To provide students with an interdisciplinary course and to expand the Academic Decathlon program, Academic Decathlon advisor Phil Cerami was approached by assistant principal Matt Haines, to implement an Honors Seminar class into the new school year.
According to Cerami, Honors Seminar has many different components to it that make it unique from other academic classes. It allows students to experience a different way of learning.
“It’s just very exciting for people who don’t just want one way of learning,” Academic Decathlon Co-Captain Alexis Pittman said.
In Honors Seminar, students study one topic from different angles.
“Honors Seminar is a way to take one topic and look at it from all those angles [art, music, literatury, economics, science, and history.] In doing so you get a deeper appreciation for it,” Cerami said.
Through looking at a topic from different angles, students connect with the information they are learning about.
“You get personal with the information and it helps you to retain it better,” Pittman said.
The majority of the class is based off of reading, discussions, and presentations. According to Cerami the course is “very much like a college class.” For Academic Decathlon Co-Captain Roman Stanell in Honors Seminar he learns large amounts of information but it isn’t as stressful as other classes.
“If you are looking to learn and to expand your horizons a little bit but you don’t want the strict rigorous testing that comes with other honors or AP classes, then Honors Seminar is for you,” Stanell said.
In the class, students work independently to understand new concepts.
“Honors Seminar has really become an avenue for us to dive very deeply in a very independent way in a different kind of classroom environment,” Cerami said.
Students have to put in the work to be able to get something out of the class.
“If you are looking for a class where you get what you put in then I would say seminar is for you,” Stanell said.
Even though Honors Seminar lets students work independently, it still allows students to connect with their classmates.
“In Seminar just being able to discuss everything we read and to have that collaboration with not only the teacher but other students and sharing the passion about the material we are reading [is positive,]” Pittman said.
Discussion with classmates allows students to become closer.
According to Stanell Honors Seminar allows students to become family even if not all of them are competing in Academic Decathlon.
Honors Seminar allows students second chances unlike other academic classes. “If you aren’t happy with your grade the first time you take it, you can redo it until you get 100 if you really feel like that,” Stanell said.
Honors Seminar is a course that differs from other classes. “Seminar is such a unique course and its nothing like what I have experienced in my academic career in school. It’s a really good experience,” Pittman said.