By KEN CARPENTER
Great Bend Post
At their monthly meeting Monday night, members of the Great Bend School Board listened to a proposal to overhaul the curriculum at Great Bend Middle School. They heard from a committee of six teachers, two administrative staff, and a counselor from the school who recommended changing the curriculum to allow students the opportunity to choose elective courses.
Middle School Principal David Reiser explained why that is important.
“We always want our kids to be engaged in school, want to come to school. We think that offering different choices and options that the flexibility that this schedule will provide for us is going to help encourage kids to want to come to school.”
Some of the electives proposed include art, computers, choir, band, PE and enrichment courses in math, science, social studies and language arts.
According to Reiser, the new curriculum will be popular with students and their parents.
"As the principal, I field a lot of calls about why does my kid have to be in vocal music, why does my kid have to be in PE?" Reiser commented. "Now, this flexibility lets them choose what they want to be in. If they like PE, they can choose to be in it the whole school year. Or they can be in weights the whole school year. But they don't have to be in it for a whole school year like they currently do. I just think it's going to help a lot of our kids just have some choices."
The School Board plans to vote on the changes at their luncheon meeting on April 27th. If the new curriculum is approved, it will be implemented at the middle school next fall.