High school will
offer 5 'academies'
By Tom Morphet
A revived trades and industry class is one of five academy-style
programs Haines High School will offer next year in an effort to beef up vocational
offerings and engage student interest.
Last offered about 20 years ago, the “T & I”
class will provide students with hands-on experience in home-building by participating in
construction of a small home, to be auctioned off by the district.
The two-hour
class will be taught during all four quarters, and the first-year project is building a
school district garage.
Other enhanced course offerings will include cooking and
advanced cooking, natural resource careers and marine biology, photography and digital
photo editing, and two tiers of computer classes.
“We hope electives that are exciting and more
involved will be attractive to our students,” said superintendent Michael Byer.
The enhanced classes also will run two hours and be
offered in consecutive quarters to create a “pathway” toward work in a given
field. For example, a student would take publications the first quarter and creative
writing the following quarter in a “pathway” toward journalism.
The “pathways” may lead to internships at local
businesses, receipt of professional certifications and greater interest and focus by
students, said high school teacher Lilly Boron. Boron helped hatch the idea and draw up a
school schedule that incorporates the special courses alongside traditional classes.
“The (academy) classes would build in a continuum,
instead of fitting them in wherever we could do them, so there’s an advancement of
skills. The idea is to make classes have a sense of continuity, leading to careers,”
Boron said.
The pathways don’t represent new offerings as much
as they do an improvement on current class offerings, rearranging them in a way that gives
students a sense of focus and direction, Boron said.
The pathways to be offered were chosen because they were
vocational courses the district has been trying to develop into stronger programs, but
with limited personnel, Boron said.
Except for the trades and industry class, tentatively
dubbed “construction,” pathways generally will be offered only one semester each
year, which will allow teachers to also lead required courses and other electives, Boron
said. The two-hour classes, including construction, will be offered immediately before
lunch to ease transition back to the hourly school schedule.
Besides hooking students and beefing up the school’s
vocational component, staff members hope the academy classes will maintain interest in
school for students who meet graduation requirements early in their school careers. In
recent years, some seniors who’ve collected the majority of their required credits
come to school for only a few hours per day.
Fields of study instead of “classes” may be
more appealing to students who have completed required classes, Boron said. “Instead
of looking for a certain class, a student might say, ‘Maybe I’ll try cooking, or
construction, or an apprenticeship.’”
Boron said
the academy schedule lends itself to students serving two-hour “apprenticeships”
at local businesses and workplaces, instead of 50-minute, work experience classes now
offered. Also, different pathways such as medical or nurse training might be developed,
she said. “If we have a system that works, who knows how it will expand and what it
might include?”
