ACT’s EXPLORE Exam
Every October all eighth graders are given the EXPLORE exam. The exam is intended to help students understand their academic skills, assess personal needs, measure their interests, and explore career possibilities. It’s the first step in a series of exams that allows each student to address many of these issues. The students are tested on English, Mathematics, Reading and Science Reasoning.

8th Grade Class Picnic
Every year in late May, we take time out of our daily schedules to recognize our 8th graders as they move from the junior high to high school. We celebrate by having a filled day of games, food and fun. It’s a nice time for our 8th graders to reflect on life as a junior high student at CBA and to have all their friends sign their yearbook.

6th Grade Shadowing Days
The junior high counselor coordinates the 6th grade-shadowing program. Throughout the months of January, February and March a selected group of 7th graders are asked to participate in the program. Their primary responsibility is to help the 6th graders get a feel for what life is like here at CBA.

Classroom Guidance

8th Grade: An essential element of the EXPLORE exam is going into the classroom and interpreting what the scores actually mean. Because this exam is given to eighth graders across the country, our students are quite fascinated on how they ranked on a national basis. We also conduct an interactive project involving careers on the Internet. It’s a nice opportunity for the students to start researching various careers that may be of interest to them.

7th Grade: Some topics that we discuss are study skills, test taking skills and organizational skills. We really stress the importance of organizational skills by implementing what we refer to as the Junior High Student Agenda Program. The agenda is a useful tool, allowing the students to write down anything from their very first exam to their very first school dance. Most importantly, it’s another source of communication to the CBA parents.