Welcome

Welcome to Rockhurst on behalf of the Mathematics' Department. We are here to give you an honest evaluation of your readiness to handle an Algebra I course at Rockhurst.

We hope that you will maintain at least a 75% average over the 4 weeks of our course. Selected parts of the homework are graded daily by our student assistants. A quiz is given each day over the previous night's homework. A practice quiz that parallels the next day quiz should be completed each evening. We will have a final exam on the last day of summer school. This comprehensive exam has 55 questions. You will receive a grade report each Monday so that you can keep track of your weekly progress. The motto of our program is: "There are no surprises." We expect you to keep a notebook. Graded quizzes and homework are returned promptly and will serve as the study resource for the final exam.

Attendance is another key element in the success of our program. I know it is tough to see your friends stay up until midnight and sleep until 10:00 each morning, but I am confident that you will say, "I am glad I went to summer school. It gave me a head start" sometime this coming school year. Stay tough and keep doing your work every day. We don't expect perfection, but we do want your best effort. Daily progress is the key to your success in a high school level mathematics course. If for some reason an absence is known about in advance, you should tell the summer school director. If the advanced absence is approved, you should get your assignment in advance from your teacher.

This 4-week curriculum was developed over fifteen years ago. It demands 45-60 minutes of effort each evening. Upon completion of this course you can go into the freshman year confident in their ability to handle a high school Algebra I course. Algebra I is a course that must be mastered to guarantee future mathematical success.

The first week we will work with whole numbers, factoring, and fractions. These are concepts that you have seen before, but now the emphasis will be on procedures that will serve as the basis of algebra. Yes the answer is important, but the procedure is more important. In the second week we will operate with decimals and percents. Beginning Monday of the third week, a four-function calculator should be brought every day. Please do not buy anything expensive. All we need is something that will add, subtract, multiply, divide, and take square roots.

If you struggle with a concept, we are here to help. From 7:30-8:00 each morning or from 11:30-12:00 our doors are open. If a quiz is missed because of an absence, it must be made up before or after school.

I know that you are anxious about your performance. We do not sit on the selection committee for students on the waiting list, but we do forward our observations to those people. We've been doing this for many years. Standardized test scores do not always predict success at Rockhurst. Hard work and a love of learning are the hallmarks of a successful student. That is what we try to ascertain in these 4 weeks.

Mr. LeRoy and Mr. Monteil