Elective classes are extremely important in order to provide students a variety and choice in their learning and to help high school students be prepared with needed credits when they leave FWPA. FWPA has had elective classes for only a few grades since 2015 and it was only up until about 2 years ago electives were provided to everyone. Since then, they’ve changed a fair amount over the short time they’ve been around.
In the beginning, we offered a total of 8 elective classes for students to pick between. Each student was required to pick just one to be their 6th period class. There were 4 year-long classes and 4 semester-long classes, with some offering credits for high school graduation. The year-long classes included Personal Finance, AP Human Geography, Environmental Science, and Yearbook. The semester-long classes included Current World Problems, Speech and Debate, Musical Theater, and Health. Since the semester-long classes lasted just half the year, at the end of the first semester, students picked a different class.
Over the past couple years, some classes have changed. For starters, Personal Finance is no longer a year-long class and is now only a semester long. This choice was made since the contents didn’t require a whole year to teach. Next, AP Human Geography was removed. Speech and Debate was once taught by Ms. Paris, but with there needing to be more math classes, Mr Young, the former AP Human Geography teacher, took her place. Another elective that experienced a teacher change was Musical Theater. The former teacher Mr. Olsen left FWPA and Mr. Roberts took his place.
There were also some elective classes that were dependent on things like grade level and weren’t even assigned to your 6th period. Now the 6th graders are given a choice between two elective classes for their 6th period as they weren’t allowed to pick any of the others. Two years ago, they were given the choice between Robotics and Life Skills both being a semester long, so every 6th grader ended up being taught both. One of these classes has changed in the last 2 years. The change being that they replaced Life Skills with Service Learning. Other than that, they didn’t really change the 6th graders electives this year. Now there are actually electives that aren’t assigned to your 6th period. The incoming 8th graders two years ago had just finished Spanish 1A so they all took Spanish 1B. However, going into their 9th grade year they had the choice between Engineering or to continue pursuing Spanish into Spanish 2. Now 8th graders aren’t required to take Spanish 1B, but rather Engineering/Medical Detectives. So now those entering 9th grade had the choice to either take Spanish or Engineering for the rest of their time at FWPA.
On the other hand, 6th graders becoming 7th graders had the choice between two 5th period classes, those being either Engineering/Computer App or Art class. This was quite the change as previous years had 7th graders take Spanish 1A then 1B the next year. However the principal at the time didn’t like this as each year only gave half a language credit so it was changed to this format. Now, these classes have changed a good bit. Incoming 7th graders have to take Art and no longer have a choice.
Now you know how electives were in the past and how they are now. But what about the future? Mrs. Thornton, our principal, gave us a few words on the future of elective classes. Things like any new classes or the removal of any classes is still up in the air, however one thing that’s certain is the number of electives as she states, ”The number of elective classes will always be predictable thanks to our size, number of teachers, and number of periods.” In terms of the number of elective classes, it’ll probably stay the same so expect about 7 or 8. As for what electives there may be, Mrs. Thornton states, ”Me and Mrs. Rangeloff are still discussing what worked and what may need to change in order to provide FWPA students with what they need when they leave 10th grade.” In other words, what electives there may be is still uncertain and is mostly centered around what’ll provide students as many credits as possible for graduation.
Electives are things that our principal and counselor try their best to make as good as possible so that we can have a variety of classes as well as the credits we need for graduation. But of course, due to the many changes in principals in the last couple years, electives have changed and will probably continue to change thanks to Mrs. Thornton and Mrs. Rangeloff’s plans.
Picture Caption: The health class walking outside and talking. Mr. Luong wants to make sure that the Health students stay active so for the first 15 minutes of class or so he’ll have them either walking outside or doing yoga. A few health students were surveyed and stated how they joined health class hoping to learn healthy habits and that they enjoy how Mr. Luong keeps them active. “I would recommend health class to others as it teaches you things about your own health that you wouldn’t have known.” -Arshdeep Sandhu, one of the surveyed health students.
