At its meeting Monday, the Indian Prairie School District 204 board approved course updates and new instructional materials for several existing high school classes and two that will be new next year.
The courses included in the changes are French 2, Advanced Placement (commonly referred to as AP) Biology, AP Environmental Science, AP United States History, Criminal Law and World History through Media, according to the meeting agenda.
Following the board’s approval on Monday, the district will be purchasing new textbooks and their accompanying digital resources for all of the courses except World History through Media, amounting to just over $400,000 in total, according to Monday’s meeting agenda.
The board also approved curriculum revisions to the five courses at Monday’s meeting.
The courses were updated via collaboration with teachers from the district’s three high schools in line with state standards, College Board course and exam descriptions for applicable courses, the district’s strategic plan, “culturally responsive instructional practices” and the district’s “Portrait of a Graduate” goals, according to the meeting agenda.
District 204’s director of high school core curriculum and instruction Michael Purcell gave a presentation on the proposed curriculum updates for next school year at the district’s board meeting on March 24.
At the March meeting, Purcell’s presentation noted that the proposed revisions would be open for comment until the April board meeting, when they would then be voted on. At Monday’s meeting, the district confirmed that there had been no public comment on the changes.
The French course and three AP courses are all existing classes at Indian Prairie high schools, Purcell explained in March, but Criminal Law and World History through Media will be new next year.
For the French course revision, Purcell noted in his March presentation that the new units for the course align closely with the AP French curriculum that students can take later on in high school, per the district’s course catalog.
The three AP courses that will be updated for next year are AP Biology, AP Environmental Science and AP U.S. History.
The AP Environmental Science course in particular tends to provide students who do not take many other AP classes during their time at Indian Prairie a chance to take an AP course, Purcell noted.
“We really look for those opportunities to, to talk about AP classes that are more accessible than others,” Purcell said at the March 24 meeting. “It’s not easy by any means, but unlike an AP calculus class or an AP physics class, it doesn’t require as much background knowledge to access. It requires an interest and a work ethic.”
The updated AP U.S. History curriculum focuses on themes including national identity, geography and the environment, migration and settlement, politics and power and American regional culture, Purcell previously said.
Asked by board member Susan Demming in March about culturally-responsive instruction, Purcell noted that the new French resource represents French-speaking cultures that are not France, and said that the AP Environmental Science resource showcases more diverse portrayals of scientists.
In January, the board also approved changes to the middle school English Language Arts curriculum, which will now use a digital curriculum resource. They also OK’d the district to modify some of the books it teaches: all sixth-graders will read “The Giver” by Lois Lowry, while seventh-graders will read “Brown Girl Dreaming” by Jacqueline Woodson and eighth-graders will read “Twelve Angry Men” by Reginald Rose.
The changes approved Monday will also extend to two new course offerings for next year: Criminal Law and World History through Media.
The two new courses were brought to the board in October, according to past reporting. They were approved in the fall so that students could enroll in the courses in time for the 2025-26 school year, Purcell explained at the March meeting.
The two courses are not AP classes, Purcell said, but rather one-semester social studies electives available to students in grades 10-12.
The idea for these courses is to prepare students for the transition between the district’s freshman year geography class requirement and the U.S. history course requirement.
“Some of our students leave our freshman social studies class not quite ready to take on U.S. history,” Purcell said at the March meeting. “So (we) really wrote these classes with that in mind – to really look at, what are those social science skills that students need to bridge that gap.”
As for the criminal law class, Purcell noted in March that it was born out of surveys of students and staff on what types of courses they’d like to see, and based on survey data from students of what they want to study in the future or pursue as a career path.
The district already offers a business law class for students to take, and Purcell noted that the district wants students to have the option to take both as companion classes.
The World History through Media course will include units on topics like historical accuracy, “What happens when cultures collide?” and “Does change always mean progress?,” according to Purcell’s presentation in March. Students will learn about films as well as podcasts, television, infographics and other forms of media.
mmorrow@chicagotribune.com