About Us

O'Rourke Middle School follows a schoolwide teaming approching to educating students

What is a team? Who makes up a team?

A team is a group of teachers (math, English, social studies and science) that will work with a small group of students. Teachers will have common planning times and common homerooms. Each grade level has a set of teams. Grade 6 has four teams, grade 7 has three teams and grade 8 has two teams.

What is the purpose of a team?

Research shows that teaming is fundamental to middle school education. Using the team approach, students can expect academic excellence as well as support for their emotional and social needs, which are equally important. The team
structure allows teachers to get to know their small group of students better, offer more opportunities to collaborate within disciplines, have common time to streamline communications to students and parents, and foster stronger
relationships with students.

What was the process, how did we get to teaming?

Over the course of last school year, a committee of 23 members that included administrators, middle and high school teachers, parents and a teaming consultant worked together to create a plan for bringing teaming back to O’Rourke Middle School. Budget cuts in past years resulted in the reduction of staff, which eventually diminished the teaming structure. Thankfully, with the support of the superintendent and Board of Education, teaming became a priority
once again. We are excited to implement teaming this school year.

What does this mean for my student?

Students will generally work with teachers within their own team for math, English, science and social studies. They will work with other teachers in such subjects as World Language, art, music, health, and physical education. Teaming
will allow content area teachers to perform interdisciplinary work and have more time to work with the kids who need extra help.

Where do we go from here?

We will be assessing the strengths and challenges of teaming over the course of the 2015-16 school year. The Building Council (with PTA representation) and the middle school faculty will also track strategies that are working well and in
addition, look for ways to improves the process, if necessary. We will also be soliciting the thoughts and ideas of our students. Their input in invaluable in helping us ensure our teaming approach is a success.

What team will my student have?

Generally speaking, the homeroom teacher assigned to your child will indicate what team he or she is on. Parents will be able to cross check their child’s homeroom teacher with the list on the web site. Please know that first period is
homeroom for almost all students. We’ve found that this will help with the morning transitions and get student settled quicker. However, grade 7 students who have world language first period will learn their team assignment on the first
day of school.