This year has offered a lot of educational opportunities for seniors. Blended learning has been a very talked about topic around school. According to the jths.org homepage, blended learning offers students the opportunity to learn on their own and mentally challenge themselves to prepare for life outside of high school. This program allows students to be very flexible and have more control over what material they learn and how they learn it. Students also get exposed to online learning opportunities that aren’t really emphasized or taken as seriously as they are during this program.

In blended learning, the classes that are offered include College Prep English 4, College Prep Government, and College Prep Economics. This year PE, Conditioning was added to this list of blended learning classes. When a student has either one of these classes, it means two things: a student has the class second period for only two days a week (Tuesday and Wednesday or Tuesday and Thursday) meaning they are only to report to that second period class the two days they have it, and all the other days they are not to report to school until third period. The second thing that it can mean is that the student has the class the last period of the day, eighth period, and the student is only to report for this class on days they have it, the students are allowed to leave school after seventh period.

As great as a program like this is, there are requirements for students who are involved. When entered into the program, the students must keep a C average to stay in the class. As soon as the student drops below a C average, he or she has a week to bring up their grade. If able to bring up the grade, the student is allowed to stay in the class. When the student is not able to bring up their grade, the teacher of the student will go to their counselor and request that the student is dropped from the class. The students are also required to have their school issued-device on them, or some type of device that they are able to access internet on. This is very crucial for the student because most if not all the material taught in the class, along with the classwork and homework, is based online. Lastly, a student is required to be at most, if not every class during this program. This is very vital because the student only has this particular class two times a week. A student can also be dropped from the class if they miss too many days of it.

Blended learning classes are helping and preparing lots of seniors for college and how to live life not according to a bell. With the blended learning classes, students are in control of what they choose to pay attention to in class and how they will use what they learn in class at home. When away from the class, students are required to cover material that will not be covered in class on their own, and students will be tested on all the material they have covered in class and on their own. To know more about how the students feel about this program, go to the JTHS west website and type in blended learning in the search box provided. Click the first link that pops up, then scroll down and click the link highlighted in blue that says; Video: “JTHS West students describe the blended learning experience.”