Where to start . . ? Well, let's see, the Texas Academy of Math and Science, or TAMS for short, is where I spent two years of my life. I could have you reading for the next two years if I was to tell you about all my experiences there, but I'll spare you that by just telling you what TAMS is. First of all, what the heck is it?? Well what TAMS does is take juniors in high school out of high school and put them in a college "environment". At least that's what they tell the parents and stuff. I never quite figured out that environment thing, I mean, heck, they put us in college. No if's and's or but's! Anyways, so, now they've got us in college, well, originally, they didn't have very many rules, cept a curfew to make sure that we were all accounted for at night, and a few others, like visitation, etc. And when I say curfew, I mean, we had to all be in our rooms at 11pm on school nights(Sun-Thurs) and 1am on non-school nights (Fri-Sat). Then while we were being counted in our rooms, they locked the doors to the building so no one can come in or out till 6am the next morning. As for visitation, what that was, was that the dorm we were in was split into 3 floors, with a lobby in the middle of the first floor. Walking in the front door, to the left of the lobby was girl's rooms and to the right was guy's rooms. Then the second floor was all girls rooms, and the third floor was all guys rooms. Visitation meant that members of the opposite sex were not allowed on the floors except between 4pm and 8pm on Mon-Fri and 2pm-8pm on Sat-Sun. e.g. guys couldn't go on the girls floor unless it was between those hours, and vice versa. And of course who could forget the no tolerance policy on drugs, alcohol and sex, although if those rules kinda got overlooked for certain people . . Okay, these were pretty much the early rules, plus a minimum required GPA to stay in the program, but over the years more and more rules were added until while I was there it was pretty strict. I mean, there were rules about how much affection could be displayed in public, ex. no extended kissing, no full-body hugs, you couldn't be under the same blanket with a member of the opposite sex, etc. And there were rules on all sorts of other stuff, like you had to occasionally clean your room, and stuff like that . . oh yes, and each person that goes there has an FBI record, due to a counterfeiting ring discovered there one year. Now that I've talked about the rules, lets discuss discipline. Well, TAMS operates on a point system. For each rule, there is a designated amount of points that are assigned if the rule is broken. If a student in the program accumulates 100 points, then they are sent home. The rules are divided into 5 levels. Level 1 is 10-20 points, Level 2 is 20-30 points, Level 3 is 30-50, Level 4 is 50-90, and Level 5 is 100 or automatic expulsion. Level 5 stuff is the zero tolerance stuff like drugs, alcohol, sex. Although, like I mentioned earlier, I know people that got caught with that stuff that were allowed to stay, cause either, they had 4.0's, or they had a Goldwater Scholarship, or they were accepted to really, really good colleges, or mommy and daddy were in the right place in society, etc. Anyway, now about the program in general, each student takes classes there, there being University of North Texas (UNT) where the program is located. There is a set curriculum that each student must complete to graduate. Although we are in college, we are still technically classified as high school students. That way we can apply as freshman to college and get scholarships, plus, we have all kinds of stuff that normal high schools have. For example, we have a yearbook, we have a prom, we have a graduation in which we get a high school diploma, we play intramural sports on campus, we have an orchestra, we have several student organizations (clubs), etc. So we can still be regular high school students . . almost. Although TAMS has it's downsides, it has a lot of upsides, which by far outweigh the downsides. I for one, feel it was the best decision of my life. But best of all, I developed a lot of really good, really close friendships. That is one of the neatest things about TAMS, it promotes really close friendships, that don't fall apart really easily. I mean, it's quite possible that the friendships that you develop at TAMS will be friendships that last you the rest of your life. It's a really cool place. I'm really glad I went to it. Anyway, that's it for now. Oh yeah, the colors on this page, they are the TAMS colors. Blue and Gold . . still working on that alma mater though :)
If you want to learn more about TAMS, just click here for their official website.