[Courtesy of West Central Tribune]

May 26, 2022 is the day many of us have been waiting for. For all of you that don’t know, that is the date for the graduation of the class of 2022. But in order for all of us to experience this joyful day, there are some requirements that need to be met. To graduate, you need to pass the 10th grade ELA Grade exam and the Algebra 1 EOC or get the concordant score on the SAT. As of November 15th, we have 132 seniors who need ONLY English (FSA), 14 students who ONLY need Math (Alg. 1 EOC), and then 109 students who need both exams.

Mrs. Gardiner, an English teacher here at Apopka, is offering SAT English tutoring for those who are interested. When asked what made her begin tutoring, she told us there are a lot of juniors and seniors who have not received the concordant score to graduate. Mrs. Gardiner specializes in grammar and writing so this is the section of the SAT that she focuses the most on. She believes that working on improving your skill in the grammar and writing section is the easiest way to improve your score. Her main goal is to make sure every kid is able to walk the stage when they are supposed to.

These sessions are not structured like your typical after school tutoring sessions. Instead, she has identified the students who are in need of help and uses her sixth period to teach whole other classes or pull small groups of students out of their classes in order to assist them on improving their scores. She teaches a class of about 25 students every two weeks. She is now beginning to work with some of the sports teams here at Apopka like the girls and boys basketball teams. Mrs. Gardiner told us that she has seen improvement in scores since she started working with these students and highlighted that one student even went up 120 points.

If you are in need of the scores needed to graduate, there is still plenty of time and tons of places to get help. Mrs. Gardiner is located in room 549A or you can email her using [email protected]. Apopka High School offers tutoring for almost every subject with locations, dates, and times located on the Canvas dashboard. May 26 is coming sooner than you think and I know you don’t want to miss out.