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School District

Dear Editor,

I have recently become aware of the conversation about cutting Honors and AP courses from outlying high schools in Warren County, and the potential plan to offer these courses at a central location. I wanted to bring to your attention the way that the Honors and AP courses that I took at Eisenhower High School greatly improved my academic ability as a student and the impact that they had on preparing me for college. Also, I would like to make you aware of how the change would negatively affect the Honors and AP program from a student’s perspective.

I experienced a great change in my academic ability due to the challenge of AP and Honors classes that I took at Eisenhower. A specific example of this is the way that my writing and literature analysis ability greatly improved from my first year of Honors English in tenth grade, through the program to AP English in twelfth grade. At the beginning of tenth grade, I was receiving poor grades on nearly all my assignments. By twelfth grade, I was able to get an A in the AP class due to the all-around improvement of my abilities in English. The transformation I experienced took hard work but was more to the credit of the material learned in the class along with close support and help from my teachers.

The honors and AP classes that I took in high school played the most significant impact in preparing me for furthering my education at the collegiate level. The fast pace of advanced material taught me important education skills such as working hard, seeking teacher assistance, time management, and how to learn as a student most efficiently. When entering college, I found myself noticeably ahead of other peers in all those areas which I believe is due to my prior experience practicing those things in high school. Also, the college credits that I received in high school were a great savings to me in college. The college credits that I received through the Pitt Bradford College in High School Program at EHS that transferred in place of a college class have saved me over six hundred dollars per course.

The material is designed to be a challenge for students, and often I sought out of class help from teachers to improve upon my personal skills through their close examination of my work. Having the Honors and AP classes at a different location than student’s schools would prevent them from being able to seek much-needed teacher assistance outside of class. Not only did working alongside teachers help me to succeed, but also the smaller class sizes caused the students to be a tight knit group that helped one another understand the challenging material through class discussion. Having the schools combine for these courses would prevent the small class environment, making it harder for students to support one another in learning.

While the combined classes would affect the education of students directly in the classroom, it would also impact their lives outside of the classroom. The time that the bus ride to the central location would take out of their days would prevent them from having the time for much-needed study halls. Along with Honors and AP classes comes a substantial homework load that study halls assist students in completing with peer assistance. Study halls are also a critical homework time for students who are involved in extracurricular activities that limit the time they have for homework during after school hours. Preventing students from having the time for study halls would drastically affect their performance in these courses in a negative way.

The Honors and AP classes that were offered at EHS, the high school I attended, increased my academic ability greatly as a student. The courses that I took played a large part in teaching me how to work hard, seek teacher assistance, manage my time, and efficiently learn. Much of my current college success is because of what I learned in high school by working closely alongside my peers and with my teachers to better myself academically. Due to the great impact that the Honors and AP experience had on my life academically for my future, I want to stress the importance of continuing to give current students the same chance for academic success that I received in high school.

Grant Venman,

Russell,

Eisenhower 2016 graduate

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