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Date: 1/5/2022
AMHERST – In their Dec 21 meeting, the Amherst Regional School Committee went over new courses for the Amherst-Pelham Regional High School curriculum that includes Disability Justice Literature, Fiber Arts, Advanced Robotics, Introduction to Dance: Hip Hop, House, and Locking Course as well as a few others.
The new class proposals were developed by eight teachers and were approved earlier this month in a unanimous vote by the Amherst-Pelham Regional School Committee.
Superintendent Michael Morris said the courses match the goal of the high school to provide students a deeper understanding of the world around them but cautioned that without a proper budget to support these initiatives it would be difficult to incorporate these new courses.
He added that the budget will largely depend on the assessment method that will divvy up the payments for which Amherst, Pelham, Shutesbury and Leverett will be responsible. As the budgets continue to be built for the next school year, Morris said that will play a factor in the possibility of these new courses.
Committee representative from Amherst Peter Demling was appreciative of the variety of courses and acknowledged the duty for committee members to promote and support a budget that will allow them to incorporate new classes such as these.
“It’s about meeting students where they are, and contouring our offerings to those students,” Demling said.
English Department head Sara Barber-Just was in virtual attendance of the meeting and explained the disability justice literature course. In what has been a five-year project for Barber-Just, she explained the nine-week, quarter-long elective for seniors will focus on reading disabled writers and activists and learning about critical historical moments, such as the adoption of the Americans with Disabilities Act and ending institutionalism.
Some of the readings will include “Sitting Pretty: The View From My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body” by Rebekah Taussig and “The Secret Life of a Black Aspie” by Anand Prahlad.
“It’s like really hearing from the people themselves,” said Barber-Just. “Literature by disabled writers and concepts of disability justice are rarely centered in public school circular. This quarter long course will introduce students to important disabled writers and activists, critical moments of disability history in the United States, and the transformative work of the BIPOC and queer led disability justice collective over the last two decades.”
Art teacher Kristen Ripley is putting together a fiber arts course that she hopes will engage students and add to their artistic skills.
New dance teacher Remy Fernandez O’Brien said the dance program will study the history, culture, and social activism of hip hop.
“Engineering for Social Good” will be taught by John Fabel as part of the effort to offer more advanced technology courses for students. There will also be an “Advanced Robotics” course that will utilize the $5,000 in VEX robotics equipment already at the school.
These new course developments come as the high school continues to use a “4 by 4” block schedule, with four classes in the fall and four classes in the spring instead of the previous format of having seven courses a day with one class each having their own day off, totaling eight classes altogether.
Morris added that more new courses are being introduced in 2022 than in a normal year saying it was a higher number than normal.