From the outside, not much will look different at Akron Public Schools middle school buildings this fall.
But an overhaul of the way Akron teaches students in grades six through eight is coming over the next several years, starting in the fall, with the implementation of College and Career Academies at the middle school level.
Students will be exposed to career options much earlier, including off-campus visits to Akron-area businesses, and classroom instruction will more heavily emphasize group projects and lessons that push students to research to come up with answers to questions. Additional emphasis will be placed on developing students’ social and emotional skills, in line with new state standards.
Superintendent David James previewed the transition during his State of the Schools address Wednesday, calling it a “preschool through 12th grade transformation.”
“At all levels, we’re focusing on shifting instruction to be more hands-on and project-based,” James said. “We’re dramatically changing the school experience by bringing student learning out into the community, where they can apply their learning to real-world problems.”
That the academy model is coming to middle schools starting this fall is certain, but what will be implemented when, and where, is still in question.
A school board committee this week reviewed the first draft of an overhaul plan, which has been in the works for about a year in partnership with the Akron Community Foundation.
The proposal for what should be implemented will wind through finance and academic committees before full board approval in the next few months. The next step would determine a timeline for full implementation.
The changes come a year after the district fully implemented the academy model at the high school level, a four-year process that culminated in every student in grades 10 through 12 choosing a career pathway to guide their high school years.
Students still take their regular required courses, but supplement those with industry-specific classes. Their regular classes are also taught through the lens of their chosen career path, and teachers work to incorporate those interests into lesson plans. The goal is to make learning more relevant for students.
The middle school implementation will also take time, estimated at five years, Chief Academic Officer Ellen McWilliams-Woods said.
Unlike at the high schools, the younger students will not pick a career path for middle school. But they will have exposure to several careers as early as sixth grade.
“Our focus has been on, what do we need to do at the middle school level to prepare students to take advantage and maximize all of these college and career opportunities that we now have at the high school,” McWilliams-Woods said.
For example, she said, the first time some students are setting foot in a workplace office is when they are seeking an internship their junior year. The earlier students receive preparation for those experiences, she said, the better they will be able to take advantage of them.
Building students’ social skills, including their ability to work in teams and take responsibility for their learning, will also be key.
In addition to the off-campus career explorations, each student in seventh and eighth grade will have six career experiences at school, McWilliams-Woods said. That could be a guest speaker from a local company or a career fair.
Each school will also have several partners in the community. The high school academies have amassed more than 260 business partners over the last four years. McWilliams-Woods said she doesn’t have a target in mind for the middle schools, but that all the partners will be non-profit or government agencies.
Classroom projects will include partnering with those agencies and organizations to solve real-world problems. Not only would they spend classroom time thinking up ways to solve — for example, how the food bank distributes food every week — but they would go to the main location and present their ideas to the organization’s leaders.
“We don’t want them to just come up with an idea to propose,” McWilliams-Woods said. “We want them to actually see it through.”
A group of about 50 teachers, middle school directors, central office staff and school board members is traveling next month to Nashville, Tennessee, to see middle and high schools that already have the academy models.
Teachers will go through professional development, she said, but it won’t be as intensive as what was required of high school teachers.
The financial burden for the district won’t be as heavy either, McWilliams-Woods said, as the middle school redesign does not require overhauling facilities.
The middle school academies won’t involve any students changing schools, she said, because the same opportunities will be offered at each school.
“It’s more focused on changing what’s happening during the school day in their current schools to enable them to develop these competencies,” she said.
Contact education reporter Jennifer Pignolet at jpignolet@thebeaconjournal.com, at 330-996-3216 or on Twitter @JenPignolet.
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Akron is overhauling its middle schools. Here’s what it means for students - Akron Beacon Journal
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