Each month during the school year, Pocatello-Chubbuck School District 25 holds a “key communicator” meeting on the first Wednesday of the month. To accommodate folks in the community they hold two meetings, one at 7:00 a.m. and one at noon. I usually go to the 7 a.m. meeting and occasionally, like today, I go to the noon meeting. There are more people at the noon meeting, sometimes meaning a better conversation.

The topic for May (the last meeting of this school year) was about a change the school system implemented this year to meet the State of Idaho requirement to add a Freshman Studies class, another math credit, another science credit, and a Senior Project. To do that, the system switched from semesters 18 weeks long to trimesters 12 weeks long. Further, the system went from 7 50-minute class periods per day to 5 70-minute periods per day. Several Junior-year students came to the meeting to tell us their likes and dislikes about the new system. All of them were honor students deeply involved with Advanced Placement and Dual Enrollment classes and they were unanimous in their opinion that the change limited their ability to take interesting elective classes.

The “culprit” is that the AP classes take all three trimesters. The reasons are that the AP tests are given in May and by going all three trimesters, the students can get more in-depth and be better prepared for the test. They all felt that the extra time to learn the material and prepare for the test was very beneficial. Further, all of them were taking at least two AP classes (and two were taking 3 AP classes), meaning that they actually had two or three fewer periods in the year to take other classes, and that some of the classes they wanted to take were only available during time periods when they were in an AP class.

There is probably no good solution to their problem. But, I did learn one interesting / strange thing. In order to be in the drama plays, the student has to take a drama class during the trimester when the play will be presented. Also, in order to be in Student Government (a class officer or being elected to the school senate), they had to be enrolled in a government class. In one case, one of the presenters had to give up her class officer position because she simply couldn’t work in the required government class. The Superintendent assured us that they would be reviewing these requirements and that changes would be made.

So, instead of financial woes, we learned about student woes. It was interesting, the kids were very well prepared, very articulate, and Very Smart. The financial woes continue … and the State of Idaho needs to be held accountable for what they’ve done to our schools. But, I did meet a group of very motivated students who will make the best of their high school time, regardless of what happens to the school district financially. I liked what I saw and heard.

TTFN!