Stunting Progress: It Doesn’t Add Up
It’s fair to say that everyone has ambition for something, or some type of skill or hobby or even part time obsession they want to get really good at. For some people it’s an instrument, or chess, or a sport, and the list goes on. But for many students at Govs, their goal is to exceed expectations and excel in courses.
It makes sense for the Academy to assist these students in their endeavors in trying to get ahead and giving them ample opportunities to get ahead and be more competitive in the college application process. However, rising juniors aren’t allowed to get ahead and skip to calculus, and I fail to see why this is a good decision.
There are enough courses available, being that there’s Linear Algebra, Multivariable Calculus, and AP Statistics as courses that follow Calculus, and even with Linear and Multi switching off annually, there are enough math courses for every student to have something to take all four years; even those who take Calculus as sophomores will be able to take Multi/Linear junior year and AP Stat senior year. And it’s not as though it’s uncommon for juniors to take Calculus, but there are many true juniors on that accelerated track, none of which struggle with a lack of math courses available. The Academy does an excellent job of allowing many students the opportunity to challenge themselves in difficult courses, so it’s illogical that they wouldn’t make it available for rising juniors who haven’t had the same opportunities in their prior education.
And it’s not as though The Academy doesn’t allow anyone else to move up either. Juniors in Algebra II have the opportunity to skip to Calculus for their senior year because they would benefit from the opportunity to learn it. Since there is a system in place that allows students to move ahead and skip to Calculus, I think it’s illogical and a waste of potential to only offer it to rising seniors; there are many students who would relish in the opportunity to take advantage of all of the courses offered at the Academy.
Further, many students who didn’t receive a satisfactory education at their previous schools, so for them it’s much harder to take advantage of the abundant courses offered at the Academy. Govs offers opportunities to skip Geometry for rising sophomores, but other than that there are no more opportunities to excel; skipping Geometry would put someone in a position to take Calculus in senior year with no opportunities to excel beyond that. This means that students with more competitive prior education will take more competitive classes in their time at the Academy, and subsequently potentially have less math courses in college, or at the minimum a better understanding of the math courses one would have to take for some degrees. I believe that creating the opportunity to move ahead would help create a more equitable academic environment for students with worse education prior to arriving at the Academy, and giving them the same opportunities to excel as their more fortunate counterparts.
In conclusion, it only makes logical sense that Govs offer rising juniors taking Algebra II the opportunity to move on to Calculus in their senior year. The school has enough courses for juniors in Calculus to have options for their future math courses, the school has a system set in place already for the rising seniors wishing to skip to Calculus, and it would level the playing field for students with worse education before Govs.
I believe that the opportunity for rising Juniors to take Calculus would give those with a passion for math the opportunity to move ahead and live up the their true potential, and at a school with the prestige and number of opportunities of Govs the only logical decision for them is to allow rising juniors to take skip to Calculus.