This course is a survey of economic life that aims to create a sense for what a healthy relationship to the economy means to each individual student. We begin from the premise that the whole of humanity is knit together in a global economy. The potential for free individual self-development in creating the conditions for an economic life that strives to actualize the ideal of brotherhood or cooperation is emphasized. We explore how the economic activities of production, trading, and consumption are bounded by culture and nature. The wealth generated by economic activities also depends on intellectual creativity and the capacities of laborers, and this is explored in historical context. The course reflects the idea that a sense of fairness and equality between human beings should regulate human relations within the economic sphere.
Instructor: Denese Giordano
This course will introduce students to the fundamental ideas of conventional evolutionary theory. Using the animal kingdom we will focus on the increasing complexity exhibited by the organisms of the various phyla beginning with the porifera and ending with the chordates. Classical Darwinism will be compared to other ideas including modern evolutionary theory. Students will be asked to examine and understand the special position the human being occupies within the living world.
Instructor: Carolyn Ver Pault
This course presents the students with a survey of African History in order to provide the students with a broad, general background of African History in the hope that they will be able to see more clearly the role of Africa in the world today. Emphasis will be placed on the different cultures that arose on the continent, from ancient times, through the colonial period and up to the present. While the class will not be able to touch on everything in Africa’s rich history, hopefully the students will gain a greater appreciation of the contributions and struggles of the African people. The students will complete an artistic project inspired by current events in Africa as their final project for the course. Lecture and a reading packet will serve as the basis of student learning.
Instructor: Emmie Yaeger
The students examine the social, religious, geographical, political, and philosophical influences affecting the activities and life of a culture by observing the physical structures that a society erects. We look at the use of caves, the development of Greek temples, theaters and city centers, and the Roman mastery of various methods of construction.
Instructor: Jeffrey Katzman
Optics is the science of the visual world. Light cannot be seen directly, it is only through the interaction with matter that we perceive its existence. Students will explore the phenomena of reflection, refraction, polarization, dispersion and colors, interference, and diffraction. We will study images generated by mirrors (flat, convex and concave) and lenses (biconcave and biconvex) through observable quantities (parallax and perspective), and later through the ray-tracing. We will discuss some of the contemporary topics related to optics like the wave and particle models. Topics of special relativity and quantum mechanics are added according to the time available.
Instructor: Victor Kim
The seniors read a selection of Russian poetry and prose works by authors such as Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, and Solzhenitsyn. Biographies of these authors and others are studied. In addition, each student chooses an area of history or culture of Russia and presents a report to the class.
Instructor: Deirdre Somers
The senior class presents a play in the late spring. Everyone participates either through a dramatic role or through help with the technical production.
Instructor: Deirdre Somers
During this course the students will look at several aspects of World History that were not possible to visit during the history track classes or main lessons. The class will focus on modern political issues that shape and define the current political situation of the world. Some of theses topics include radicalization of Islam, treatment of prisoners of war, politics of oil, the Israeli Palestinian conflict, global terrorism, and domestic surveillance. The goal is for the students to begin to see the world as not merely a series of events strung together, but rather to perceive the deeper impulses that run through events or even epochs. This course curriculum and instructional style is designed to prepare students for active participation and understanding of current events issues and for more advanced studies in college.
Instructor: Emmie Yaeger
Transcendentalism is examined through the lens of American identity, Nineteenth Century spiritual and intellectual movements, and as a specific, modern manifestation of Romanticism. Through examination of seminal American literary figures such as Emerson, Thoreau, Fuller, Dickinson, and Whitman, this course introduces students to key concepts such as self-reliance, the Oversoul, and the role of tradition in the education of the individual.
Instructor: Alexios Kritas
Students will develop fundamental writing skills, including good sentence structure, solid paragraphs with topic sentences, proper use of vocabulary, mechanics and transitional phrases. After reading short stories, articles and poems in class, students will work on writing clear summaries, comparisons, articles, critiques, essays and analysis papers. Particular attention will be paid to essay development so that students learn to advance an idea forward rather than merely restating it. Students will also practice editing and revising their own writing. In this workshop, enrollment will be limited so that students have ample opportunity to get individualized feedback on their writing skills. Students will be graded on their finished pieces, effort and participation.
Instructor: Alexios Kritas or Peter Goble
This class consists of a systematic overview of world history from the beginning to the present. It is global in scope. We also focus on essential skills necessary for success in college humanities classes, such as writing effective research papers, participating in seminar discussions and writing essay exams. There is a heavy emphasis on global current events and each student is required to not only read the entire textbook, but also a reliable news source.
Instructor: Emmie Yaeger
The goal of this one-year course is to help students understand and develop conceptual principles in physics with the ability to reason by using problem solving skills. Topics include kinematics in one and two dimensions, forces, Newton’s Law of Motion, dynamics of uniform circular motion, work and energy, and impulse and momentum. Elasticity and simple harmonic motion, principle of linear superposition and interference phenomena, Electromagnetic theory, and magnetism are among many concepts developed. Prerequesites: Elective Science: Chemistry and PreCalculus. Corequisite: Calculus.
Instructor: Victor Kim
The students work on college essays using the techniques they have learned¬ – brainstorming, free writing, drafts and revisions, and peer and teacher conferences. They read, discuss, and respond to works of literature from the mid 1800’s up to the present day. As part of daily English, the students have a weekly unit to work through in their vocabulary workbooks.
Instructor: Deirdre Somers
The students do basic eurythmic exercises, such as three-fold walking, and contraction and expansion. Using forms and gestures, the students enter into the inner being of the movement of sound, speech and tone. Speech eurythmy includes: vowels and consonants, poems/poets studied in literature lessons, rhyme forms, meter, construction, thinking/feeling/willing forms, Apollonian and Dionysian forms, symmetrical and geometrical forms. Gestures for soul moods, color, the planets and the zodiac are studied. Tone eurythmy includes: pitch, rhythm, beat, major, minor, dissonance, the intervals and tones.
Instructor: Sabine Kully
The senior French class focus is predominantly on literature with some advanced grammar units. A survey of French literature, theatre and poetry from the 17th century through the present is studied along with a concentration in building a more sophisticated vocabulary.
Instructor: Reina White
The seniors survey all of grammar, literature, and culture from their origins to the present day. They read excerpts by and about the greatest writers of the language. Writings of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries are emphasized.
Instructor: Roland Rothenbucher
The seniors will focus on advanced grammar and vocabulary through conversation, literature and composition. The students will be reading biographies, poetry, and excerpts of
Don Quijote de La Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes.
Instructor: Perla Yanovitch
This is a one-year in-depth study of differential and integral calculus of functions of one real variable. Students will use the calculus, i.e. limits, various methods of differentiation and integration, effectively in their solution of problem in physics, economics, business, the life sciences, and the physics of sports. The students will explore mathematics or the vast domain of inquiring it really is. Prerequesites: PreCalculus and Departmental Approval.
Instructor: Victor Kim
This course primarily deals with functions and the related equations, from data to equation and vice versa. The function concept plays a unifying role in our study of linear, quadratic, polynomial, exponential and logarithmic functions. All of the material is related to real life situations and data. The graphing calculator is introduced and used heavily throughout the course. The last trimester introduces discrete mathematics: probability, combinations, permutations, sequences and series. The course ends with a creative senior project based on a real life situation.
Instructor: Michael Gentile
The Twelfth Grade completes units in soccer, volleyball, team handball, basketball and softball. The students play recreational team games such as kickball and agility drills. During these units, students learn skills, terminology, and rules. They also apply their knowledge and skills to game situations. Fitness and cardiovascular activities are presented throughout the year. Safe playing techniques and sportsmanship are always emphasized.
The twelfth grade social dancing block includes the waltz, lindy, cha cha and tango. To add to the variety of dancing and to enhance the spirit of enjoyment, line dances, circle dances and a square dance are included. Emphasis is placed on thinking less of the footwork and more of moving to the music with the whole body.
Instructors: Bonnie Bolz, Paul LeSueur, and Robert Weschler
In the senior year, students choose one of the art mediums offered at our school (fine art, handwork, or woodwork) and work in that medium for the entire school year. Each senior completes a “Senior Project” in that medium.
Seniors who choose to concentrate on fine art may focus on one technique such as painting, drawing, printmaking, clay sculpture or stained glass. After selecting a theme, students also have the option of combining more than one of these media for their work during the year.
Instructor: Nancy Metz
Seniors who choose to concentrate on handwork are able to deepen their knowledge and expand their skills in any one of the following areas: weaving, dyeing, felting, spinning & knitting, sewing/quilting, tailoring or bookbinding/box making. The students spend the first month of the year designing and planning the project, gathering supplies and creating a timeline for themselves for the remainder of the year. From October through April the students work on the projects in time for them to be completed and put on display during the school’s “Spring Festival” in early May.
Instructor: Jeffrey Katzman
Twelfth Grade students who choose woodworking for the school year will have the opportunity to build a fine piece of furniture. Depending on the skills and motivation of the student, s/he may make a cabinet with paneled doors and a drawer, a small desk with a file cabinet and a drawer, a computer desk, a rustic dining table or a chest of drawers. Each student has about 50 hours for the senior project, 20 of which should be allotted to sanding and finishing.