Our school offers many different Kirkwood courses for students to take, both online and in person. Students will get both high school and college credits for these courses. “Taking Kirkwood classes is a great idea because you get dual credits and our school pays for it,” senior Sophie Bunch said. It’s a way to get ahead on some of the classes you will have to take in college and a very big plus is that our school pays for them.
Most of the courses are online and you will have certain things to accomplish each week. Each professor is different but many provide textbooks for the class. Some will be physical textbooks that you will get from counselor Brett Karkosh and some will be online.
Mount Vernon also has students who use open spaces in their schedule to take some classes on the Kirkwood campus. For this, you would use about three class periods in your schedule so you would be able to drive to Kirkwood and back before your next class at the high school. Most students who do this are juniors and seniors because they can drive themselves or even carpool with other students. Another option is to take a Kirkwood course with a teacher at the high school. There are not as many of these courses available but there are a few.
Online Courses
There is just about anything you could possibly think of for online courses. It’s just a matter of whether or not they are offered in the semester you want to take them. Some online courses are self-paced and some have strict schedules. Some of the common online courses taken are sociology and psychology. To graduate high school you need at least one of these classes. Some taking them through Kirkwood gives you a dual credit for both high school graduation and college credit.
Senior Renae Woods is enrolled in two online courses this semester, one being psychology and the other being drawing. “Psychology is self-paced, so the work for that isn’t necessarily overwhelming,” Woods said. “Drawing assignments are due every week and some are more time-consuming than others. I usually take time out of my weekend to accomplish the assignments. There are also weekly sketchbook entries I have to complete. For those I use my free time during the week to complete an hour each week of a sketch.” Being able to manage your time with all the different classes is a skill students need to be successful at co-curricular classes.
Senior Sophia Bunch is taking sociology online. Her professor is a bit different in the sense that there are assignments that need to be completed regularly. “There is a lengthy discussion post every week,” she said. Each week she knows what she is going to need to do and when to get it done.
Jacob Jordan is taking Art History because he needed elective credit. “It’s not too overwhelming,” he said. “We have one quiz and one Image quiz every week along with the readings and it is not too much. The only time that it gets overwhelming is when we have a discussion, and those have a lot of criteria to follow which makes them hard to write.”
Overall, students say as long as you stay on top of assignments and class, you will be fine, and taking a Kirkwood course won’t be too overwhelming. However, once you begin procrastinating, things are going to get overwhelming.
Going to Kirkwood for class
Not as many kids end up driving to Kirkwood because it takes up some of their time throughout their day. Normally students will take up three spaces in their schedule to go to one Kirkwood class. The most popular class students from Mount Vernon are taking this semester at Kirkwood is Anatomy and Physiology. Senior Nora Weiland is taking Anatomy and Physiology. She has the first two periods off so she can go to Kirkwood at 7:30 a.m. for her class. This is easier for her because she is a senior and can drive herself. She is going into the nursing program so getting some important classes done now will help her in the long run. It also is good to get them done now because she will not have to pay for them. She can save that money for other expenses she will have in college.
Kirkwood courses that Mount Vernon teachers teach
Another option for Kirkwood classes is in person at Mount Vernon High School. We have a few different options for this kind of method. Mount Vernon has about ten different classes that you can choose from if you would like a teacher from our school to teach the Kirkwood class you would like to take.
We offer Composition 1 and 2 with English teacher Alissa Sabers. Currently, for this semester we have four sections of Composition 1 with a total of 43 students enrolled, and Mary Lou Batenhorst has been teaching the class while Sabers was on maternity leave. Batenhorst is going to finish teaching this class for the semester but once next semester starts Sabers will take over. For Composition 2 there are three sections with 63 students. Composition 1 is taken by a mixture of grades but Composition 2 is taken by mostly seniors. Renae Woods is in Composition 1 and said, “This class can be overwhelming at times but if you manage your time and get papers done when they need to be done you will be fine.”
Kevin Murray teaches Intro to Business and Personal Finance. There are two sections of Intro to Business with a total of 30 students. He has two sections of Personal Finance with 44 students. Both of these classes are mixed with kids in grades 10-12.
Erica Nichols teaches Intermediate Spanish 1 and 2 along with Cornell Spanish grammar and Spanish text. There are two sections of intermediate Spanish 1 with 36 students and two sections of intermediate Spanish 2 with a total of 34 students. The Cornell Spanish grammar has one section with four students and Cornell Spanish text also has one section with four people.
Architecture Plans and Specs is taught by Shawn Voigt with one section with four students. This class is not taken by many students, mainly because not many kids know about the class.
Lastly, is Statistics taught by Nathan Namanny with two sections totaling 29 students. Bunch is in this class this semester. “I like the challenge and Namanny does a good job of helping out the class when it is really needed,” she said.
As you can see many kids take advantage of this opportunity. It’s a good way to get dual credit as long as you get the in-person interaction with the teacher. “With a teacher present is nice because I can go in and ask questions whenever I have any time when you take them online there is a communication barrier through email,” Bunch said. Sometimes when you email a teacher it can take a long time for you to get a response and it can be too late by the time you end up getting it. So having a teacher at the school makes it so the teacher is available at all times for any questions you may have.
Overall taking Kirkwood classes in high school is a great idea. No matter what option you choose to do it will help you in the long run. “One hundred percent,” Jordan said. “It is free and helps you get college credit done which I think is amazing. It also gives you a head start on how college classes will look like and be.” Getting as many done as you can now so they are free is a very good idea.
