Community Middle School
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Community Middle School is a middle school located in Plainsboro Township in Middlesex County, New Jersey serving students in grades 6 through 8. The school is part of the West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District, a school district serving students from West Windsor Township (in Mercer County) and Plainsboro Township (in Middlesex County). As of the 2003-04 school year, Community Middle school served approximately 1,066 students (per the National Center for Education Statistics).
The West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District is one of the top achieving districts in New Jersey.
The mascot of Community Middle School is the panther, which symbolizes strength, quick thinking, and fierce competition. The school colors are black (for the panther), red, and white.
Contents |
[edit] Location
Community Middle School is part of a three-school campus that also includes Millstone River Elementary School, which serves fourth and fifth graders, and West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North, which serves students from ninth to twelfth grade. The district has two additional schools in Plainsboro Township and four other schools in West Windsor Township, which is the site of the district's other middle school, Grover Middle School.
[edit] Subjects
There are four essential classes in Community Middle School each lasting approximately one hour or one period. Lengths of periods can vary from 60 minutes to 40 minutes. The essential classes are taught by groups of teachers often called teams. In each team, there are about four teachers who teach the subjects of Science, IRLA (Integrated Reading and Language Arts), Social Studies (Civics), and Mathematics. Each grade consists of a group of teams that each teach a group of students. There are also team field trips and team days. For 6th grade, the teams are 6A, 6B, 6C, 6D. For 7th grade the teams are 7A, 7B, 7C, 7D. For 8th grade the teams are 8A, 8B, 8C, 8D, 8E. In addition to the four basic classes instructed at CMS, there are also three classes that last about 40 minutes long. These classes are World Language classes, A-B day classes(also called electives), and Cycle classes.
Seventh graders get to pick one elective, and eighth graders get to pick two electives. In sixth and seventh grade, students have their electives every other day and have physical education in place of the days that do not have electives. Eighth grade students have electives opposite each other in somewhat complicated 2-day schedules.
Cycles are extra curricular classes that each student is assigned to every year. Each cycle is a fraction of the year, and each cycle is a different subject. For example, in the 7th grade each cycle is a marking period, on alternating days, and are either Technology, Health, Music, Computers, Art, or Life Skills.
[edit] World languages
There are four languages taught at CMS: Spanish, Mandarin Chinese, German, and French. If students wish to learn German or French, sixth grade is the first grade in which those languages are available to students. Spanish is the sole language available to students beginning at the grades of two and three. In fourth and fifth grade, students are asked to choose between Mandarin Chinese or to continue Spanish. Thus, students continuing to learn Spanish at grades six through eight are generally more experienced in their dialect than students learning Mandarin who are two years behind and French and German students who begin in sixth grade.
[edit] A-B Day Classes
A and B Day Classes are actually two classes that alternate days. Throughout the year, students go to their A and B Day Classes depending upon if it is a B Day or an A Day. For example:
If a week starts with Monday being an A Day, the student will have his or her A Day Class which could be Gym, Orchestra, Band, Choir, and others. On Tuesday, it would be a B Day in which a student would have a class different from what he had the previous day. Threfore, if a student had Gym on an A Day, he or she could have Band or Orchestra on a B Day. The consecutive classes are 40 minutes long.
[edit] Cycle classes
Cycles are sections of the year where students take an additional class on top of the basic classes, world language, and A and B Day Classes. Unlike A and B Day Classes, Cycle classes are taught every day, but only for a set amount of days, after which there is a new cycle with a new class. A Cycle lasts about seven to ten weeks.
- Sixth Grade Cycles: Music, Art, Computer Literacy, Life Skills, and Health.
- Seventh Grade Cycles: Music, Art, Industrial Technology, Life Skills, Health, Computer Literacy.
- Eighth Grade Cycles: Music, Art, Health.
[edit] Honor roll
To be eligible for the Honor Roll, students must attain grades in the "B" range or above. To be eligible for Principal's Honor Roll which is a slightly greater honor, students may only receive one grade in the "B" range. The other grades must be in the A range or else it is an Honor Roll.
[edit] Accomplishments
- The Community Middle School Science Olympiad Team was the National Champion at the National Science Olympiad Tournament held at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2005.[1][2] The team included some of the best and most talented students of the school, most of whom have won medals at the Regional, State, and National level. They beat out the reigning champion, Booth Middle School, who had won the National Award for nine of ten years. The Community Middle School team has also won the state title the past five years; their most recent being on March 14, 2006, where they set an all-time New Jersey record of 36 points.
- Karen Galley won teacher of the year award honors. She also was nominated for ACS Chemistry teacher of the year.
- Daesun Yim, the 2006 National MathCounts champion, attended Community Middle School and won the MathCounts competition in eighth grade.
[edit] Bomb Scares
On October 27,2006, a note was found in a bathroom claiming a bomb would go off between 12:00 and 1:00. Students were evacuated to West Windsor -Plainsboro High School North across the street and missed the most of the day. On November 30, 2006 another note was found on a bathroom wall. The note was not credible, but students were evacuated because a time was alotted.
[edit] Administration
- Dr. Arthur C. Downs - Principal
- Donna Gibbs-Ninni Assistant Principal
- Stephanie Leroux Assistant Principal
[edit] References
- ^ State Board Recognizes Winning National Science Olympiad Team, New Jersey Department of Education press release dated September 7, 2005
- ^ National Science Olympiad - May 21, 2005 - Division B. Retrieved on 2006-10-14.
