college preparatory curriculum that includes several mandatory classes for graduation. This includes 4 years of English, 4 years of social studies, 3 years of a foreign language, 3 years of math, 3 years of science (Earth Science is taken prior to high school in 8th grade at Pelham Middle School, and Living Environment and Chemistry are required classes), and one art or music class in order to qualify for an Advanced Designation Regents Diploma, as opposed to a Regents Diploma. Health must be taken for one semester and physical education must be taken for all 4 years. Pelham currently offers 18 Advanced Placement courses, with the intention of adding more as the budget allows. Among the courses offered are AP Art History, AP Art, AP European History, AP US Government and Politics, AP Statistics, AP Calculus AB, AP Calculus BC, AP Psychology, AP World History, AP US History, AP Latin, AP Spanish, AP French, AP Music Theory, AP Biology, AP Environmental Science, AP Physics, and AP Chemistry. However, most of these classes are only available to juniors and seniors. Also, as AP Chemistry has a reputation in the school for being the most difficult class at Pelham, it is only offered once every two years due to the lack of students willing to take it. The Social Studies Department provides courses which follow the New York State Core Curriculum. Students are provided an honors program which includes four Advanced Placement courses and multiple Syracuse University Project Advance courses, in addition to regents courses. At the culmination of the two-year Global History and Geography Courses the respective regents exam is taken, typically in tenth grade. The United States History and Government regents exam is typically administered in 11th grade. For students taking AP United States History, a concurrent Political Process Seminar is given in podcast form to satisfy the government requirement for graduation. Otherwise, students may take any of the Participation in Government, American Law, Criminal Justice, Sociology, or Politics and Public Policy courses as a senior to complete the requirement. AP European History and AP U.S. Government and Politics are also available to seniors. Students enrolled in AP European History complete their state economics requirement by enrolling in an Economics Seminar course. Otherwise an Economics course can be taken as a senior. In grades nine and ten, students can take either regents or honors English courses. As of the 2015–16