CONNEAUT — This year, the students of Conneaut High School came back to many changes. Former athletic director, Dawn Zappitelli, moved up to fill the position of principal. This left a vacancy in the athletic director’s position which was filled by Joel Taylor, former government teacher and baseball coach.
When Zappitelli was asked what she enjoyed most about being principal, she said, “I like being more involved with all the student activities.”
In addition to new administration members, the students of CHS also came back to classes that were not previously offered. Some of these new classes include Statistics, Chemistry II, Yoga and Fitness and Current Events.
Many students took the opportunity to take an extended lab period of Chemistry II in collaboration with Advanced Placement Calculus. On Mondays and Wednesdays students attend a double period of AP Calculus and on Tuesdays and Thursdays they attend Chemistry II. The students alternate between AP Calculus and Chemistry II every other Friday. During this extra period, students complete labs and work on enrichment materials. The goal of this extra period is to help students in AP Calculus score higher on the advanced placement test which is taken in the spring. With a high score on this test, students have the opportunity to earn college credit.
Calculus teacher Judy Jones is thrilled with the double period. “The extra time allows me to cover more material, not only more material, but more extensively,” she said.
This extra period also allows Chemistry II students to complete longer labs and will help prepare them for a more college-like environment.
Chemistry teacher Anne Markijohn had similar feelings when it came to the success of the double period. “I believe that this should give them a strong basis for introductory chemistry in college. They will hopefully feel very comfortable with the material,” she said.
During double periods in chemistry students look forward to lab activities, homework sessions and concepts that need more time to go through.
“The lab period has given us more time to do labs and time to go over problems and have one-on-one time with the teacher,” said senior Donovan Beedie.
In addition, new technology and teaching materials are present at CHS this year. The math department adopted much-needed textbooks and calculators. Algebra II teacher, Toni Raisian, explained that the text books were needed because previously different textbooks were used.
“We wanted one cohesive brand for the whole entire school district. They’re newer, use more technology and are all more updated,” Raisian said.
The math department ordered new pre-calculus, geometry, statistics and algebra text books. The AP Calculus class ob-tained Advance Placement workbooks to prepare them for material on the test. These workbooks are often utilized during the extended periods on Mondays and Wednesdays. Technology such as new calculators is also available to students. All math classes now have a new set of Titanium TI-84 calculators which have many useful features and replaced the worn and torn TI-83 calculators previously used in the department.
Senior Tevin Colbert finds the double period to be beneficial. “I’m extremely excited to be able to utilize the good opportunity that is being afforded to us this year,” Colbert said. “I think the extra time is really going to foster the needed skills in order to be successful in the future.”
