The elimination of the Global History 10 Honors course, which went into effect in September, has improved the entire social studies program, according to social studies curriculum coordinator Jeannette Balantic. She gave an update at Tuesday evening’s Garden City Board of Education work session.

“I really do think that the change has been in the best interest of kids and has really strengthened our overall social studies program,” Balantic said. “I will certainly continue to get feedback from teachers, students and parents as we move forward and try to refine and improve our practice.”

Last December, after much discussion at the work session and regular meeting, the Garden City Board of Education decided to eliminate the Global History 10 Honors course beginning in September. The district now offers Global 9 Regents and Global 9 Honors for ninth-graders; Global 10R and World Advanced Placement for tenth-graders; US History 11R and US History AP for eleventh-graders; and Economics/Government R and Economics AP or US Government AP for twelfth-graders.

Balantic worked for 18 months with teachers to align the content and skills of the 9H course with the tenth-grade AP World History course. “We all have concerns about kids as they make transitions from the middle school to the high school and we didn’t want kids to walk into a 9H class and be overwhelmed that they were going to be in an AP course. It’s a pre-AP class, and we were really mindful of that with the curriculum choices that we made.”

The 9H course covers two levels of the AP course, whereas in other school districts three levels of the AP course are taught over the year. According to Balantic, covering two levels of material instead of three enables students more time to develop writing and critical thinking skills, as well as focus more intensely on projects. Unlike in some other school districts, the ninth-graders in 9H at Garden City High School do not use a college-level textbook.

Balantic said she reached out for assistance from an outside consultant. “She [the consultant] worked with our teachers, the 9H teachers and the AP World teachers, to really help us create a vertical team of teachers who would teach these students and really help us design a curriculum that would enable the kids to develop the habits of mind and the body of knowledge that they would need in 9H to move into AP World and be successful in AP World.”

This year, five students transitioned from 9R into AP World. Balantic spoke with parents as she tried to make their leap into the more challenging AP course as smooth as possible. Students were provided with a two-hour skills booster class. She also is helping to ensure that 9R teachers are aware of the expectations students face when they choose the AP World course and will continue to encourage them to explore ways in which they can help make the transition easier.

Since September, one out of the five students has switched to 10R. The other four students have an 80 average.

Twenty-nine students have transitioned from 9H into 10R. These students have an 87 average, whereas the average for other students in the class is 82. Since the students who were going from 9R to 10R had already studied the Renaissance and Reformation, the 29 students who were moving from 9H to 10R were offered a two-hour class focusing on that specific period in history.

Curriculum work was also done by teachers over the summer to help promote a higher level of rigor for the 10R course. These measures were taken to increase the probability of success for more students as college admissions officers place a greater emphasis on more challenging coursework.