Science
The general pattern for students is to study physics in ninth grade, biology in tenth grade, and chemistry in eleventh grade; these subjects can be studied at different levels, from modified to regular and to advanced/honors. Science department supervisor Tom O'Dowd explained that "teaching physics in ninth grade has been identified as the best option because physics is the fundamental science ... It is potentially the most concrete and the best suited for inquiry-based learning." A movement towards teaching physics has been going on for years, explained one school spokesperson, who explained that physics is "more basic than biology" and "makes for a more rigorous and thoughtful curriculum."
Generally honors and AP programs require test scores or honors applications (see chart) for a student to be accepted, and students in these programs are expected to maintain a B- average or better to continue in the next year's accelerated science courses. It's possible for students to apply for a more accelerated course each year by getting a favorable teacher recommendation or applying to an honors course. (One note not shown on chart: students taking modified biology in grade ten have a choice to study environmental science in their eleventh grade year.) Students in their sophomore, junior, or senior years of high school also have the option of participating in a shared-time program offered through the Union County Vocational Technical Schools (UCVTS). Student enrolled in the shared-time program can receive science credits for their coursework at UCVTS, and should discuss this option for science credit with their guidance counselors.
Single semester electives are available to juniors and seniors in the following subjects: Forensic science; Marine Biology/Oceanography; and Astronomy. Full-year courses for seniors include: Environmental science, Honors physics, and AP study. AP courses offered include: AP Environmental Science, AP Biology, AP Chemistry, AP Physics C, and AP Physics B. Generally, honors and AP courses have prerequisites of past study in honors or AP courses (and maintaining grades of B- or better in those courses); and students can be admitted via a teacher recommendation.
Read more about this topic: Summit High School (New Jersey)
Famous quotes containing the word science:
“For us necessity is not as of old an image without us, with whom we can do warfare; it is a magic web woven through and through us, like that magnetic system of which modern science speaks, penetrating us with a network subtler than our subtlest nerves, yet bearing in it the central forces of the world.”
—Walter Pater (1839–1894)
“... my one aim and concentrated purpose shall be and is to show that women can learn, can reason, can compete with men in the grand fields of literature and science ... that a woman can be a woman and a true one without having all her time engrossed by dress and society.”
—M. Carey Thomas (1857–1935)
“One science only will one genius fit;
So vast is art, so narrow human wit.”
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744)