(a) The State Board of Education, in consultation with the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia and the State Board of the Technical College System of Georgia, shall adopt policies and establish guidelines for awarding units of high school credit to students based on a demonstration of subject area competency, instead of or in combination with completion of courses of classroom instruction. Such policies and guidelines shall clearly delineate the manner in which students can earn credit, how mastery of standards will be assessed, how locally developed assessments will be reviewed and approved, how such credit will be recorded on high school transcripts, and when outcomes as a result of these policies and guidelines will be reviewed. The state board shall adopt such policies and establish guidelines, and such policies and guidelines shall be applicable beginning with the 2013-2014 school year.

(b) Students may earn credits through:

(1) The completion of courses; or

(2) The testing out or otherwise demonstrating mastery of the course content.

(c) The state board shall identify assessments, including various commercial assessments, for immediate use for students to demonstrate subject area competency, which may include, but not be limited to:

(1) Advanced placement exams;

(2) ACT course assessment;

(3) Industry-specific certificates and industry credentialing, as defined in Code Section 20-2-326, for career, technical, and agricultural education courses;

(4) College Level Examination Program (CLEP) exams; and

(5) Nationally recognized foreign language performance assessments.

The state board shall establish a process for reviewing and approving performance based assessments developed commercially, by the state, or by a local school system. Initially, the state board shall limit the number of credits earned though such educational options to three credits per student until the practice is proven to yield student outcomes at least equivalent to those found in standard seat-time courses. The policy shall ensure that credit for demonstrated proficiency is reported on student transcripts in the same way that seat-time credit is recorded. The state board shall review such policy after three years to determine if student outcomes from these educational options are equivalent to, if not better than, student outcomes in traditional courses.

(d) Each local school system shall comply with the state board's plan adopted pursuant to this Code section and shall award units of high school credit in accordance with such plan. Local boards of education and charter schools shall establish implementation policies and shall be prohibited from setting policies that negate or otherwise prohibit access to such plan.