The State Department of Education holds a series of meetings throughout the state this week to discuss the proposed changes to Missouri’s minimum high school graduation requirements. Stan Johnson, the Department’s Assistant Commissioner for School Improvement, says the public meetings will be an opportunity to provide information and to get feedback. The main ingredients of the proposed changes are increasing minimum graduate requirements to 24 units of credit, developing a new”exit test” to replace the current high school MAP eams, and adopting a two-tiered diploma for public high schools to highlight accomplishments above the standard requirement. The first meeting is this afternoon in St. Louis. The tenth and final meeting is Thursday in Warrensburg.