Long Term Ideas

Curriculum

  • Move curriculum to one that is more mastery based rather than outcome based so that all students can reach an understanding (Canady & Rettig, 1995)

  • Find a way to incorporate cross curricular learning. This is something that would need to be strategically planned, as the pacing is tight and students may be focused on that one particular course.

Scheduling

  • “Staged implementation” of the quarter system, so that all of the changes do not occur at once (Carroll, 1989). For example, starting with something voluntary rather than mandatory (Bradford, 1996)

  • Provide an extended learning class in the following quarter to allow students that need more time to more fully understand the material or a one week carry over process (Canady & Rettig, 1995; Desrochers, 2020)

  • Not 2 cores in one quarter for example, have a core in morning, option in afternoon (Bourassa, 2015; Pickell, 2017). This would be true of teachers and students. Or for teachers, if they were teaching the same subject once a quarter, they may not have to prepare all the material again.

  • Built in breaks according to the bell schedule (G. Wikenheiser, 2020)

  • Consider if certain courses would be better on a semester or quarter format i.e.) perhaps math on semester to have more gradual sequencing and science on a quarter to allow in depth exploration (McCreary & Hausman, 2001) or it better to fully commit to one (Desrochers, 2020)

  • If ever had to be online again, should consider how options would be incorporated (Desrochers, 2020)

Goal creation

  • Create goals and outcomes that can be evaluated (Carroll, 1989; Wronkovich, 1998). This ensures that progress of the quarter system itself can be tracked and improved according to certain criteria

Attendance

  • Clear wording in student handbook if a certain number of classes are missed (Wikenheiser, 2020)