The Upper School Administration is in the process of making decisions regarding credit and course changes to the Upper School curriculum for the next school year. Besides introducing new courses, these changes will also lead to specific adjustments concerning English 9 courses.

There will be several new courses available next year, many of which are to expand the number of IB courses offered. Some of the new classes include Honors European History and Western Political Thought, IBHL Economics, Honors Research in Data Science and Honors Painting.

Apart from adding even more variety to the course catalog, one major change going forward is merging the two English courses for ninth graders—English 9 and Honors English 9-–into a singular class. As such, all incoming ninth graders will take English 9 in the years to come. “We want to ensure that we are being developmentally appropriate because not all students develop their skills at the same rate,” Mr. Montgomery, the head of the English department, said. “If we can give them that additional year, we know that we will be making AP, IB and other Honors courses from grades 10 through 12 available to more students.”

Merging the Honors and non-Honors courses is possibly a decision that administrators will continue to make to humanities courses in the future, as a similar decision to make History of Asia a mandatory course for freshmen was implemented last year. The same does not necessarily apply to math or science courses because computational skills are picked up at different speeds and are built upon each other, whereas the learning curve of English and history are distinctly different. “The humanities courses can be a bit more forgiving by giving you a little more time to relearn a skill if you missed it previously,” Ms. Read, the Upper School principal said.

Some parents have raised concerns about the lack of a grade-point average (GPA) boost that Honors courses provide for their children who may have considered taking Honors English 9. One way the English department has tried to mitigate this concern is to open up more Honors English electives. “There are a total of two changes,” Mr. Montgomery said. “There won’t be a teacher recommendation required for Honors Creative Writing going forward, and we’re making Journalism an Honors course for all grade levels, though traditionally it has been non-Honors for first-year takers.”

Ultimately, though significant changes are being made, the Upper School Administration assures that these decisions have been made with the best interests of students in mind. “We’re looking at our curriculum and our teaching methods from an analytical perspective, trying to offer the absolute best quality instruction as possible,” Ms. Read said. “Curriculum is a living document. A good portion of our training is analyzing, writing, and changing the curriculum.”