As part of an accreditation process for the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, Aragon is currently involved in conducting an overall evaluation of the school. As part of the process, a voluntary online parent survey is currently underway, the link to which can be found on the Aragon High School homepage. At this time, approximately two hundred responses have been accounted for.
Preliminary data from the survey has been examined by the Aragon faculty, though results have yet to be released to the general public. Of the many comments found within the results, a sentiment that was reflected was one regarding the stratification of classes at Aragon. More specifically, there appeared to be some degree of desire to make changes to the current structure of class offerings.
With the exception of some special education students, most Aragon students participate in one of four varieties of classes: College Prep, Advanced Standing, Honors, and Advanced Placement. Honors and Advanced Placement classes distinguish themselves from College Prep and Advanced Standing classes in that the former pair will raise a student’s weighted total grade-point average in the event that he or she earns an “A” grade in such a designated class. Advanced Placement differs from Honors on the grounds that it is the equivalent of a freshman college course.
In addition, an examination offered by the College Board evaluates how much and how thoroughly the student has learned the course content and assigns a numerical score indicating the results of the assessment. That score can then be used to apply for credit at a college or university. In regard to Advanced Standing and College Prep, their names indicate their difference; Advanced Standing is a more advanced, accelerated course while College Prep concentrates on readying students for education after high school.
Yet, as Assistant Principal Jim Coe points out, Aragon adopted such an academic program relatively recently. He says, “Ten years ago, there were a lot of these honors courses that had come to bear between the College Prep and the Advanced Placement… there was kind of a cop-out. For students who didn’t want to do the rigorous work for an AP course but were good students, Honors courses became sort of a skate mechanism; they wouldn’t have to put themselves up as much. It was kind of a holding ground for the smart kid who didn’t want to do the work. So, the thinking at that time was to do away with those and instill rigor. And so if you were a smart kid and wanted to push the envelope and do your best, you had to take the AP course.”
He adds, “[Ten years ago], AS courses did not exist. They had an Honors designation. But the UC wanted a more refined designation, and so freshman and sophomore courses became Advanced Standing courses, which were normally Honors courses… So that’s when the district went through and cleaned up the 9th and 10th grade courses that were formally Honors courses. After the decision, I would say there was a reduction in the number of Honors courses that students could take.”
Alluding back to Aragon’s educational system from a decade ago, though, a number of individuals have expressed a desire for an intermediate course between the College Prep and Advanced Placement classes offered during junior and senior year.
Aragon alumnus Ari Brenner notes, “A complaint that many students express, and one that has shown up in the Outlook a few times when I was at Aragon, was about how as of junior year, students are forced to choose between College Prep and Advanced Placement for history and english. The rigor of the Advanced Placement is definitely increased from Advanced Standing in freshman and sophomore years, and I think some students wish that threw as a choice that fell in-between the two.”
However, Matt Bigger, the associate superintendent of instruction, says, “I think there’s a pretty strong view from the district that we don’t want to offer yet another level because that just further divides students. We get really concerned, then, about the third level…Suddenly you’ve got a class that can perceived as the weakest of the three, and we really don’t want that dynamic. If College Prep isn’t challenging enough, we want to look at that and make it more challenging. I think we want to constantly fine-tune and improve to respond to our student-parent concerns about the curriculum, but I don’t see the structure changing.”
Referring to the change from ten years ago, Coe says, “Looking at the stats that were going on in the courses, that’s what lead the instruction council to make that move. Now, it’s been ten years, and it may be time to revisit that and take another look at the data. That may be something that occurs once the survey has been taken by a sufficient number of parents and they’ve expressed their opinion. It may be a chance to take another look at, because times change…we’ll have to wait and see what happens.”
