Step 1: Think About Your High School Goals
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Before you consider your future - you need to consider your past. Think about how you want your high school experience to go. How you start 9th grade has a big factor on how successful your high school career goes. When thinking about your classes - consider your goals as well as how you have done in school so far. Do you want to step up your game? Has school been tough in the past? We want to make sure you are challenged in class, but in a way that you can find success.
To the right is our NTHS 9th Grade Math Placement guide which will be used to determine your 9th grade math class.
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Step 2: Consider Your Options
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Next you need to know what classes are available for you next year. Please view this in relation to YOU. Do not make decisions based on what others are doing or not doing.
We've prepared short video course descriptions for you over on YouTube - click the picture or button below to check them out. There is also a written, though likely more boring, course catalog below too. |
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Step 3: Make Your Plan
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The document to the right (or below on mobile) is a PDF of a typical sequence of required and optional classes for your graduating class's grade next year.
Your grade will have the following classes pre-assigned to start: Pre-AP English 1 Honors, Biology, PE/Health Questions? Check with your school counselor! |
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Step 4: Enter Your Requests With Ms. Alcaraz
Incoming 9th graders from NTS will be meeting with Ms. Alcaraz in the spring to process their course requests during their school day. Ms. Alcaraz has created an Incoming Freshman video, you can view below.
Special Scheduling Circumstances:
There are a few potential scheduling circumstances that may have common questions. We have tried to address these questions below:
1. Ski Academy: All 9th in Ski Academy will be scheduled with their IS PE or IS PE/Health course as their first ski academy period. If students desire a second section of Ski Academy - they will be assigned either IS Biology for 9th graders. We do encourage 9th grade students to take only 1 period of ski academy and 5 on campus classes if possible. It allows for the best solid start to high school while being able to pursue their skiing. If students desire to take other courses through IS - they may do so via a pre-approved online course, but schedules won't be changed for this purpose. Please speak with your school counselor about those online options before registering. The ski academy contract will be due in May to participate and verification of your participation with your organization will happen in the fall. If a student plans to participate in full-day training - NTHS Ski Academy is not designed to support that program and families are encouraged to explore other educational options in the area.
2. ELD/Learning Center/TA: Students who have mandated periods like ELD or Learning Center will be automatically placed into those periods in their requests and have them locked. These courses will not appear in the request options. Courses like Staff Assistant/Peer Tutor will be assigned generally until the upcoming fall when students will be assigned to teachers based on need. We cannot promise specific placements for TAs (but try to make a match where we can).
3. Coldstream Single Subject Requests: Requests for CSA Single Subject courses will be open initially for 11th and 12th grade students only.
1. Ski Academy: All 9th in Ski Academy will be scheduled with their IS PE or IS PE/Health course as their first ski academy period. If students desire a second section of Ski Academy - they will be assigned either IS Biology for 9th graders. We do encourage 9th grade students to take only 1 period of ski academy and 5 on campus classes if possible. It allows for the best solid start to high school while being able to pursue their skiing. If students desire to take other courses through IS - they may do so via a pre-approved online course, but schedules won't be changed for this purpose. Please speak with your school counselor about those online options before registering. The ski academy contract will be due in May to participate and verification of your participation with your organization will happen in the fall. If a student plans to participate in full-day training - NTHS Ski Academy is not designed to support that program and families are encouraged to explore other educational options in the area.
2. ELD/Learning Center/TA: Students who have mandated periods like ELD or Learning Center will be automatically placed into those periods in their requests and have them locked. These courses will not appear in the request options. Courses like Staff Assistant/Peer Tutor will be assigned generally until the upcoming fall when students will be assigned to teachers based on need. We cannot promise specific placements for TAs (but try to make a match where we can).
3. Coldstream Single Subject Requests: Requests for CSA Single Subject courses will be open initially for 11th and 12th grade students only.
Step 5: Patience and email checking
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Once you have added a course to your requests - it is in. There is no submit button. You can change classes as often as you like when the request window is open if you change your mind. Once the window closes - you will need to contact your school counselor to change any requests and it may fall under the add/drop policy.
Scheduling is like a giant puzzle and takes us about 2 months to create your perfect schedule (it's equivalent to making about 3,000 individual classes all fit together nicely). We can make most student requests work, but we are never able to make them all work. If we can't - we will reach out to talk about alternatives, waitlists, etc. Please be sure to regularly check your email because we may ask you about a scheduling question that needs a prompt reply. If we do not hear back quickly - we may move on to the next student. |
We set mid-May as our goal to return tentative schedules to students each year - however they will be ready...when they are ready.
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