By Kathleen McAleese
Managing Editor

With course selections fast approaching, the Ghostwriter gives you 9 tips for planning out your upcoming ’14-’15 school year.

1. Take a variety of classes. Overloading your schedule with similar classes, especially early in your high school years, will both lessen time in your schedule for more enjoyable classes and lessen your options and exposure to other subjects that you may not have had the opportunity to explore.

2. Balance is key. As great as you may think overloading your schedule with AP and Honors classes looks for college, extracurriculars like clubs and sports are imperative to coming across as a balanced individual – and always leave time in your schedule for sleep.

3. Get necessary requirements out of the way. One computer class is required for all students. Depending on if you want to be in Image Editing with all underclassmen as a senior or not, you should budget your time wisely when it comes to classes you need to take. On the positive side, learning computer skills early in your high school career can be very beneficial.

4.Take an ADC. If you want to help other kids with their classes, you can be an ADC tutor. This will get you either community service hours or course credit. If you need some extra help from some peers when it comes to your studies, ADC tutors could lend helping hands. On top of that, a break in a long list of academic courses can be stressful, making one block of study time incredibly valuable.

5. Avoid doubling up on gym. Gym is usually a nice break throughout the day, but when you waive a year of gym and end up having to take it for an entire year to graduate, it can be a bummer.

7. Take a prerequisite. Classes like Foundations of Art or Marketing I open up your options to take more advanced art and business classes. As an underclassmen with a lack of direction when it comes to the future, taking a class that will give you more and more classes as options in the future could help give you some direction.

6. Know the final choice is your own. When it comes down to course selection, you know yourself better than anyone else. Take into account your strengths and weaknesses and try and select classes that you will be challenged a healthy amount.

7. Take a class that you can benefit from. Aside from the regular required classes, there are plenty of elective classes that you can use to your advantage. Classes such as Child Development can give students valuable life skills. Classes with real world application will give you skills to take outside the classroom setting. Some of these classes include Personal Finance, Journalism I, Public Speaking and more.

8. Take your foreign language seriously. Some students take foreign languages just because they ‘look good for college’ but really, the opportunity to learn a new language should be cherished. Languages can expose you to travel or exchange opportunities. Additionally, these studies can help with English vocabulary and derivatives.

9. Pick an appropriate level of classes. As said before, you know yourself better than anyone else. That said, do not fool yourself into thinking that you can take a level of a class that you will be drowning in. Challenges are healthy, but there is a fine line between being challenged and a ruining your school year, especially if you are overriding.

The Ghostwriter recommends some electives to take:

Film and Lit

Intro to Engineering

Psychology

Westford History

Journalism I

Lyric Writing

Image Editing

Public Speaking

Marketing I