Click here to subscribe today or Login.
By JENNIFER LEARN; Times Leader Hazleton Bureau
Sunday, June 18, 1995 Page: 3A
HAZLETON — Honor classes are causing a commotion at the Hazleton Area
School District’s three junior highs.
Some parents of high-achieving students have aligned under a new group
called Children First Advocacy to demand honors classes where students receive
bonus points added to their grade point average.
But some school board members say the classes can’t be offered for at least
two more years, when ninth-graders are expected to consolidate under one roof
at the high school.
This year, students in grades seven through nine who earned 90 or above in
a subject could enroll in accelerated classes at the junior high schools in
Freeland, Hazleton and West Hazleton.
But students don’t receive bonus points for taking accelerated classes,
even though the classes may require more time and work than typical classes.
Bonus points are important because grade point averages starting with ninth
grade determine the top 10 students, said Children First spokeswoman Pat
Ferrari.
Also, taking honor classes makes a positive impression on college
applications, Ferrari said. She said the parents’ group, which now numbers
about 31, is asking the school only to honor a past promise.
Ninth-grade students who earn a 93 or above were supposed to have the
option of attending honor courses and receiving bonus points, according to a
student grouping plan implemented by the board in March 1994.
But the honor classes were not available to ninth-graders this school year
and won’t be offered next year, except for one honor geometry class.
School board members have acknowledged the parents’ concerns but aren’t
promising quick results.
Board Vice President Ed Pane said the board intends to implement the honor
class concept but probably not until the ninth-graders move to the central
high school. That happens in two years under the new building plan.
The plan will eliminate seventh-to-ninth-grade junior high schools by the
year 2000. Under the plan, seventh- and eighth-graders will attend renovated
and expanded elementary schools with students in kindergarten through sixth
grade in Freeland, West Hazleton, Hazleton and Sugarloaf or Butler Township.
Ninth-graders will move into the central high school on West 23rd Street.
Until then, some junior high schools don’t have enough honor students to
justify creating separate classes, Pane said. He said when ninth-graders are
together in one school, enough students should qualify to create honor
classes.