Class Culture

Overview

Honors courses are intended to be more challenging than standard math courses. Ongoing success requires that students attain proficiency in personal responsibility for their learning, independence, and work ethic.

  • Personal responsibility - student choices directly influence the outcomes in the classroom. The course notes, the textbook, and the teacher are all resources, but the onus to achieve is on the student.
  • Independence - the bulk of the learning happens outside of the classroom through study and practice in accordance with the quality of the work demanded by the course. A student should have a strong desire to improve in mathematical ability.
  • Work ethic - Work ethic can be defined as your personal rules that control your level of energy and effort in tasks that you choose to do or are given to you. Daily homework must be valued as the means to learn the material and must be completed, checked, and corrected for reasons that go well beyond homework points.

Students should take Honors math courses because of an advanced level of interest and achievement in mathematics. The rationale for honors courses is not to provide a means to attract students in enroll in classes for additional weighting of the GPA, but rather to offer challenging, higher level courses for students who aspire to an advanced level of learning. Furthermore, students and parents should be informed that Honors math courses are more demanding with requirements beyond those of non-honors or non-AP math courses. Honors students are expected to be more independent in dealing with new material.

Algebra II-Honors demands a more challenging approach to the student's study of algebra concepts. While achieving a satisfactory result on the Algebra I Mastery Exam is a requirement of the course, it cannot predict how a student will engage the course. While we firmly believe all students are capable of learning and achieving in mathematics, it may be too soon for many to take on Honors mathematics.

Weighting and Indiana Academic Honors Diploma

  • This course carries a additional weighting of 0.5 when calculating your GPA. This means, for instance, that if you get a B in the course which carries a value of 3.0, it will still be recorded on your transcript as a B but the GPA will be calculated with a value of 3.5 (3.0 + 0.5).
  • Because the weighting does not change the grade letter of the course, students should be aware up front that a letter grade of C- or below may cause the student to be ineligible to receive the Indiana Academic Honors Diploma. The potential consequences of this should be discussed with the student's academic and college counselor should this circumstance arise.