The Intensive Learning selection process based on random numbers and student selection will be taking place in public view next week, announced Upper School Director Meredith Godley during an assembly Tuesday afternoon.

The process is as follows: students are randomly assigned a number within a group based on their grade and how many times they have traveled. Students within a group will select their trip of choice from available programs when called by their assigned random number. Seniors who have not traveled will be the first to select on Tuesday, September 18, followed by everyone else on subsequent days.

The process is similar to what used to happen behind closed doors after students submitted a Google Form.

The upper school was shown a video demonstrating the now public process at the assembly. Students will need a parent or guardian to sign their permission slip to participate in the process, similar to the previous online selection form.

IL Intro from MFS WordsWorth on Vimeo.

Godley told WordsWorth that there was a lack of transparency and concern about the randomness with the process in previous years, but everything is now completed in public view.

A major difference is that students can see the other students signed up for a program, but Godley said the goal is not to get friend groups going to the same place. “I don’t think that’s going to happen,” she said.

Godley said there is a small increase in student choice by conducting the process in public, because students can see what programs are full and can adjust their preferences.

To ensure students taking a foreign language get first choice on a their language’s trip, students are able to sign up through their language teacher before the process begins.

Upper School Service Coordinator and Computer Science Teacher Gail Barna told WordsWorth she will be creating the program to generate the random numbers herself. She said her program will be truly random, unlike some online generators. Barna offered to show the program to anyone who was skeptical of the randomness of the system.

Sophomore Mikey Paznokas said the added transparency was a positive of the public system. Sophomore Madi Hughes said that one of the downsides of the public process was that it is more time consuming.

 

WordsWorth will have more coverage once the selection process begins.