By Danny Kelleher
Sports Editor
After the Mira Costa administration issued a new rule last year that requires students who planned to take an AP, honors or accelerated class to sign a binding commitment form, students have had mixed emotions.
The new rule has caused considerable controversy, and students have complained that the preemptive restriction is unfair.
“The new policy has definitely affected the way I choose and will choose classes in the future. I don’t like the fact that there is no trial period,” sophomore Alex White said. “It is really difficult to feel how a class will be, and it definitely makes me want to play my schedule safer in the future.”
The Mira Costa administration, however, insists that this change in the process was necessary. Multiple drops in a single class can have negative effects on the master schedule.
“Hypothetically, if 15 to 20 students in a class decided to drop an AP class, then the class would fall apart. The remaining 10 or so students would have to drop the class too. That can’t happen,” Vice Principal Jaime Mancilla said.
Advisors want students to be more particular and careful when choosing their schedules, instead of signing up for classes with the assumption that they can later be dropped.
“We try to promote the idea of being very thoughtful when selecting classes,” Mancilla said. “We get seniors who sign up for all these AP classes and are immediately overwhelmed and try to drop out. With this, we try to get them to put some thought in.”
As school resumed this fall, some wondered whether or not the administrators would hold to their previous statements.
“Ben Dale has made a couple exceptions to students that could be in truly harmful situations, but besides that, we are trying very hard to execute,” MBUSD Superintendent Dr. Michael Matthews said.
Though administrators do not currently plan to rescind the policy, changes are not completely out of the question. The commitment form policy will be examined at a later date.
“This is a master scheduling issue. I am going to come back to this after a semester and reassess the situation. By then we will be able to look at any changes in grades and any other changes that might have been a result of the waiver form,” Matthews said.
The basic process of the AP commitment forms will remain unchanged. The forms are currently submitted via paper, but administrators are considering altering this aspect so that forms can be submitted digitally.
“I think it would be more difficult to submit the forms online, because people would be less likely to send them in on time,” junior Shelby Brand said.
Administratos feel that only time will tell whether the policy will be effective. A very common issue with students is that they are unable to switch out of a class after signing up for more AP classes than intended because of the uncertainty of AP waiting lists.
“There have been around 20 students who have appealed to Principal Dale. Many of those students were wait-listed and later enrolled after already signing up for another AP class, both of which they were no longer allowed to switch out of. Hopefully next year we will have it figured out so that wait-lists are out of the picture,” Matthews said.
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