Starting next year, more issues will be added to existing scheduling problems. Incoming freshmen are required to take an additional math and science course, making it harder for

elective class teachers to get the kids they need to continue their programs.

“People will have less space for electives, and a lot of students take the Career Technology classes as seniors,” Apparel and Child Development Teacher Karen Stanton said. “We’re going to have to work to make our classes seem more appealing.”

This new policy is called “Four by Four,” meaning that four credits are required to graduate in the four core subjects of math, science, history and English.

“This will probably increase competition for elective classes because there will not be as much flexibility in scheduling,” Assistant Principal Frank Miller said.

For certain AP courses, this new re-quirement might actually make things more simple. “I think it will be easier to get students to sign up for AP Biology because the students coming in must have a fourth year of science and they will want it to be an honors class anyway for their GPA,” AP Biology Teacher Denise Shupe said.

Elective classes and teachers will also have to contend with a district-wide decision to shift class sizes, making core classes smaller and elective classes larger.

“The district called in a third party who did an audit on how we do staffing and how we run things to make suggestions on how to improve scores, performance and efficiency,” Mr. Miller said. “One of the suggestions they made was to improve performance in core classes by making those classes smaller. This will probably mean more core teachers and fewer elective teachers.”

Teachers of these elective courses must do whatever they can to get the news of their class out to the students in order to get them interested and to fill class size requirements.

“We’.re going to have to be a little more diligent about making people aware of what we have to offer in each course,” Ms. Stanton said. “We’ve never really had to do that before because the classes mostly sell themselves. Students see people in the class carrying around the babies or things that they’ve made in Apparel and that’s what gets them interested.”

If they fail to draw enough students to fill the class, the teachers and students might lose the course entirely.

“There is a concern of filling classes so the most number of students can benefit from these courses,” Career Prep Teacher Carol Burnham said. “The school district also has to look at an appropriate student-teacher ratio while considering what best benefits the students. It may be determined that not enough students are enrolled, which may result in consolidation of several classes, cancellation of the class or program and reassignment of the teacher’s duties.”

In previous years, even if a student wanted to take a particular class, obstacles could, and often did, arise due to conflicts as students in a trimester system still pick their classes based on block scheduling. A student in multiple organizations such as fine arts, athletics and journalism might be forced to choose between them.

“Not having the prerequisite of the Technical Applications credit and conflicting courses can seriously get in the way of a student being able to enroll in my class,” Animation Teacher Eric Bushland said. “For example, if a student wants to play soccer and the only animation class open is fifth period, then the student would be unable to take animation.”

Conflicting desires from the students can be costly to elective classes.

“I will admit I hassle my students who tell me they are going to take ETI or Clinical Rotation instead of animation, but if that is a field they think they want to go in then I encourage them to take courses that are in their area of interest even at my expense,” Mr. Bushland said.