(a) For purposes of Sections 51.803 and 51.804 only, the governing body of a school district may treat a high school magnet program, academy, or other special program conducted by the school district at a high school attended by high school students who are not students of the special program as an independent high school with its own graduating class separate from the graduating class of other students attending the high school if:
(1) the special program was in operation in the 2000-2001 school year;
(2) the students of the special program are recruited, selected, or admitted from among the students residing in the attendance zones of not fewer than 10 regular high schools in the district, including the high school at which the special program is conducted;
(3) the students of the special program are selected or admitted independently of and identified as a student body separate from the other students of the high school;
(4) the students of the special program constitute not less than 35 percent of the total number of students in the graduating class at the high school at which the special program is conducted;
(5) the students of the special program have a curriculum different from that of the other students of the high school, even if students of the special program and other students of the high school attend some of the same classes; and
(6) a student graduating from the special program receives a high school diploma that includes a reference to the special program in describing the high school from which the student graduated.
(b) This section does not apply to the manner in which the members of a graduating class of the high school as a whole, including graduates of the special program, are ranked by grade point average for purposes other than admissions under Sections 51.803 and 51.804.