Unleveled courses encourage community

HANNE BRABANDER Assistant A&E Editor

Algonquin predominantly offers leveled courses, but still offers the opportunity to take mixed-level and unleveled courses which can foster additional academic benefits by allowing students to grow and learn together.

Algonquin often relies on the tradition of ability-based grouping, creating levels that are designed to reflect students’ skill level. These levels fall into three categories: college prep, honors and advanced placement (AP). However, there are several exceptions to this norm; all freshmen are enrolled in unleveled United States History I, and there are various mixed-level electives as well as open honors-level courses. An unleveled course is a class open to all where students will receive college prep credit; a mixed-level elective course is one that has students taking the class at an honors level and college prep.

According to Principal Sean Bevan, leveling can unintentionally lead to many challenges.

“[Leveled classes] can really stifle a student’s growth sometimes,” Bevan said. “It can make a student feel like they are only a certain level or ability and that it’s a fixed feature of their personality and strengths, and not something they can grow through.”

According to the 2021 Novak Education article, “What You Need to Know About Deleveling,” ability-based level courses potentially facilitate a system that can eliminate the possibility for students to learn in a diverse classroom, preventing many learners from accessing advanced coursework with their peers.

In recent years, many ARHS courses have experimented with deleveling, aiming to create a more inclusive environment– a safe space for all students to thrive.

During the 2018-2019 school year, the U.S. History I course underwent a drastic curriculum change and switched to an unleveled class, prioritizing skillbased learning experience opening potential pathways for students. U.S. History I teacher Kristen Turner believes the course emphasizes the potential successes of unleveled classes.

“We [U.S. I teachers] were focused on providing an equitable place where kids can all succeed,” Turner said.

In the Social Studies department, all electives are stand-alone courses only offered at the honors level, but are open to everyone without a prerequisite. Department Head Brittany Burns prioritizes equity and access for these courses, as she believes it is important that all students have access to high level, rigorous curricula.

“[Members of the Social Studies department] felt like, with those courses in particular, what was most important was the level of interest,” Burns said. “It is more about meeting standards and looking at personal growth rather than a specific criteria or level.”

According to Burns, before adapting the electives to be open honors-level courses, the college prep level electives would often not receive enough interest to run during any given semester. Thus, many students missed out on learning about a topic they were interested in.

“It is important to offer opportunities for all students to learn and to succeed and to show their knowledge and growth,” Burns said.

Another practice that challenges the tradition of leveled classes is that of mixed-level courses. After many years of Journalism running as separate honors and college prep courses, it has been taught as a mixed-leveled course for several years with college prep and honors-level students in the same class.

“Leveling has a lot to do with self-perception,” Journalism teacher Lindsay Coppens said. “For the students who are traditionally honors-level students, it is beneficial to have an opportunity to be in a class with students who have different experiences and viewpoints, and vice versa.”

Having a combined class is the best of both worlds according to Coppens. It allows her to teach the same content and skill building material, while having the ability to be flexible with certain students if need be.

“The offering of the levels gets them in the door,” Coppens said. “Once they’re in the room it provides them the ability to make the choices that are best for them as learners.”

Other English electives such as Silenced Voices and Creative Writing have also been taught as mixed-level classes. According to English Department Head Jane Betar, the philosophy of unleveling and mixed-level classes is a conversation currently being discussed by teachers in the English department.

“I’d be really curious to have a team of teachers study [unleveling freshman year] a little bit more and see what happens if we put it into place,” Betar said.

Freshman English teacher Rebecca Pratt believes unleveling should be heavily considered for the course in the future to ease students into the transition to high school.

“Unleveled courses give a more even playing field to allow students to get used to high school,” Pratt said. “I think having a mix of students is good for all students to engage with different personalities and abilities across the board.”

Deleveling can open the doors to opportunities.

“The research has shown that students do well in unleveled classes, and we were happy to test that out and for it to be true,” Turner said. “We have found there to be no drawbacks and only benefits.”