I certainly hope the new magnet-school program works. My 8th-grade child has been subjected to so many new programs in the Wake County, N.C., public schools that it is hard to keep track of them. I would like to review these once-new but now abandoned programs with you.
In elementary school, my daughter was taught new math. It is no longer taught.
When all of America was being forced to use the metric system, she was in the grades where this system was stressed. Metrics have been de-emphasized and are now taught for conversion purposes only.
She was also part of the open-classroom experiment. It is now defunct.
When 6th-grade centers were established to help desegregate the schools, my daughter was bused out of the neighborhood, for the third time in her school career. Sixth-grade centers no longer exist.
At the end of 7th grade, my daughter finally achieved a milestone of her dreams--trying out for 8th-grade cheerleading. She made it! However, because now, all of a sudden, the school system decides to reshuffle grades and form a middle school, it’s not such a big deal. The girls coming from the 6th grade now can become cheerleaders--for a two-year term.
We shouldn’t worry, though. As a result of the changes, as an 8th grader she now enjoys top status in the middle school.
Just think, she’s going to be included in the biggest section of the yearbook! But then we come to find out, yearbooks are also abolished. Junior high schools had yearbooks--middle schools do not.
Next year, she’ll be in high school.
