September 22, 2000 UNT Inhouse publication: Five Brewer students to enter TAMS

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Five Brewer students to enter TAMS

When the Brewer High School marching band marches on a football field for its first halftime show this month, it will be missing a percussionist, a clarinet player and a trombone player.

Annie Bennett, Justin Jordan and Ben Yee entered college two years early as new students at the Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science. Two other Brewer students — David Chung and Julie Marling — also are attending TAMS.

Brewer is the only high school in Tarrant County to have five students in the TAMS Class of 2002 — more than any other high school in the county.

Bennett, Chung, and Marling are from Fort Worth and Jordan and Yee are from White Settlement.

All five students were in the same seventh- and eighth-grade gifted and talented class at Brewer Middle School, and some have known each other for longer than that.

Bennett met Jordan, whom she calls her best friend, in third grade. The two were in the Brewer Middle School and Brewer High School band for four years, with Bennett playing percussion and Jordan playing trombone. They met Yee in 1997 when he began playing clarinet in band after moving to White Settlement from Big Spring.

All of the students say being at TAMS will outweigh high school activities, however.

"I'm looking forward to living and going to school with students just like me. I haven't always felt accepted in school, and I will finally get to be accepted," Bennett says.

She adds that because attending TAMS will allow her to receive her bachelor's degree two years early, "it will give me a good head start since I plan to go to graduate school."

Jordan says he never felt challenged in high school, despite honors classes.

"I sat for eight hours and twiddled my thumbs. TAMS is the perfect opportunity for me because I know college-level courses will challenge me," he says.

Yee says he's looking forward to living away from home.

"It will be fun to live independently and do things by myself, like laundry," he says.

In addition to being in band, Bennett and Jordan also participated in University Interscholastic League one-act plays. They are looking forward to joining the Academy Players, TAMS' drama club.

And although TAMS students aren't eligible to participate in UNT's Green Brigade Marching Band, there are many other UNT student organizations they can join, including the university's famous jazz ensembles. Bennett says that she and the other Brewer students are also thinking of starting their own rock ensemble to play at TAMS functions.

"TAMS encourages students to be creative. The best thing about it is that the opportunities are endless," she says.