Thomas Edison HS/Wheaton HS Roundtable Advisory Committee Report

The Thomas Edison High School of Technology/Wheaton High School Roundtable Advisory Committee released its report last week.

Superintendent of schools Dr. Weast will be reviewing the report as he develops his recommendation about Edison and Wheaton.

On February 8th (tomorrow) Dr. Weast will release his recommendation.
On February 28th, the Board of Education will have a work session.
On March 15th, the Board of Education will hold a public hearing.
Finally, on March 28th, the Board of Education will take action.

The Committee developed several approaches to deal with Edison and Wheaton. Below is an excerpt from the report describing each approach.


Approach 1—One Comprehensive High School and One Career Technology Education (CTE) Center on Current Site
A. Status Quo
• Maintain existing relationship between Thomas Edison High School of Technology (Edison) and Wheaton High School
• Program improvements as needed for Edison and Wheaton High School
B. Edison and Wheaton High School in one building
• Buildings are attached and located on the current site
• Keep Edison and Wheaton High School separate and add an application-based magnet program at Wheaton High School
• Expand enrollment in the CTE center programs at Edison
• Upgrade programs and expand partnerships at Edison and Wheaton High School
• No redundancy in CTE programs between Edison and Wheaton High School
C. Two separate buildings for Edison and Wheaton High School
• Keep Edison and Wheaton High School separate and add an application-based magnet program at Wheaton High School
• Expand enrollment in the CTE center programs at Edison
• Upgrade programs and expand partnerships at Edison and Wheaton High School
• No redundancy in CTE programs between Edison and Wheaton High School

Approach 2—One Comprehensive High School that Includes the CTE Programs of Thomas Edison High School of Technology and Wheaton High School
A. One comprehensive high school on the site that serves the needs of all students
• School offers graduation requirement courses, current Wheaton  High School  CTE programs, and current Edison CTE center programs in one Grades 9–12 school.
• School serves the whole continuum of students—for example, special education, English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL), Gifted and Talented (GT), Advanced Placement (AP)
• Expand the time period to acquire credits for CTE programs from 2 years (Grades 11 and 12 for most programs) to 4 years
• Add CTE preparatory courses as needed in Grades 9 and 10
• Provide two enrollment patterns:
• For Downcounty Consortium (DCC) students:  Enroll in the comprehensive high school without designating a specific CTE program or choose to apply to the CTE center programs
• For students outside DCC:  Students across the county apply to the CTE programs5
B. One  comprehensive  high  school on the site that serves the needs of all students and allows students to enroll after Grade 9.
• Same as 2.A. but allows additional students to enroll in comprehensive  high  school for Grades 10, 11, or 12
C. One  comprehensive  high  school on the site that serves the needs of all students and allows students to enroll in CTE programs for part of the day while remaining enrolled in their home high school.
• Same as 2.A. but allows additional students to enroll in CTE programs in Grades 10, 11, or 12 for part of the day while remaining enrolled in their home high school

Approach 3—Wheaton High  School Remains on the Current Site and CTE Center Programs Are Relocated to Another Site
• Move Edison CTE center programs to another location
• Upgrade CTE programs at Edison and create additional partnerships with businesses
• Make Wheaton High School a high-tech high school and expand partnerships

Approach 4—Multiple Locations for CTE Programs
• Create three comprehensive CTE centers throughout the county
• Students would attend the center for CTE programs and attend their home high school for most graduation requirements
• CTE programs that are packaged together by industry/subject matter and divided among separate comprehensive high schools, which would allow student to have more access to programs (disperse Edison CTE center programs to comprehensive high schools across the county)
• Roll the CTE/magnet programs into other modernization projects and offer an upcounty and downcounty CTE center
• Make Wheaton High School a high-tech high school and expand partnerships

Approach 5—Charter school with business involvement
• CTE programs would be run by a charter school with business involvement Roundtable members also identified implementation strategies that could be considered with any of the approaches.  These strategies include:
1. Create a middle school connector or overview program that lead to CTE programs
2. Create more MCPS  Foundation courses to help develop CTE programs and magnet
programs
3. Create introductory classes at home school for Grade 9 students that introduce students to
CTE programs
4. Make CTE facilities available for adult education

The report is located here: http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/planning/pdf/EdisonWheatonFinalRoundtableReport.pdf