Earning Credit

This week a large part of my time has been trying to explain to students about how you earn credits in high school.  It is a valuable reminder for everyone.

High school is different than elementary and middle school.  In middle school, you take classes and each year you move on to the next grade and take all the classes for that grade.  In high school, you must earn credits for specified classes and the way you earn credit is by passing each semester of the class. 

So, for example, all students must earn 4 credits of English to graduate.  When you pass both semesters of English 1 during your freshman year, you move on to English 2 during your sophomore year.  If, unfortunately, you failed one of the semesters of English 1 then you are going to have to make that particular semester up before you can progress on to English 2.  Students who failed a semester will be able to make up the course either by repeating the class in summer school, repeating the class through credit recovery or repeating the class by retaking it during your sophomore year.  The bottom line is that you must REPEAT the class in some format.

Some classes (like English) have pre-requisites that students must meet in order to move on to the next level.  Other classes, like Science and Social Studies, do not have pre-requisites to move on to the next level so we will potentially allow you to move from Physical Science to Biology or from World History to US History without first repeating the freshman year class.  Don’t misunderstand though, you will still have to repeat the class at some point, but if you are not making it up during summer school, then you will likely be taking a freshman year class during your junior year.

In order to earn sophomore status, students must have earned at least 5 credits.  To become a junior you will need 10 credits.  To be classified as a senior, you must have earned at least 15 credits.

So, if you need to repeat a class, by far, most students will do that during summer school. Summer school

Grad Requirements & Reminders

I just got home from Curriculum Night and it is always so fun to see everyone exploring the options available at WKHS. Before I get into reviewing the graduation requirements, I want to remind all students and parents of 2 important events we are offering tomorrow.

Tomorrow morning, Thursday, January 22nd at 8:15am in Room 201 we will host a Senior Scholarship Seminar. This is a quick, 20 minute presentation to help get seniors moving on working on searching for scholarships.

Additionally, tomorrow evening, Thursday, January 22nd, at 7:00pm in the Auditorium we will host a College Credit Plus (CC+) presentation. This presentation is an annual requirement for all students interested in participating in CC+ classes in the upcoming school year. Please make plans to attend if you are considering taking a CC+ class next year!

Now, for graduation requirements. I know they can feel daunting for students and parents because there are so many components involved. With registration starting today, having an idea of what you need to complete for graduation is essential to selecting your classes, so I wanted to take a moment and give a quick overview of the requirements.

Basic Academic Requirements:

• 4 credits of English
• 4 credits of Math
• 3 credits of Science
• 3 credits of Social Studies
• 1/2 credit of PE (or additional elective credit if earning the PE Waiver)
• 1/2 credit of Health
• 5 credits of Electives (anything other than the classes listed above count as electives)
• 1 full year worth of Fine Art completed between grades 7-12
• Financial Literacy requirement (can be met through Personal Financial Management, Economics & Financial Literacy, Independent Living, or Financial Algebra)

Demonstrate Comptency in English and Math:
For most students this will be done by earning comptency scores of 684 or higher on the English 2 and Math 1 state End of Course tests. Students can repeat these tests as needed.

There are a range of other options for how comptency can be demonstrated, but testing is the clearest path. If you need other options, I will be working with you to identify what pathway would work and be a viable option for you in the future.

Show Readiness by earning 2 Seals:
There are 12 seals (9 state seals and 3 local seals) that students can try to earn.
All students must earn 2 seals and one of those two seals must be a state seal
If you visit the counselor website and look at the graduation requirements page there is a link to information about all of the seals. As you click on each seal you will be able to see the specific information about what is required to try to earn that seal.

Today you also received a copy of your transcript. If you or your parents want to see it now or at any other point in time, you can always review your progress by accessing Infinite Campus.

Tomorrow & Registration

Tomorrow kicks off the process for registering for classes for next school year. You will be on a very different bell schedule and then, tomorrow night, you and your parents are invited to WKHS for Curriculum Night as a chance to get more information about the various programs and opportunities available to students.

Here is tomorrow's bell schedule:

• 1st period- 8:40 - 9:20
• 2nd period- 9:25 - 10:50**
• 3rd period- 10:55 - 11:35
• 4th period- 11:40 - 12:20
• 5th period- 12:25 - 1:05
• 6th period- 1:10 - 1:50
• 7th period- 1:55 - 2:35
• 8th period- 2:40 - 3:20

** As you can see - 2nd period is very long and that is because we will be holding class assemblies for the current freshmen, sophomore and junior students to pass along information about course registration and important information you need to know to successfully select your classes.

I recognize that it feels too early to be making decisions about what you're going to take next year when students are still settling into the new semester, but the time it takes to be able to take your requests and then build a master schedule that will meet your needs is very complex.

One of the most common reactions for students (and parents) as soon as they hear that it is registration time is to panic. So please, right now, before you even receive your registration information, pause, take a deep breath and relax! Thinking about the future can feel overwhelming, but I promise that we will help you through it. This is a very hectic time of year for us dealing with far more than registration, but I want to reassure you that we are aware of the anxiety and we will get through it together.

So, let me give you a quick glimpse of what these next few weeks will include. Tomorrow will be the meeting where you’ll get the details of what you need to do to register for your classes. You will submit your course selections online through Infinite Campus starting on Friday. The deadline to submit your requests is Friday, January 30th. Counselors will meet with every student individually to review your requests. We will still be able to make adjustments to your requests at that time so if you are uncertain about something, go ahead and make your best guess on what you are thinking and then we will talk about it when we meet together.

Here are some of the key dates you’ll need to know about:

• Wednesday, January 21st: Registration materials distributed
• Wednesday, January 21st: Curriculum Night at 7:00pm – you and your parents can come to talk with the teachers and learn more about the different options available to you;
• Between now and the end of February: Individual meetings with juniors and parents as scheduled
• Friday, January 30th: Deadline to submit online course requests
• Monday, February 2nd and Tuesday, February 3rd: Individual meetings with all freshmen students during Modern World History classes
• Wednesday, February 4th and Thursday, February 5th: Individual meetings with all sophomore students during English classes
• Friday, February 27th: Counselor deadlines to be able to make any adjustments in the online system

Over the next few days, during classes, your teachers will be reviewing the different classes offered within their departments as well as talking with you individually about the courses they would recommend for you to take next year. As you talk about the classes and what your teacher recommends they may enter that information into IC for you so that you don't have to worry about signing up for those classes as they will already be on the list for you.

You will have a course selection sheet to help guide you in the different options available and you can use that sheet to make notes about your thoughts on what interests you and then you can highlight to help select your classes that you will then enter online. If you would like to hear more in depth information directly from the teachers who teach particular courses, please set up a time to talk to the teacher or come to meet with them during Curriculum Night. (Let us know if you need help finding a teacher during one of their off periods.) Don't forget that your teacher in the same department will also be able to share a lot of insight with you about the classes options within their department even if they aren't the one who teaches it.

After you have determined which courses you would like to take, please talk it over with your parents and then login and register on Infinite Campus. The online window for students will open this Friday (January 23rd at 4pm.) When you submit your course requests on Infinite Campus they will be saved automatically. You will need to be sure to submit 3 alternates. I will only use those to replace classes if your first choice selections are absolutely not possible.

Freshmen and sophomores will be meeting with us individually during your History or English classes. Juniors, you will have individual meeting times. You should have received an invitation to set up our time to meet via email so use the link to select your own meeting time during an off period that works best for you. Please be aware that some of the appointment slots for juniors will be before the online registration window closes, but you must submit your requests online before our meeting!

Also, just in case you lose any of your forms, we will have extra copies posted, along with the slides from tomorrow’s presentation and the Course Planning Handbook all available for students and parents to access on the Kilbourne Counselor website – www.wkhscounselors.com – and as of tomorrow we will have it on the home page for your convenience.

Once again, the counselors are here to help you, but I please be patient because having more than 300 students makes it hard to get to everyone all at the same time... and we ultimately have until February 27th to get everything determined and finalized.

Institutional Priorities

In my last post I wrote about dealing with deferrals and it had me thinking a lot about how colleges decide on which students they will accept or reject (or defer). There are factors you absolutely know and control - your grades, the rigor of your classes, your ACT/ SAT test scores, but there are also factors you don't have any control over which can play a large role in an admissions decision and those are their institutional priorities.

Colleges have their own needs, goals and priorities. Those who work in the offices of admission work tirelessly to try to build an incoming freshman class that meets the identified priorities (think talents, qualities, and preferences) of their respective colleges. Some of those might be mission driven and others may be based on needs identified on a shifting basis based upon the students on their campus. But here is the challenge with institutional priorities... you can't influence them. So I would encourage you to let go of that element of stress and focus on the areas you can control. And, if you get a rejection to a college after doing everything "right" know that it likely has less to do with something you are lacking and more to do with the college's institutional priorities and some other students being a better fit for those goals.

Here is a list of some common examples of institutional priorities that a particular college admissions office may receive as a target from their college leadership team:

• Recruited athletes
• Artists, Musicians, Thespians
• Underrepresented backgrounds
• First generation college students
• Geographic diversity (they like to say things like "we have students from all 50 states")
• Academic stars
• College level research with a faculty recommendation
• Major academic competition and scholarship winners
• Students applying to under-enrolled or new academic programs
• Students with special talents
• Faculty and staff children
• Legacies (parent attended the college)
• Development potential (possible future financial donors)
• Gender (males are often rarer at liberal arts colleges and women can be rarer at STEM colleges)

It is important to realize that all of these are not going to be priorities at every college. Additionally, even if you fall into one or more of these categories and it is a priority at the college where you are applying, if you don't have the academic qualifications, you're not going to automatically end up getting admitted to the school.

I hope you had a great lo

Dealing with Deferrals

One of the realities of the college admission process is that not every student will be accepted to every college. The waiting game can often be one of the more frustrating aspects. With family members and friends consistently asking, "Where are you going to college?" the uncertainty present with each "I don't know" response can be overwhelming.

Sometimes even when you hear back from the college, the answer still leaves you wondering where you stand. That is the case with a deferral. A deferral is not a "yes" and it is not a "no." It is what a college will do when they need more time to make a decision on your application.

So, what should you do if you are deferred?

One of the first steps should be to stop in and see me so that we can talk about the college decision and develop a game-plan for your next steps.

If I were trying to simplify the process, then I would suggest that you review the information communicated by the admissions office and follow their instructions. If they tell you that there are limits on what you can do, follow those. If they don't specify any guidelines, it may be beneficial to reach out and talk to the admissions rep who covers our school to learn more about where you stand and what they would like for you to do to be a more "ideal" candidate.

Almost every college who defers you will allow you to submit a letter of continued interest. This is where you will communicate any updates and information you can share with the admissions staff. In particular, let them know that of any new experiences that you have had or recent accomplishments they weren't previously aware of when you first applied. Updating them on your new activities and accomplishments through concrete examples and, when possible data, is important because it is your effort to help give the college a reason to select you and add your application to the "accepted" pile.

The counselors have also sent an updated copy of your transcript to all of the colleges who require a mid-year transcript through Common App, but if you applied in a different format or it is a school that doesn't require a mid-year transcript, then I'd suggest you requesting to have one of your updated transcripts sent.

Additionally, if you re-took your ACT or SAT exams and haven't forwarded your most recent scores to the college, request for the scores to be sent directly to the college of your choice.

You may also be able to consider other outreach efforts to communicate your strengths with the admissions office such as an additional teacher recommendation letter.  (But only do this if they will be sharing new information in their letter that wasn't already addressed in other parts of your application.) Or an additional college visit to the campus.

Although no one likes to be deferred, remember that this is not the end of the world and there is still plenty of time to communicate your strengths to the admissions committee so that you will hopefully be accepted to their school.

Searching for Scholarships

Seniors, we will be hosting a Senior Seminar on Searching for Scholarships. The workshop will take place on Thursday, January 22nd from 8:15am - 8:35am in Room 201.

This short, 20-minute presentation will be packed with information to help you explore options to be able to maximize your scholarship search process. The ultimate goal is for you to be able to make college as affordable as possible.

We are only offering 1 session of this and so we are asking for students to please RSVP if you plan on attending because space is limited. Here is the link to RSVP.

We look forward to seeing you at the Senior Scholarship Seminar next week!

College Credit Plus Night

The College Credit Plus (CC+) program is an opportunity for high school students to take college courses while still enrolled in high school. Students have the option of completing courses on a college campus, online, or at WKHS. College classes at WKHS include both classes that are taught by WKHS teachers who are eligible to serve as adjunct faculty at colleges and classes where CSCC instructors are coming to Kilbourne to teach our students.

Classes that we anticipate being taught at WKHS (dependent on enough students enrolling in them) include: Pre-Calculus, Calculus 1, English Composition 1, English Composition 2, English Literature, Intro to Psychology, Intro to Sociology, Intro to American Government, and Ethics.

There are a lot of details involved in participating in the CC+ program and students must complete and submit the paperwork before April 1st to indicate their intent to participate in the CC+ program in the following school year.  CC+ is also available for students to take classes during the summer in addition to during the school year.

In order to explain all of the details of the program and to provide you with the forms necessary, ALL students and parents interested in participating in this program must plan to attend the Academic Options night which will be held on Wednesday, January 22nd at 7:00pm in the WKHS auditorium.  This will be a joint meeting for all of the students and parents in Worthington. Every college in a 30 mile radius is invited to participate in the meeting.  

One thing that is important for students and parents to realize is that this presentation is a state requirement that you must participate in an information session. As a result, please see me if you are unable to attend this meeting so we can explore other options for sessions being provided at local colleges which you can attend if you can't make it to the Worthington meeting. Let me stress this again - this is a mandatory meeting for any students who want to participate in CC+ next year!

Credit Flexibility is another program we will highlight during the Academic Options night.  Credit flexibility allows students to earn credit based on a demonstration of subject area competency, instead of, or in combination with, completing hours of classroom instruction. Students are able to customize aspects of their learning around their interests and needs. It encourages student self-direction and motivates learners to develop new skills and fulfill their potential. Examples of credit flexibility opportunities include, but are not limited to, independent study, online learning, and demonstration of course proficiency.

If you have any interest in learning more about College Credit Plus and Credit Flexibility, please plan to join us January 22nd!