Brookfield High School is not offering any new courses this year, but it is giving students the ability to take more courses.
Principal Adam Lewis said administrators have expanded the focus of Warrior Online Academy.
“In the past, we’ve only used it as a credit recovery program,” Lewis said.
Now, students will be able to take a class through the academy, such as in an instance where a student cannot take a class because of a scheduling conflict. The student will be able to take the class on his or her own time, or will be issued a Chromebook computer to take the course in a study hall.
Adam Lewis
“That’s a really big move for us as far as offering more courses for our kids,” Lewis said.“They work with a teacher from the county that actually is grading their work and communicating with them. We just kind of oversee it.”
The expanded academy use fits in with the theme administrators have chosen for the year, “Don’t count the days; make the days count.”
“As educators, we get in the habit of, ‘How many days until summer break?’” Lewis said. “We need to take full advantage of every minute of instruction. I want that to be reflected onto our students as well. I want them to have a sense of urgency about being in the classroom and getting things done. We changed our bell schedule a bit and it works into that. We’re actually going to get a few more minutes of instruction period to period. I think it averages three or four more minutes a period this year.”
Incoming ninth-graders will get a preview of that expectation at Freshman Bridge Day, an orientation program that will be held Aug. 15.
Assistant Principal Kristen Foster “put all of this together, the opportunity for our freshman to come in, get acclimated with the building,” Lewis said. “We’re going to have a lot of different activities for them throughout the day.”
Topics to be covered will include the student handbook, the bell schedule, discipline, clubs and activities, wellness and hygiene, Chromebook use, study skills and social media and texting.
“They’re going to get their schedule that day and we’re going to have some student volunteers, mentors, working with them,” Lewis said. “Even though they’re in the same building, they’re now high school students and we want to go over our expectations and things like that. We want them to feel comfortable coming to us as administrators. We want them to understand clearly how things work at the high school and how it’s different than at the middle school.”
