As the first semester concludes for Benet Academy, freshmen through juniors select course options for the next academic year. As they opened the curriculum guide, students saw many new academic course selections for the following year. Benet Academy students now have the opportunity to take more Advanced Placement (AP) courses earlier on in their academic careers.

Benet Academy now has twenty AP-level courses in its academic curriculum, like AP Psychology and AP Language and Composition. Bella Kurellko, a junior at Benet Academy, said, “I am excited for Benet to offer AP Psych! It is a great opportunity for us to explore and develop an understanding of the human psyche.” This class will be offered for both Juniors and Seniors in the upcoming school year. Moreover, another additional AP class that has attracted many current sophomores is AP Language and Composition. This class will now be available for rising juniors to take and fulfill the British Literature requirement at Benet.

Another exciting addition to Benet is the Collegiate Level classes. These classes carry the same grade weight as AP classes but are not explicitly accompanied by an AP test. An example is Benet Academy’s level 5 language courses, which have moved from the honors to the collegiate category. Kurellko believes that “the new classes will help us prepare for college admissions.” She also said, “The new curriculum sets the class of 2025 and younger with opportunities that we only dreamed of having.”

Beyond expanding the difficulty level of courses, Benet Academy is also promoting interest classes. Classes such as AP Psychology excite students as they can explore the first pure social science at the Academy. Other art classes like Web Designing and Graphic Design allow students to intersect creativity with the digital world. From a letter in the curriculum guide from Benet Academy’s Principal William Myers, he believes, “From our required courses to a robust elective program, you can choose how to construct your rigorous learning experiences, participate in opportunities for involvement, and interact with strong support systems.”

Overall, this addition of new classes in Benet Academy’s curriculum provides a new opportunity for students to continue living out the Benedictine tradition of “Work and Pray” but on a heightened academic level.