Skyline High School: Two Pluses and a Wish

When my children were in their middle elementary years, they had a teacher who would have students read and evaluate other students' projects. In their evaluations, they were asked to write down "two pluses" (things they liked about the report), and "a wish" (something they wish the student had done better).

A typical comment on a project might be:

Plus: I liked the pictures in your report.
Plus: I liked hearing the music they play in that country.
Wish: I wish you would speak louder when talking to the group.

Since I have a recent graduate of Skyline, many people have asked me what I thought of the experience, and I think that "two pluses and a wish" is a good format for me.  The pluses are really strong, and the wish might be even stronger.

Plus: On balance, the teachers and extracurricular staff were truly excellent. I don't mean to say that there was never a poor teacher (of course there were a few), but in general the level of teaching was fantastic and the teachers were not burned out. The same was true of the people who worked with my daughter on extracurricular activities. THANK YOU, teachers and staff!

Plus: Mastery learning. Although it's not always been implemented all that well, I think having a goal of every student mastering material, and grading them for mastery, is fantastic. Keep working to improve this.

Wish: I wish, I wish, with all my heart that the school would drop the trimester system. I've written about this before, but at this point I could add some more reasons:

• Teachers report to me that when students get behind, it is harder for them to catch up because the pace has to be faster.
• It causes many more conflicts between classes. As a student moves into their junior and senior years, it is much more likely they will have to choose between AP Biology and Orchestra.
• If you want to take band, orchestra, or choir, you end up needing to use 50% more credits.
• It makes dual-enrolling at Community, taking a CR class, or taking a class at Pioneer or Huron much more difficult. (Even if you can get to the other school, it's likely the timing won't work out.)
• Most students end up taking math over three terms instead of two, so they end up using 50% more credits on math too. This reduces the number of electives they can use.
• Many of the AP classes end up being three trimesters instead of two. Again, this ends up eating up elective credits.

In my dream world, at lunchtime, there would be a bus allowing students to switch schools to take that German or Mandarin class, that Physics or higher-level math class that can only be offered at a single school. But even if we don't get the bus, can we at least offer students who can figure out how to work things out the opportunity to make sure that the schools are on the same, semester-long, system? That's my wish.