Friday, Aug. 13, 2010

Tiger Prep ushers in junior high school year

Orientation helps both old and new students tie up all loose ends

The junior high held its orientation Wednesday and Thursday for its 1,430 students.

Los Banos Junior High School's Tiger Prep welcomed seventh-graders on Wednesday, and eighth-graders on Thursday.

Principal Paul Enos, starting his fifth year in that position, said the school gets a high percentage of the students to attend.

"I would say probably 95 percent of the kids will show up," Enos said.

The main purpose of Tiger Prep for the eighth-graders, Enos said, was to pass out schedules. The seventh-graders, new to the school, need to garner physical education clothes and get all of the immunization paperwork in order. School T-shirts and all-purpose binders were also for sale.

The eighth-graders, however, can use the day to pay for a rotating elective, called the Elective Wheel, that is very popular, Enos said.

"They'll have a trimester of ceramics, a trimester of art and a trimester of home economics," Enos said about the elective. "So, there's a fee for that."

Enos said most of the eighth-graders take the Elective Wheel.

Daniel Bautista, a 14-year-old eighth-grader, attended Tiger Prep with his mother, Anne-Marie. Daniel, who attended school in Dos Palos before moving to Los Banos, said he did not like having to come a week before school started to get his schedule.

"I'm from Dos Palos and it was a lot easier, because we would just get it the first day of school," Daniel said.

Anne-Marie said she liked that the school passed out schedules before school started, but she would have preferred to get the schedule online.

Enos said the junior high is working toward making that option available for parents.

Enterprise staff writer Thaddeus Miller can be reached at 388-6562 or by e-mail at tmiller@losbanosenterprise.com.