| What
will sports and extra-curricular activities
look like?
Crater extra-curricular activities like
athletics, music and drama and to traditional
high school events like the prom and graduation
will almost certainly continue to look
much like they do now. Rest assured we
are well aware that Crater High School
is the central unifying aspect of our
community, and we do not want to lose
any of the rich Crater traditions. While
we want our 4-6 small schools to have
their own identities, we will still have
campus-wide events like the prom and graduation
and Crater Comet athletic events. The
goal is not to break up Crater but to
break up a very large group of students
working with a large number of teachers.
Too many kids get lost in our current
system; we want to develop schools where
all students are nurtured and have success.
Will I have to choose a school
before 9th grade and stay in it all 4
years? What happens if it’s a bad
fit?
As to students being able to switch schools,
we are only beginning to talk about this,
but our initial thinking is that we need
to have an avenue for kids to change schools,
and we need to develop a process for this.
Regardless, we believe that it will need
to be done on a case-by-case fashion.
In visiting with other schools who have
gone to a small school format, we know
that, after a rather short period of time,
most students don’t want to leave
their schools because of the close and
positive relationships they have developed
with other students and their teachers.
What if I don’t want to
decide to have a certain career in 9th
grade?
First, as to students picking a school
too early, every school will be responsible
for an agreed upon set of core standards
and expectations which will fully comply
with Oregon high school graduation requirements.
The schools will not be designed as career
track schools. If we chose to have themed
schools, say like our current School of
Business, the intent is for them to be
very broad so they appeal to a large group.
Our idea is to make education more relevant
to our students and not, as you put, to
pigeonhole them.
What if I never see my friends?
Even if you are in a different school
from your friends, there will be many
opportunities to still interact with them
including lunch, dances, games and before
and after school. In visiting with other
schools who have gone to a small school
format, we know that, after a rather short
period of time, most students don’t
want to leave their schools because of
the close and positive relationships they
have developed with other students and
their teachers. Not only will you have
the opportunity to maintain your current
friendships, this will be a chance to
make many new close friends!
Will there be competition between
schools?
Hopefully no more than there is currently
between the TIESS programs or the the
Social Service School and the School of
Business or between freshmen and sophomores
or juniors and seniors. We're all still
part of Crater.
Why are we waiting 2 years to
start this?
It's big! It's going to take a tremendous
amount of planning and work to make this
happen.
What happens if I’m a sophomore
now, and we make the switch my senior
year?
We hope our sophomores will be the leaders
in this change. If you think about it,
if we go to five small schools we will
need five times the numbers of student
leaders we have now. Our current sophomores
have a chance to lead something very exciting.
Why should Crater convert entirely
to small schools?
We want to build on the success of the
Crater schools-within-a-school and the
district middle school teams. We pioneered
these three schools at Crater and have
a lot of graduates who did very well in
this setting. Even more than that, research
shows that smaller school units enjoy
a higher attendance and graduation rate
and more students go on to some form of
post secondary education than do students
in a general comprehensive high school
setting. Likewise, smaller schools have
fewer disciplinary referrals and higher
academic achievement. Finally, these smaller
schools experience strong parent and community
support.
If you are going to have
4-6 smaller schools, are you going to
physically divide the school in some way
so each school has some sense of physical
autonomy?
It would be best to have students of
a particular school in a central location.
The grant does not pay for any capital
improvements, so that will be a limiting
factor. Most small schools do not share
a common schedule other than starting
and ending times and usually lunch time.
This flexibility of schedule will provide
an additional element of autonomy for
the schools.
How many small schools will
there be and how many students do you
anticipate being in each school?
A fundamental grant requirement is that
a school can not be larger than 400 students,
so with our current enrollment of approximately
1500, we will be looking at 4-6 schools,
all of which will be determined this year
and developed during the 2006-2007 school
year.
Will moving to separate schools
be the the end of advanced and college
prep classes offered at Crater?
Because our goal is enroll more students
in challenging and advanced classes, we
believe that by moving to smaller separate
schools, we can achieve this. Research
shows that all students, even academically
challenged ones, perform better and learn
more in advanced type classes. |
