In education it is not always about faster, but about better, they believe at the Hooghuis Stadium in Oss. Since this school year, instead of moving directly to the second year, secondary school students can take an extra year, the so-called Stadium Gap Year. “I am now going into the second year with more confidence,” says student Jim (13).
More and more students find education at pre-vocational secondary education (VMBO) theoretical pathway level more difficult, notes Esther van Eggelen, director of Het Hooghuis Stadium. Based on their grades, a large group of students would have to double their grades or take a step back to pre-vocational secondary education.
“But that is often not the solution. Most students have no problems with the content, but they get stuck with the skills they need to learn well,” says Van Eggelen. “If they stay seated, they will be taught the same material again. But they don’t learn how to improve these skills. This causes them to get stuck again later.”
That is why the school has introduced a special gap year after the first grade. During that school year the focus is on improving that basis. “Grades are not always the most important thing, it is also about a child’s development.” After the gap year, students choose whether they go to the second year at VMBO-TL level or take a step back to VMBO level.
“I could have transferred to the second year.”
Since the beginning of this school year, seventeen students have been in the gap year class. One of them is 15-year-old Ishana. “I would rather consciously take five years to complete my VMBO diploma than still have difficulty with some subjects after four years and fail my final exams,” she says.
Her classmate Jim (13) also opted for the gap year. “I could have transferred to the second year, but that was a bit of a grind. I didn’t want that, because then I would be in trouble again this school year,” he says. “Now I am going to face the next school year with much more confidence.”
The students repeat material from the first year, but also work on important skills such as planning, collaboration and building self-confidence. “I often put off doing homework and assignments. This caused me stress in the last weeks of the previous school year. Now I get help with that,” says Jim. His classmate Ishana complements him. “We have fewer children in a class, which gives us much more time and explanation for the things we have difficulty with. For me it was mathematics, and I now understand that subject much better.”
“We don’t see it as doubling up.”
Now, halfway through the school year, the school management is discussing with parents and children whether the gap year is a good solution. “We already notice that almost all students will probably go to the second year at VMBO-TL level,” says the director. “Without this extra year, many of them might have opted for the easy route, pre-vocational secondary education.”
But not everyone views the extra year of schooling so positively. Van Eggelen: “The education inspectorate sees the Stadion Gap Year as a form of repeating, because on paper the students do not immediately transfer to year two.” But she says that is not the intention. “We don’t see it as duplication, but as an additional opportunity to grow.”
Students also often receive reactions that they ‘got left behind’. “I hear it a lot because of my age. I will be 19 years old when I finish high school. That bothered me at the beginning, but now I think: what difference does one more year actually make,” says 15-year-old Ishana.