One of the many recent additions to Jesuit High School is the option for students to take enrichment courses.

Enrichment classes were created to offer students something more in the direction of an co-curricular type course during the school day and to broaden students’ experiences and interests.

“For example, students could learn Mandarin or digital media skills without the pressure of homework,” said Mr. Colin O’Connor, English Teacher.

The classes are designed to have no homework and are graded as pass or fail. There are a variety of different enrichment classes. For example, Mr. Ronald Cunha,Instrumental Music Teacher, offers a Jazz Appreciation Class offers a chance to learn about jazz’s origins and history as well as famous musicians who have contributed to the genre. Jazz Appreciation also gives students the opportunity to learn a little about the composition of jazz and the blues music.

“It’d be great if we could take the class on a field trip to the jazz club, Yoshi’s, in Oakland,” said Mr. Cunha as he explained his plans for future Jazz Appreciation Courses.

Another course, digital media, “gives students opportunities to spend some dedicated time learning or further developing their digital media skills,” said Mr. O’Connor.

Students who have interest in the digital media field of jobs and careers should sign up for this class to gain experience. Mr. O’Connor is trying to make his class one in which students can discover new and possible interests in the digital field. He also emphasizes that Digital Media is a class in which students learn to design and make their own creations, not just use others’ creations.

Ms. Julia Yang, Biology and General Science Teacher, offers Learning Mandarin Course gives students completely new to the language insights as to how it works.

“The hope will be that students leaving the course will have the ability to use basic sentences that will be useful while traveling,” said Ms. Yang.

Aside from learning Mandarin, the class learns about and experiences some of the different Asian cultures.

Many of the different teachers for enrichment classes are beginning to imagine new features that they want to incorporate into their courses. Hopefully, with students becoming more familiar with the concept of enrichment classes, they will have the initiative to sign up for a course that they might take interest in.

There are many more enrichment classes, such as yoga and organic gardening. Each course allows for students to get a glimpse into specific subjects and learning opportunities that standard classes do not offer.