art class, no CC course code attached. The only approved art class that counts for A-G is “Photography 1 (College Prep)” – almost the same curriculum, it just went through UC’s approval process to earn its 4-digit CC code. That one tiny difference was enough to leave Javi short the visual and performing arts credit he needs for California State University admission.
The day before this meeting, I’d sat with a dad who pulled his 9th-grade daughter out of all CC courses last semester because he thought “CC” stood for community college, and he didn’t want her starting at a community college before she even finished high school. That’s the thing about these two terms: most parents don’t know what they mean until there’s a problem. The system is full of unhelpful acronyms, and most high schools don’t send a plain-English explanation home when your kid starts freshman year.
To put it simply: A-G is the set of 15 required classes that the UC and CSU systems require for freshman admission, broken into seven subject areas labeled A through G (A for history/social science, B for English, and so on). CC courses are just the specific classes at your high school that UC has reviewed and approved to meet those A-G requirements. Each approved course gets a unique CC course code, so that’s why people shorten them to CC courses. It’s not about whether a class is “honors level” or harder than other classes – it’s just about whether it’s officially approved to count toward admission requirements.
This isn’t just a problem for families targeting California public schools, either. Most private colleges and out-of-state public schools now use the A-G course pattern as a baseline to check that a student is ready for college-level work. Even if your kid isn’t 100% sure what they want to do after graduation, staying on track with approved A-G CC courses keeps all their options open.
From all the meetings I’ve had over the last three years, there are a few small, concrete things parents can do to avoid last-minute panic. The first is to take 15 minutes once a semester, after your kid gets their schedule, and cross-check every class against the official UC A-G course list. Don’t just rely on your school’s paper course catalog or what a new part-time advisor says. The official list is free to access on the UC website, you just search for your high school, and every approved CC course is listed right there with its A-G subject. I’ve seen so many mix-ups where the school’s catalog has the wrong course name, or a new teacher didn’t get approval for a new class before registration opened. This 15-minute check catches 90% of problems early.
Second, if you find a mistake, fix it as soon as possible. If it’s the first month of the semester, most schools will let you switch to the approved CC section with no extra penalties. If it’s mid-semester, ask your counselor if the school can petition UC to approve the course retroactively. I’ve had that work three times in the last two years for 10th and 11th graders. If switching isn’t an option, most requirements can be made up with a single semester of an approved A-G course at a local community college, over the summer or even during the school year. That’s what I would have suggested for Javi if switching didn’t work, and it’s a totally valid fix that all UC and CSU campuses accept.
Third, if you’re a parent of a senior who just found out they’re short when transcripts are sent, don’t assume it’s over. Call the admissions office at each college your kid applied to, and ask what your options are. Most will give you until the end of senior year to make up a missing credit.
Javi got switched into the after-school section of the approved CC photography class the next day, and he’s making up the first nine weeks of work over spring break. It’s an extra hassle, and he’ll miss a few football practices to get it done, but it’s a small fix that keeps his plan to study graphic design at San Diego State on track.
I got a quick text from Maria this morning, saying Javi turned in his first make-up photo assignment, and he already asked about registering for the CC-approved Photography 2 next year. I have two more meetings about A-G and CC confusion scheduled for this afternoon, and I know at least one of the parents will leave still a little overwhelmed, because the system isn’t designed to be easy. It’s full of weird acronyms and last-minute approval changes, and nobody sends that step-by-step explanation home when your kid walks into freshman year. But it doesn’t take hours of work to stay on top of it. 15 minutes once a semester is most of the job, and most problems are fixable if you catch them early enough.
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