MCW to offer college credits

Jennifer Brookens — Staff Writer
SHERBURN — While schools are proud of their advanced students, one problem facing some districts is how to keep them on campus for their schooling.

“We have one student who’s taking all these advanced courses and she’s only here for band,” explained Justin Williamson, the Martin County West dean of students.

But starting next school year, those advanced students can begin earning college credit while staying in the Martin County West classrooms.

“We’re already offering challenge courses for college credit in government and literature,” explained Principal David Traetow. “We have five lined up for next year.”

Those classes being added for college credit are psychology, pre-calculus and English Composition. Also pending are chemistry and Spanish III and IV.

“This is to help keep these students in school and maintain balance in the student body,” Traetow said.

The challenge courses are available to senior students in the top half of their class and juniors who are in the top third of their class.

“We hope to see a decrease in the post-secondary education option,” Williamson said. “This will reduce the travel for the students, but they can still get college credits.”

“We’ve tried to implement this in the past, but this year, we made a real concerted effort,” Traetow said.

The challenge courses are being sponsored by Southwest State University in Marshall.

“The teachers need to be certified through Southwest,” Traetow explained. “To teach the challenge courses, the teachers need a master’s (degree) in the area they want to teach and also must currently be teaching in that area.”

With the addition of the challenge courses, students could earn as many as 28 college credits their senior year, virtually eliminating one year of schooling.

“One of the less talked-about points of the No Child Left Behind act is eliminating the senior year in a sense of giving the students more skills to enter the work force,” Traetow said. “It’s a tough transition, but one we have to make as an attempt to make the students more prepared for college and preparing them to compete globally.”

With that in mind, Martin County West also is offering new courses to reflect changes in technology, along with global issues that students will face in the future. New courses being offered include digital photography and digital cinema, the super-mileage challenge, alternative energies, hydraulics and electricity, and leadership.

“Some of these classes are already full,” Traetow said. “When we had our enrollment, we had parents saying they wanted to enroll just to take some of these new courses. That was a very meaningful comment.”

The current fuel crisis and global warming make the alternative energies class one of the hottest topics.

“With the two ethanol plants and biodiesel, there’s just so many areas we can draw from right here,” Traetow said.

Another class that’s proving popular is a food science and processing course.

“There’s local resources available and it’s a popular elective class,” Traetow said. “We’ve had 88 students register out of 285 students.”

The new digital technology is also a favorite.

“Put the word ‘digital’ in the title, and you automatically have the kids’ attention,” Traetow said. “We’ve had a photography class with 35 millimeter cameras forever, and that’s almost obsolete now.”

The super-mileage challenge addresses several areas, such as fuel efficiency, engineering, aerodynamics and working together as a team.

“What they do is make a vehicle from the ground up,” Traetow explained. “The one with the highest miles per gallon wins, and they’ve had ones up to 300 miles a gallon. The top-end speed on these vehicles is 30 miles an hour and they’re tested in Brainerd. That was something I was concerned about because we weren’t sending them up there to race ... But it also incorporates other skills and the kids have to work as a team; it’s their product.”

The hydraulics and electricity class was introduced after learning from several college professors that students were not getting much experience in the area in high school.

Finally, the leadership class shows there is more to being a leader than just being captain of the football team.

“We see a need to develop leaders in teens and leaders in the community,” Traetow said. “That class filled up right away.”

The new courses and college credit classes will challenge not only the students, but the Martin County West staff as well.

“Most of the ideas for the new classes came from the students,” Traetow said. “We’ve challenged our staff to update and revamp their courses ... We have to continuously examine our curriculum to not only meet the needs of the students, but also the world. That’s something we don’t take for granted.”