Friday, April 30, 2010
By Abby Watkins
Staff Writer
The English Department changed the process by which students are accepted into the accelerated and honors English programs by requiring an additional essay.
In previous years, students’ eligibility for the honors program was determined by their English grade for both semesters that year, a teacher evaluation score from their current English teacher, and their English Standardized Testing and Reporting score from the year before.
This year, students came to school on Saturday, April 10, for a timed-writing that will be used to gauge their readiness for accelerated or honors English, in addition to previous criteria.
“Adding this additional component will better assess students’ readiness for the honors level,” English Department co-chair Pam Jenning said. “It’s difficult to see how strong of an English student you really are unless we have an actual sample of your writing.”
English teachers who currently instruct accelerated or honors courses proctored the hour-long essay. The English Department hoped that having students write their essays outside of the school day would ensure that everybody had a similar environment in which to work.
“I think that the essay kind of evened the playing field by having everybody in the same situation. And, you get the experience of seeing what some of the accelerated teachers are like. It was an overall preview of what next year might be like,” freshman Nick DiNiro said.
Essays were graded at least twice by honors English teachers to further establish fairness in assessment and grading.
“By strengthening the screening process, we can give students another way to demonstrate their skills,” Jenning said.
“We want to make sure that everybody has the same opportunity to show that they are capable of being in a more advanced class. The essay can help us evaluate that,” Jenning said.
All students looking to enter the honors program, including current eighth graders and all freshmen, were required to write the essay. Even freshmen currently enrolled in the freshman accelerated English course were required to write the essay.
“Considering that I was already a part of the [freshman English] accelerated program this year, I didn’t think it was fair that I had to come in on a Saturday and write an essay,” freshman Axel Zwissler said. “We’ve already established that we can handle an accelerated course. I don’t think that we need to prove it again.”
Though some students did not look favorably upon the additional essay, others thought that it would be valuable to the process and strengthen the overall quality of their appilcations.
“With the other considerations like the teacher recommendation and the STAR scores, I think it was a fair assessment,” freshman Jason Kim said. “Even if you’re not necessarily the strongest essay writer, there will still be many other ways by which they judge you, and vice versa.”
The English Department hopes that by expanding the application process, they can ensure that students are given the fairest chance possible to get into the higher-level programs.
“We review the honors screening process just like we would any other part of the department, such as curriculum,” Jenning said.
“As a department, we’re always reviewing everything we do in order to further develop the English classes and make them the best for the students and teachers,” Jenning said.
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