Rick Chen ‘24 | Maggie Lo ‘23
Many departments in the Upper School have developed new course offerings for the 2022-23 school year, including the English, History, Math, Science, Computer Science, and Visual Art departments. Most notably, the English department is significantly changing the structure of the V Form course options. The increase in new classes was due to a variety of reasons that were different for each department; some of these motivations included an increased student interest in a particular subject and the movement towards greater student choice in course selection.
Photo courtesy of Gianna Trala ’23
English
The English department is altering the way they organize the V Form english classes next year. Currently, juniors can take a full year of American Literature, Honors American Literature, or American Studies, which combines both the V Form English and History requirements.
Christopher McCreary, Upper School English Teacher, explains that a new structure will be implemented next year. He says, “American Studies is not running next year. Students could still take, if they qualify, the full year of Honors American Literature. For everybody else, instead of a full year of American Literature, there is going to be one semester of a course called Foundations of American Literature, which is required for everybody and will cover some of the texts leading up to the early 20th century. Then there’s going to be a variety of electives that people can pick from for their other semester.”
The new elective courses that are available for next year include Creative Writing, Contemporary American Fiction, Literature in the American City, and Nature and American Literature. McCreary says that “for Contemporary American Fiction, we’re looking at a blend of short stories and novels. Also, Literature and the American City is a good way to focus on a bunch of different urban experiences at different eras in American history.”
There were different reasons behind the change. McCreary comments, “It is nice that they have the choice. We have found that in the Upper School curriculum as a whole, there has been a shift toward more choice for students overall. We’re hoping that this is a way where students can choose a course that most interests them while still giving them a good selection of American texts.”
He continues, “It’s also a way to reconceive what American Literature is. It’s going to free us from having to follow a timeline through American literature to being able to focus on themes or settings. This also helps us include a much wider range of voices from a wider range of time. It could be about a region of the country, or racial identity, or gender identity. It frees us to reconsider how we group things.”
The new structure also allows students who are very interested in English to take more classes. McCreary adds, “There’s also the option that if you are somebody that loves literature and writing, you could take the year-long Honors American Literature course, but in theory, you could also take other electives at the same time. We’re giving people some more options that way too.”
He also says that “if this goes according to plan, we’re going to also carry the option for electives through to seniors for the following year. One of the things that that will give us the ability to do is have seniors and juniors in some of the same electives. This is often an interesting energy, especially in the spring where people are moving at different speeds depending on where they are in their academic careers. That’s something that I’m excited about.”
History
The History department will be including one more class in their course offerings for next year: Honors International Relations. Steven Schuh, History Department Chair, explains, “It’s an honors level class co-taught by Mr. Kelly and Mr. Shah, in the English Department. They’re going to look at international diplomacy and international strategies. They’ll be working with the Batten School at the University of Virginia, so students will actually be working with professionals in the strategic defense field. They’re going to be presenting to professors at the Batten School and to members of the Department of Defense. It should be a really interesting class.”
Math
In the Math department, Kelly Edwards, Math Department Chair, says that “next year, we have one new elective called Honors Number Theory. That’s open to any student who has completed Honors Pre-Calculus.”
Thomas Goebeler, Upper School Math Teacher, will be teaching the class. He comments, “It’s going to be a pure math course with an experimental component. It’s one of the few times when students are going to be able to prove theorems that they come up with themselves. We’ll look at examples with integers, and they’ll be able to generalize that to larger theorems. I’m picturing some group work and some guidance, but also some exploration. Exploratory mathematics is hard to construct at the high school level, but I think it’s going to be a success.”
Science
The Science department will be offering three new semester-long courses for next year, including Chemistry for Forensic Science, Honors Organic Chemistry, and Honors Modern Physics.
George Lorenson, Upper School Science teacher, will be teaching both the Chemistry for Forensic Science and Honors Organic Chemistry classes. For the forensics class, he says, “We really needed a non-honors class that was for kids to do project work and find out what it’s like to work in the lab. It will be mostly lab-based and project-based. It’s going to be about what they’ve already learned and new content, and they will apply that to new situations and try to solve problems. It should be a lot of fun.”
Lorenson also explains that the science department “needed a place for kids studying AP Chemistry to go to the next level, and Honors Organic Chemistry allows them to continue what they’re doing. That class is really difficult in college, so I want kids to have a leg up if they can.”
In addition, Dan Baxter, Upper School Science teacher, will be teaching Honors Modern Physics. He says, “The course picks up where our Honors and Regular Physics courses finish in the junior year and also from our new Honors Physics II class. Those courses finished the year with light and optics, and the nature of light itself is typically a discussion that kicks off the modern era in physics. We’ll look at that aspect, which takes us into quantum physics. There’s also special relativity, so E=mc^2. We will look at nuclear physics, as well as some particle physics. The end of the course will be purely for student-driven, curiosity-based discussions and topics.”
He continues, “Part of this is embracing what can be very confusing, and being okay with there not necessarily being a nice, neat, simple outcome. Traditional physics courses get students to a point where they can solve a problem, but modern physics hasn’t really reached that point yet.”
Computer Science
The Computer Science department will be including Honors Cybersecurity in their course offerings for next year. Matthew Davis, Computer Science Teacher, says that “students were so interested in the classes and course enrollment is continuing to expand, so we are offering a new course, Cybersecurity. There were a handful of kids that wanted to take a class, but we couldn’t fit them in.” Because of this, the Computer Science department is also currently in the process of hiring a new Computer Science teacher.
The Honors Cybersecurity class will teach students about fundamental cybersecurity principles through challenges and projects. Students will learn about hackers, the ethics of computing, famous cyber attacks, and cryptography.
Visual Art
There will be two new course offerings in the Visual Arts Department. David Sigel, Visual Arts Department Chair, explains that “this year, we have been able to extend our level in Woodworking, Design and Fabrication. We have kids who are in Level 4, so now we are starting a Level 5. To help allow our ceramics program to grow and become more advanced, we are offering a brand new course called Ceramic Intensive.”