If you have a student at home who’s in the 8th grade, then something is about to happen. Your student is about to enter his or her freshman year. What’s about to change and what will stay this same?

Mostly, things will be the same. It will still be important for your student to come to school, to keep on top of school work, to ask lots of questions, to avoid procrastination, to make good friends, to stay involved, and to be kind. The teachers will still be continuously available for off hours assistance and will still be the sort of cheerleaders for your kids that you’ve come to expect.

Some things will be different. Your student will see 5 different teachers in a day rather than 2. He or she will switch classes more often. Very importantly, your student will start to build a transcript. The school work that happens starting the first day of the 9th grade will begin to build an academic record which will impact your student’s after high school choices.

CSD is highly committed to the freshman year because it plays a pivotal role in a student’s academic life. We have instituted a program of Freshman Fridays, freshman teacher team meetings, Friday schools, and lunch time help sessions. Our intent is to see 100% of our 9th graders finish the year on track to graduate.

I could go on and on and I will in later posts this spring. Last week a parent at the MS informational meeting asked me what the curriculum and course load for a freshman looks like. I promised a post about within a week, so I’ll end with that. Here’s a typical freshman schedule:

PE
Math
2 periods (as a block) – AP Environmental Science
2 periods (as a block) – 9th grade English/AP Human Geography
Spanish 1

There are only a couple of variations to this. A student might take band or choir or sometimes art instead of PE. Sometimes a student comes to Corbett with some coursework in Spanish. That person might be in Spanish 2 in that case.

My phone number in the office is 503-261-4209 and my email is ppearson@corbett.k12.or.us. I’m available most every morning and in the afternoons after 2:30. Talking about school is one of my favorite things to do (except making Sunday morning breakfast with my daughter), so let’s chat more.

My next post will be about credit requirements for sports eligibility and graduation. I promise that within one week. Within two weeks I’ll also post the date for our Freshman parent orientation in May.