Theology
The Theology department, at Garces Memorial High School has made great strides in moving toward a curriculum which is aligned with both the National Standards and Benchmarks for Catholic secondary schools and the framework developed by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Our curriculum begins with students in grade 9 studying Faith and Revelation and Theology of the Body, and continuing in grade 10 with the study of the Old and New Testament. In grade 11, students study the History of the Church and will next year, begin their second semester with a study of the Sacraments. We made the decision, this year, to drop the study of World Religions from our Theology Department and move it to the Social Studies department and extend it to a yearlong course. Students may opt to enroll in the year- long class as an elective for University and Cal State University credit but the class will not count toward the four-year Theology requirement for graduation. In their senior year, our students will study, in the college preparatory classes, Ethics/Catholic Morality and Catholic Social Teachings and the honors curriculum will include Ethics/Catholic Morality and Philosophy of Man. We have transitioned to using the Didache series with additional support materials for each class level.