On June 26, 2020, Governor Murphy signed into law P.L. 2020 c. 41 establishing the Bridge Year Pilot Program (Bridge Year). The purpose of this program is to provide students in the graduating classes of 2021 and 2022 with the opportunity to offset disruptions to learning opportunities and participation in extracurricular activities that might have resulted from the closure of schools to in-person instruction in Spring 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Under the Bridge Year, certain students in the classes of 2021 or 2022 who have met all their state and local graduation requirements may defer graduation from high school for one year to participate in an additional year of academic courses and extracurricular activities immediately following their senior year. This additional year will be known as the “bridge year.” During the student’s bridge year, the student must remain enrolled in the high school they attended as a junior (host high school).
Bridge Year sets forth a series of academic and extracurricular requirements and opportunities for participating students. In each semester of the bridge year, participating students must take between nine and 12 credits. During the fall semester, those credits may be host high school credits, credits from the county college of the county in which the host high school is located, or a combination thereof. In the spring semester, participating students must receive all credits from the county college of the county in which the host high school is located. However, during either semester, participating students may also take up to three credits offered by a four-year institution of higher education at any high school in the State or at any other location to fulfill the student’s credit requirement. Under the law, public institutions of higher education are required to accept all applicable credits that a student who completes Bridge Year earned during their bridge year.
Participating students may also participate in extracurricular activities at their host high school, including a spring sport sanctioned by the New Jersey Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA). The law prohibits Bridge Year students from participating in any fall or winter sports sanctioned by the NJSIAA. Bridge Year students participating in extracurricular activities must pay applicable student athletics and activities fees and are subject to the host high school’s student code of conduct, athletic code of conduct, and any other applicable codes, rules, or policies that other students participating in the spring sport or extracurricular activity are required to follow. Bridge Year requirements do not supersede the governance or eligibility rules that are applicable to that activity established by a local, state, or national organization with bona fide authority over a particular extracurricular activity.
Parents must notify their school counselor of their intent to participate by February 15th of their senior year.
To be eligible to participate in Bridge Year, a student must:
• Be in the graduating classes of 2021 or 2022;
• Meet all applicable high school graduation requirements by the end of their senior year of high school;
• Be 19 years old or younger during the entirety of the bridge year; a student that would turn 20 years old before the end of their bridge year is not eligible to participate. o Exception: A student with disabilities is eligible to participate if the student will turn 20 years old during the bridge year due to services provided under the student’s IEP.
• Maintain a grade point average of 2.0 during the bridge year.