Speaking to the Montgomery County School Board this week, Blacksburg High School Assistant Principal Adam Simpson presented a way to use a $50,000 Virginia Department of Education High School Innovation Grant to reinvent the high school curriculum.
“We are very excited about this project and have been working on since July 2018,” Simpson said.
He said that a committee of BHS teachers has put together a plan to restructure the first two years of the high school experience. The Bruin Academy will be a half-day school within in a school, with an alternate school bell schedule, for 25-50 ninth grade students starting next school year.
These freshman students will be taught interdisciplinary courses with co-teaching teams and project-based learning. There will be an emphasis on personalized learning by increasing student freedom related to his/her choice, voice, pace and place. Teachers will co-create content and learning targets.
The freshman year in the Bruin Academy would have a course where English 9 and World History One would be integrated. Another course would meld Environmental Science with Health and Physical Education. Algebra would be a standalone class. The sophomores would be offered a combined course of English 10 with Earth Science, Principles of Technology with World History Two, Algebra, Functions and Data Analysis with Economics and Personal Finance. There will be three extra high school credits built into the Bruin Academy.
Simpson said that the Bruin Academy wanted to be something bigger. One focus will be on the 5 “Cs” to teach students how to be successful in school and life: creativity, character, citizenship, communication, critical thinking and collaboration.
The Sixteen Habits of Mind, which was from the book “Students at the Center,” will also be incorporated. The book cites research indicating that sixteen habits like persistence, managing impulsivity, and empathy, help students learn how to learn, learn how to approach learning and actually achieve learning.
Each semester of the Bruin Academy’s two years will focus on four of those habits.
“These will be skills incorporated in the Bruin Academy that is normally not directly taught in school,” Simpson said.
The mission statement of the Bruin Academy will be “to develop college and career-ready citizens who live, think, create and serve.” These components are a progression for student growth.
How does a student live in a community and be an empowered learner? Learn to think critically about a student’s present and future role in society. Moving forward, how does a student take their knowledge and skills to create a product or business? Then, serve those around you in new and meaningful ways. A flyer and logo with this motto was created by the BHS art department to give a sense of Bruin Academy identity.
“Why do something different at BHS?” Simpson asked. “We do “better” well already. But it is recognized that our high school system is a bit outdated,” Simpson said.
He offered a 2010 quote from United States Secretary of Education Arne Duncan: “Our K-12 system largely still adheres to the century-old, industrial-age factory model of education. The factory model of education is the wrong model for the 21st century.”
This VDOE grant was proposed by the Advisory Standards of Learning Innovation Committee and approved by the 2015 General Assembly. Previous winners have been Chesterfield, Fairfax, Radford, Salem City and eight other Virginia school districts. All previous winners have also received a second-year implementation grant.
The Bruin Academy Committee members were able to tour three high schools that are offering high school innovations. Those programs are not exactly what the Bruin Academy is proposing, but with same and different elements in structure. The goals are more flexibility in scheduling, to get students to feel more engaged in their learning, and to connect to the real world with experiences and community perceptions and prepare them for 21st century jobs.
The Bruin Academy began inviting and recruiting Blacksburg Middle School eighth grade students in December 2018. There has also been a parent-information meeting and applications were distributed.
Simpson said, “Currently, there are 37 students who have applied for the Bruin Academy.”
I am really excited about this,” Superintendent Mike Miear remarked. “We continue to teach in a model that was developed in the 19th century. We teach so many courses in isolation. That is not how the world works. I was excited to hear BHS was applying for this grant to reinvent high school to make it relevant to the world and showing courses are connected. Learning for the future and connecting it to the work-based learning is remarkable.”
The Bruin Academy is set to open in the 2019-2020 school year at Blacksburg High School.
— Lisa Bass
