Some students at Grandview will never have to sit through a dreary Advisory period again. 

Before fall break, students identified as Gifted and Talented were given the opportunity to either stay in Advisory or join an enrichment group where they are surrounded by students who share their interests. 

There is a wide variety of options based on students’ interests, from social justice or leadership, to computer science. These enrichment groups will take the place of Advisory for those who opted to participate in them.

In the enrichment groups, students are starting to develop projects that they are passionate about. 

“I wanted to do a cultural night and also do a showcase night for all of the enrichment groups,” said Mae Chen, a senior in the social justice/leadership enrichment group. 

She said that many students were interested in working with her. 

“I could tell that we were finding our people,” Chen said. 

The opportunity to work on passion projects within enrichment groups will be a positive force in participant’s lives. 

“When you have a group, you feel empowered to really put change into whatever you really want to do and take initiative,” Chen said.    

The implementation of enrichment groups may have seemed abrupt to students identified as Gifted and Talented, but it has been in the works for a while.

 “For the last several years, we’ve really tried to make a change in that by creating specific programming for gifted and talented students that may better meet their needs—not for more [work], but for passion to show up in [their] daily school lives,” GT counselor Dr.Mugge-Cozza said.

It remains unclear whether non-Gifted and Talented students will get the opportunity to participate in enrichment groups in upcoming years. 

“I think it can totally be opened to the whole entire school. It’s just that [it] would be a lot of work for the counselors, and I don’t know if everybody would be interested,” Chen said. 

Dr. Mugge-Cozza had a more optimistic view on this prospect.

 “Let’s see how it goes and if it’s as awesome and as great as I think it’s gonna be, we can get more people on board,” Mugge-Cozza said.