Byline: Norman Draper; Staff Writer
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You've probably heard about all the education choices available in the Twin Cities. There are private and parochial schools, open-enrollment options that allow you to enroll your kids in another district, and an abundance of school choices within your own district.
Deadlines to apply for many such choices fall in the early months of 2002. But there are other choices, as well, particularly for high school students: opportunities to do something completely different within your own school.
Most high schools offer advanced-placement courses that allow students to enroll in courses that are tougher than the regular offerings. A smattering of districts - Minneapolis, St. Paul and Robbinsdale among them - offer a program called International Baccalaureate (IB), which is almost a school within a school, combining lots of homework and a challenging course of study common to IB programs worldwide.
Many high schools now offer college courses either at their own schools or at local colleges under Minnesota's Post-Secondary Options Program. The courses are free.
State law also allows students to earn college credits by taking vocational courses at technical colleges as long as they're earning college credits.
'I sure wish I was in high school now rather than the time I was in high school [about 27 years ago], because choices were not offered to students [back then],' said Kathy Funston, secondary-curriculum coordinator for Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan schools. 'When I was in school, they had pretty much the core curriculum, and some accelerated courses, and advanced-placement courses and some electives, but not the wide variety of electives that there are now. Now kids have a huge array of courses they can choose from, going to all kinds of accelerated levels.'
Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan high schools, for example, offer a program for juniors and seniors called Mentor, allowing them to explore career possibilities outside their schools. The kids come up with the ideas for what they want to do and submit them to the schools' Mentor coordinators. The ideas might need to be accompanied by teacher recommendations or portfolios of their work, but even students with mediocre grades can get in the program.
'It could be a `C' student who is fabulous in graphic arts, but just isn't plugged into school,' Funston said. 'We have students who are working with doctors at the University of Minnesota on brain research, we have students in physical therapy, we have students who want to be teachers.'
Fifth- through 12th-graders also can take an accelerated math program called the University of Minnesota Talented Youth Mathematics Program. And there are elective courses such as debate, ceramics, video broadcasting, marketing and personal money management, all new since Funston went to school.
A student's access to special courses can depend on the school they attend. For example, some schools allow any student to apply for the Post-Secondary Options Program, while others have academic requirements. And the college must approve the student's admission. Advanced-placement courses are fixtures at Twin Cities high schools, although the number of offerings might vary from school to school and from year to year, depending on demand. At Chaska High School, there are 10 advanced-placement offerings this year in such courses as history, science, English, German and art. Such courses are open to anyone who wants to take them, said program coordinator Krista Hammann. Other schools - Armstrong High in Plymouth, for instance - require teacher recommendations for most advanced-placement classes.
Irondale High School in New Brighton offers an independent-study option to juniors and seniors who are doing well in their studies. Irondale Principal Colleen Wambach said the program is intended to offer students a class that might interest them, but which they might have been unable to squeeze into their schedules.
'The point is, there are some options for kids when they think things aren't going to fit to flex things up a little bit,' Wambach said. Irondale also offers 'college in the schools' courses in literature and composition. Such courses are good for college credits at the University of Minnesota.
At St. Paul's Como Park High School, students can enroll in the Information Technology Academy. It offers technology-based learning aimed at students who prefer to take their lessons by computers rather than in regular classrooms.
In Minneapolis, high school choices are expanding next year with the addition of small learning communities that will emphasize particular subject areas. Students will be required to choose one of the areas.
Washburn High, for example, will stress business, liberal arts, health and human sciences, and engineering, design and aviation. Henry will have the International Baccalaureate program, engineering and a commercial/fine arts emphasis. South will retain its highly regarded liberal arts program and its choice-driven Open program. Southwest keeps its own International Baccalaureate program.
There are academic requirements for some of the programs such as the International Baccalaureate programs and liberal arts program at South, and others are limited to students in the high school attendance areas.
- Norman Draper is at ndraper@startribune.com.
