A new proposal from the English department leaves Honors English out as a course option for juniors and seniors. Students will have to enroll in a regular English course or an Advanced Placement course.
According to English director Sanlida Cheng, the time when the change would take place is still unknown.
“In my opinion, if it does [change], I would want it to be for the 2013-2014 school year, but we don’t know if it’s going to happen,” Cheng said.
The idea of eliminating the Honors English courses is to help students become more adept in English and eventually prepare them for further education, according to Cheng.
“Students will benefit from more in AP classes, especially [Great American Writers, or more commonly known as GAW],” Cheng said.
Sophomore English students will have to make a decision and select which junior-year course to enroll in: regular English or an AP course. If students decide to take ALCUSH junior year, AP U.S. History will not be an option. In order to prevent the hindrance of this scenario, a bridge course will be offered over the summer that would serve as an intense preparation for the AP English course so that students can take other AP classes such as APUSH as well.
Teachers have mixed feelings about the alteration.
“I think [the elimination of honors tracking] is a bad idea. There are some students who don’t belong in an AP class, and some that don’t belong in a regular class. Or there are some students who are taking a lot of AP classes, and an Honors English class would be better for them,” said sophomore honors English teacher Sharon Swanson.
“I think that AP curriculum is one of the most powerful curricula out there. I only wish every junior had a year that they studied analysis, nonfiction, and rhetoric. The biggest con is that as we flatten all these classes, classes become more diverse as learning styles go. It’s difficult to teach with radical learning styles,” said GAW teacher David Klingenberger.
“I do like the idea that more students might feel compelled to take AP. But I am concerned that AP might scare some students, and they might end up in regular,” said sophomore honors English teacher Jody Weatherington.
Senior Christina Leon agrees with Weatherington.
“It’s important for people to push themselves, but the rigor of the AP class might be too intimidating, and they should have that option [of Honors English],” said Leon.
Sophomore Summer Brunson agrees.
“There’s not much variety [in not having Honors English]. A lot of people don’t want to do AP, and it leaves us no choice,” said Brunson.
Sophomore Mukti Bulsara feels otherwise.
“Honors is sort of like AP. If you want to do well, you will do well. It’s just a little more work,” said Bulsara.
Klingenberger said change is what is causing controversy within this subject.
“The biggest problem is all change is painful. Nobody wants to experience change,” he said.
rasco • Nov 8, 2012 at 9:38 PM
Honors English is for the kids who want to get honors credit and look a little smart without working too hard. It should be eliminated.
Mara Shapiro • Nov 9, 2012 at 1:13 AM
This is not true. I’m a former GAW student, and I’m currently taking AP Lit. GAW is a very, very challenging class. Rather than focusing on content or character development, focal points of the freshman and sophomore year English courses, GAW stresses rhetoric and the structure of prose. The AP test is very challenging, three essays in a two hour time limit, and the whole year is dedicated to this AP test. Not every student can handle this class and it’s not right that honors is still in talks of being eliminated. Honors English kids work very hard in their classrooms, just in different ways than the GAW kids. They’re still adequately prepared for college English, even if they don’t take AP English courses, which is the main mission of the education system here at West, being ready for college. Honors English should definitely not be eliminated. No one should be forced to choose between an AP class or the regular level if they feel that they could be challenged more in an honors course.
hameenah williams • Nov 4, 2011 at 11:54 AM
I think that getting rid of honors English is a terrible idea. I’m an honors English student and i feel that students should be allowed the option to choose between regular, honors, and AP. Some students may be ready to tackle AP classes. But not all of them. I mean, Regulars is too easy for some yes, but maybe those that want more of a challenge don’t want too much of a challenge. There is a reason why we have honors in the first place. It’s for the people who find regulars too easy and AP too difficult. its the in-between point and getting rid of that might actually result in more people doing poorly in their classes because they cant handle AP. but they don’t want to drop all the way back to regulars. That’ll bring down their GPA. You cant just drop from AP to regular. and you cant just go to AP from regulars. theres a big space between the two, which is WHY HONORS IS THERE IN THE FIRST PLACE! This movement eliminates a students power of choice. Either/or situations don’t work well in this case. Even if i DO take an AP classes, what if i wanted to drop it? then i would have to go back to regulars and that much of a drop would not be for my benefit. I hope that this decision isn’t final because it’s not a choice in favor of the student body.
:) • Nov 1, 2011 at 4:12 PM
I am a honors English student. I have been one for all four years of my high school career in Niles West. I excelled in English where regular English is to easy, but I did not excel enough to where AP would be a challenge rather than a nightmare. I belonged in Honors English like so many other students that are and will enter Niles West.
Hannah • Nov 1, 2011 at 4:09 PM
I don’t support the idea of Honors English being eliminated. I was in Honors English first and I thought it was pretty hard, but I switched to regular English and everything is so much easier. I believe that AP English will be a lot harder than Honors, so instead of having the choice of either an Easy level or a Hard level, why not go with Medium? If Medium is eliminated, then more people will want to go with Easy instead and classes will be filled quicker, and more students will have to take Hard instead. Also, it eliminates jobs, so if you want to fire a teacher who does Honors English, then…well, they’ll have to look for a new job. Nobody likes doing that.
If we had a poll saying we had to choose between keeping Honors and booting it, I would vote for keeping it.