As presented, WAMS students will start 12 minute earlier and log an additional 12 minutes in each core class.
William Allen Middle School will see changes to its master schedule during the 2018–2019 school year. Principal Matthew Keith, at the Tuesday, March 27, Board of Education meeting, said changes include a new start time, smaller class sizes and more student/teacher contact time throughout the school day.
Keith said the schedule change has already been approved through all the proper channels, and the next steps are implementation. As presented, WAMS students will start 12 minutes earlier, with the school day beginning at 7:35 a.m. instead of 7:47 a.m. Students will log an additional 12 minutes in class, with the new schedule calling for seven 51-minute periods and a 40-minute lunch period, and with the additional class time, writing and math will be integrated further into core content curriculum.
Keith said WAMS’ current schedule was created more than eight years ago. Currently, eighth grade has three teams while seventh grade has two and a half, resulting in larger sizes for seventh-grade classes.
Under the new schedule, trimester exploratory courses will be removed, and those teachers will be placed back on the school’s team cycles. This allows the seventh grade to have three full teams and more balanced class sizes.
Additionally, the school’s exploratory arts courses will be streamlined under the new schedule. Keith said the goal was to align courses with the state standards in the areas of visual and performing arts as well as educational technology.
While students had around 14 exploratory arts classes in seventh grade and 14 in eighth grade, the school’s offerings have been limited to five courses including STEM, digital toolbox, popular music art and theater for seventh graders, while the same courses will be offered to eighth graders with the exception of movie making replacing digital toolbox for the older students.
WAMS operates on a nine-period schedule. Keith said to create seven 51-minute periods, they cut ninth period, trimmed lunches by eight minutes, subtracted one minute from homerooms, trimmed after-school help time by seven minutes and took five minutes away from before school time. This freed the schedule up by taking 63 minutes for reallocation.
Keith said his work on the schedule began as far back as 2014. He said he sent principals at nearby schools surveys to get feedback about how their schedules operate.
Since that time, the district has been faced with tighter budgets, changing student demographics and more demanding state standards, Keith said.
He said WAMS is tasked with creating a smooth transition from the Upper Elementary School to Moorestown High School. The goal is to maintain rigor and programs while also supporting students’ social and emotional learning. Under the new schedule, all students will have access to arts courses that align better with state standards, Keith said.
“The entire drive has been about student success,” Keith said.
Superintendent Scott McCartney said he was sold on the schedule because it added seat time and instruction for kids. He said this, coupled with the smaller class sizes, made him eager to support the change.
Board President Sandra Alberti was also enthusiastic about the changes.
“I love this new structure,” Alberti said. “I think that Moorestown and its middle school will be the envy of any other middle school.”
The next meeting of the Moorestown Board of Education will take place on Tuesday, April 17, at 7 p.m. at William Allen Middle School.
