A few weeks ago, the administration officially announced that next year Upper School students and faculty will take part in a two-week interdisciplinary program in January, commonly known as J-Term. With over fifty proposed courses and the potential for inter-disciplinary courses to be taught by teachers from different departments, J-Term would “enhance our school’s education” according to Aggie Malter, co-chair of the J-Term committee along with Marc Eripret.
The implementation of a J-Term into the Upper School has been discussed in past years, but it is now in the final stages of development. Beginning in the 2013-2014 school year, a two-week J-Term will exist as part of Upper School curriculum.
Academic Dean Catherine Hall stated, “In all likelihood we’re looking at putting it in the middle of the year, in January, probably just after we return [from Christmas break].” However, as Eripret noted, there is still “a year to work out the logistics,” and no permanent dates have been set.
As of now, most of the courses offered during J-Term will reflect the timing of a normal day. Though some programs would involve travel, Eripret emphasized that “[travel] is not the focus of what J-Term would be as a whole.”
Hall added, “Trips will be very few and far between; the dominant experience for 90-95% of the students will be on-campus programs. Most students are going to be on campus doing inter-disciplinary programs or doing day trips where they’re back in time for sports practices and games.”
While actual group caps would vary depending on the subject matter and number of teachers available, one of the goals of J-Term is to create a more direct learning experience for students during these two weeks. J-Term classes will likely be capped at twelve to fifteen students.
While the proposed courses of J-Term span a variety of subject areas, a focus is given to maintaining appropriate difficulty throughout. In describing J-Term, Malter stated that it would be “as challenging as what you do on a daily basis.”
While students may be assessed differently than they are in regular classes, assessments themselves would be involved in the J-Term.
Dr. Hall asserted, “[J-Term] is a very academically rigorous program. It would be a graded two weeks and go on the transcript. It won’t be seen as a fluffy, non-academic program.”
With J-Term’s placement following Christmas break, many wonder whether the school will do away with midterms entirely, following in the footsteps of other Inter-Ac schools who recently eliminated formal midyear assessments.
Although no concrete decision has been made regarding midterm exams, Dr. Hall noted, “It is possible that midyear exams would be off the table…but we may also end up keeping them, in which case we have some other alternatives to our schedule that would not impact the school year dramatically.”
J-Term’s similarity to the current senior project system may also lead to changes in Upper School curriculum.
Dr. Hall explained, “J-term would impact senior projects. There would still be some sort of culminating experience for seniors, but the major projects would be converted into J-term.”
J-term is already creating a buzz both among students and faculty. Dr. Malter revealed that “that lot of teachers are excited about the opportunity to collaborate.”
Mr. Eripret also noted that, as the proposal of J-term has developed, “More and more faculty members have come on board to the idea.”
Dr. Hall hopes that J-term will allow “students to come out feeling like they’ve been able to either go deeper into something they’re really interested in or have an opportunity they often don’t get to really experience things as part of study outside of the classroom.”

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