By Michael Beeli
Staff Writer
Manhattan Beach Middle School, without enough student involvement, will stop offering a journalism class for its students starting in the 2017-18 school year. Journalism classes are an essential part of any comprehensive educational experience at all institutions of learning, and thus should be offered to any students who wish to enroll.
According to MBMS Principal Dr. John Jackson, school administration may have to remove the class from the master schedule in the 2017-18 school year if there is a lack of student enrollment. Many students are signing up for other electives rather than signing up for the journalism class, Jackson said.
According to MBMS journalism teacher Rachel Thomas, journalism is an incredibly important course that teaches students invaluable skills for the future. In the journalism class, students develop important skills such as deadline responsibility, cooperation with other students, demonstrative writing, and one-on-one instruction in language skills students do not have the opportunity for in their standard English classes.
Since journalism is one the few classes at the middle school that allows students to use a student-driven organization to foster responsibility in which they rely on the ability to communicate and work together, it is an invaluable class.
Thomas indicated that students who would normally enroll in journalism are being pulled away because many potential journalism students, especially leaders, are enrolling in other classes. A large number of students is signing up to be Teacher Assistants at MBMS. Some teachers are even taking two or more TAs per period, detracting from the necessary journalism class.
Most teachers should not need more than one TA each period in order to perform the tasks they need to complete. In addition, many students are most likely signing up to be TAs simply to avoid other classes.
Thomas said that part of the reason enrollment rate in MBMS journalism has dropped is a lack of promotion by teachers and administration at the school, especially in comparison to other electives. In order to draw more students to the class, MBMS staff should promote the class and the invaluable skills that it teaches, such as writing ability and real-world cooperative responsibility.
Additionally, journalism is one of the few outlets of student expression at MBMS, Thomas said. Without a newspaper or some form of student expression, students in many ways lose their voice and means of maintaining a vocal, mutual connection with the administration and faculty of the middle school.
The master schedule is student-driven, and since over 200 students applied to enroll in the STEM class, the administration may be forced to make sacrifices in order to open up more classes, Jackson said. The potential schedule change means that students who do wish to take journalism may not be able to unless a certain quota of students is met. Master schedules should be student-driven, but not to the point where the students are prevented from taking a class due to a lack of demand from other students.
Journalism is essential as it allows the students a voice that would be lost without it. Instead of considering to preemptively cut the class from the middle school’s schedule, employees at the school should better promote the journalism class to incoming prospective students.
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