Understanding your course codes

High school course codes. 

These may be difficult to understand because of the various letters and codes used to identify your courses.

The 6 characters

A course code has 6 characters that describes the subject, grade/level, course type/ pathway, and program of a course.

For example  ENG3C1

The first 3 characters

The first character tells the area of study.

A - Arts

B - Business

C - Canadian and World Studies

E - English

F - French

G - Guidance and Career Education

H - Humanities and Social Sciences

I  - Interdisciplinary Studies

K - Alternative Non Credit Courses

L - Classic and International Languages

M - Mathematics

N - First Nations, Métis and Inuit Studies

P - Physical Education

S - Sciences

T - Technology

From our example ENG3C1 has a first letter E so this tells us it's an English course. The second and third letters tell you what related content is offered in the course.

The fourth character

This is used to identify the grade level.

1 - Grade 9

2 - Grade 10

3 - Grade 11

4 - Grade 12

In our example ENG3C1 the fourth character is a 3. This tells us it's a Grade 11 course.

The fifth character

This is used to identify the type of course.

C - College

D -  Academic

E - Workplace

L - Locally Developed

M - College/ University

O - Open

U - University

N - Non-Credit

W - Destreamed

Grades 9 and 10 use three codes: D, L, and O

Grades 11 and 12 use five codes: C, E,  M, O, and U.

In our example ENG3C1 the fifth character is a C. This tells us it's a College course.

The sixth character

This will be either a letter or a number. It can tell the credit value, the delivery method, or it may be used to differentiate between courses with similar codes. This character is board specific so check with your school to find out what it means.