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Transition from Hillview to MA

Original post made by Big Jim, Menlo Park: South of Seminary/Vintage Oaks, on Feb 3, 2017

MA gave a talk at Hillview recently, I think 83% of Hillview 8th graders become 9th graders at MA. MA also draws from La Entrada and Ravenswood. At Hillview they split up the large class size (about 320) into several smaller "learning academies". There has been some research about the costs and the benefits of this approach. Benefit is that its easier to socialize in a smaller group.

I understand MA has larger class sizes (about 600) and I'm wondering why they don't take a page out of Hillview's playbook and use this approach. Surely some high schools do it. Princeton and Yale do something similar with "residential colleges". Even Stanford GSB does it. So if middle school students, college students, and grad students benefit, why not high school students. Also, do the kids get iPads like they did at Hillview? Just wondering how big a change it is from MPCSD to SUHSD districts and schools. What was the transition like for your child?

Comments (1)

Posted by Big Jim
a resident of Menlo Park: South of Seminary/Vintage Oaks
on Feb 8, 2017 at 3:33 pm

I've been asking around and I guess the answer is MA administration has its hands full. When you move from MPCSD to MA high school, you turn in your personal iPad. MA then has 1700 Chromebooks, but they stay on campus. And you go from your smaller learning academy of 80 students to a larger MA freshman class of 600. Well most of you do, but 17% don't ultimately attend MA and pay for an independent high school.

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