By Brady Currey
Contributing Writer
A staff council’s decision to eliminate Basic courses and merge them with College Preparatory classes is an effective step forward in improving the quality of Mira Costa’s academic performance and the number of graduating seniors who continue on to four-year colleges.
According to Principal Ben Dale, the council was voluntary and comprised of various staff members. It is accomplishing what has long been necessary at Mira Costa: a streamlining of the course catalogue to simplify the scheduling process and ensure that the maximum number of students are eligible for admission to four-year colleges.
Mira Costa’s Basic class program did not meet admission requirements for University of California and California State University systems, or most other four-year colleges. As a consequence, Basic classes restricted many general education students to community colleges. Thus, the administration’s new policy could conceivably boost Costa’s percentage of students headed to four-year universities.
The simplification of the course catalogue will help ease the scheduling process for both students and advisors: general education students will all be in CP classes, and administrators will have one less set of courses to juggle as they make a master schedule.
Basic classes have been regarded as both superfluous and a drain on school resources. The basic program was originally designed to give general education students an opportunity to master concepts in a small environment of roughly 20 students.
As time went on, the program was used more by Individualized Education Program students, and average class sizes grew to 25 or 30 students a section, according to Principal Dale.
This use of the Basic classes was against the state Education Code 56195.1. Classes comprised of students with IEP’s are considered special education classes and must have specific funding and regulations that the Basic classes failed to meet. Under the new system, students with IEP’s will have the option of taking either CP classes or seeking aid in the Learning Center to fulfill graduation requirements.
The combination of Mira Costa’s Basic and CP programs will surely benefit basic-level students. The school will ultimately benefit from raising the academic standards of these students.
CP classes hold, on average, five to 10 more students than basic classes. Condensing classes will save the district money by decreasing the number of classes necessary to hold all.
One objection to this change is that students previously enrolled in Basic classes may not be prepared for the rigor of CP classes. Another is teachers may make CP courses less rigorous, or devote valuable class time to tutoring students from the basic classes, which would take away from the education of other students.
Coupled with the existing academic support structure, including tools such as the Learning Center and personal aids, students who formerly were enrolled in basic classes should be able to adjust to the CP environment with time and relative ease.
Some students feel the quality of CP classes will decrease now that teachers will accommodate former Basic students. However, the integration will only serve as an incentive for former Basic students to keep pace and prepare them better for four-year universities.
It will be years before the effect of this change is revealed, but the elimination of Basic courses is a progressive step toward a greater number of college-bound students and a more rigorous curriculum.
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