Governor’s Schools beefing up this summer
He asked for the Governor’s Schools changes a year ago, but said he was unhappy with the progress.
Initially, the governor asked that the schools go from four to six weeks, but a five-week compromise fit with many colleges’ summer session schedules. This past summer, nearly all the schools were able to immediately switch from four to five weeks and offer six hours of college credit.
Next summer, they will also be asked to strengthen the list of courses they offer for college credit. Governor’s School for the Arts at Middle Tennessee State University stayed at four weeks and offered three hours of college credit last summer because of scheduling conflicts. However, the program will expand this summer to meet the higher expectations.
“We had to change everything. We’re working to make it as smooth a transition as possible,” said Dale McGilliard, director of the school at MTSU, which is the largest of the nine schools. “It really is life-changing for the students who come here.”
Daniel Chioc, a junior at Humboldt High in West Tennessee, told The Tennessean newspaper that he attended the School for the Arts to study piano and still wants to play piano but now also plans to write music, hopefully for movies.
“I think about it all the time, really. I’m craving MTSU,” said Daniel, 16, who said the college credit he earned was a bonus. “It was really inspiring. When I was there, I wrote a song in 30 minutes.”
Bredesen expressed frustration at a recent budget hearing with the state Department of Education after hearing that some schools were offering courses that were softer than he intended. He has a degree in physics from Harvard.
“What I wanted to do at the outset was to make these hard knowledge courses,” he said during the hearing earlier this month. “Five weeks is not enough time to learn much about science. I want them to take a physics course or a biology course – get some ideas and learn some hard science.”
State education officials said they would work closely with the Governor’s Schools to make sure the 500 or so students who are expected to attend this summer have access to the rigorous courses that could give them a leg up as they finish high school and enter college.
The end result would be that students who participate could take two college-level courses, attend seminars, take field trips and gain experience in their area of interest during the summer program. The goal of the schools is to offer intensive, college-based sessions in nine areas, ranging from the humanities to engineering.
The students, who must rank in the top 10 percent of their high school classes, live on campus, take classes, earn college credit and interact with experts in their future career fields, all free.
The budget for the program went up $750,000 to nearly $2.2 million last year, but will remain flat for 2006.