In an effort to weed out the bad and reward the good, Brookfield Middle School recently kicked off a program offering awards to well-behaved students.

A new school store was installed at the middle school in October and is full of items ranging from T-shirts to posters to school supplies. Students who want to shop can stop by the store and buy goods -- but only if they are good.

The program is called S.T.A.R. -- Students Together Accepting Responsibility -- and awards "Brookfield Bucks" or store credit to students who show improvement in the classroom and good behavior overall.

Melanie Schneider, a seventh-grade social studies teacher at the middle school, said she has been wanting to get this program up and off the ground for some time now.

"We're excited about it," she said.

She and Lois Cavucci, middle school computer teacher, worked with other staff to get the program started. They pitched the idea to middle school Principal Ron Garrett and other administrators while looking for a way to reward students.

Last year the two teachers had their own reward programs going in their classrooms.

Mrs. Cavucci, who is taking a clinical master's class at Youngstown State University for administration, said she is learning about programs such as S.T.A.R. that help kids learn.

Ms. Schneider said the programs works for students.

Teachers come to school and receive a paycheck, but students rely upon good grades as their reward, she said. She wanted to reward students for what they are expected to do.

Sometimes students who misbehave take away attention from the students who are good, she said. They aim to reward those students who are forgotten.

"It's negative attention, but it's still attention. Instead of spending so much energy on negativity, we're focusing our energy on the positive," Ms. Schneider said.

All staff members have the ability to issue credits to students as they see fit and administrators have the right to issue debits. Credits and debits are issued at the discretion of staff and could occur once a day or once a week, depending on the teacher. Students can also be awarded outside the classroom.

The program teaches students to be prepared, show respect for others and improve academic achievements through positive reinforcement.

It also trains students with money management skills by allowing them to balance their own checking account.

Each student was issued a banking account booklet sheet and a list of available items at the school store.

Students are responsible for recording their own transactions and teachers are responsible for stamping the checking accounts of their students when they earn or lose credit.

Earning money through the credit system works like this: good behavior such as being prepared for class, having completed homework and random acts of kindness all warrant 25 cents; bad behaviors such as not being prepared for class, having incomplete or missing homework, rudeness and disrespect takes away 50 cents, which is double the amount for good work.

Students can shop once a week after school or they can choose to save their money for larger purchases. However, teachers may request that students purchase school supplies before making any "fun" purchases.

"We want to prepare them for the world. Being accountable, prepared and on time are all skills they're going to need when they go into the job market," Ms. Schneider said.

"We want kids to be responsible and accountable, but we also want them to learn what it's like to earn money. Some kids graduate from school and don't know how to balance a check book."

Seventh-grader Kara Egelsky, 13, has $6 in store credit so far and said the program motivates her to do her work.

"It makes you want to do your homework because it's like, it's not real money, it's free," she said.

Sixth-grader Nelson Wyer, 13, said he's saving up to buy a lava lamp, which costs about $40. So far he's saved $9.75.

"It's easy to get debits, but it's hard to get credits," he said.

While students have been shopping for a few weeks now, staff members have decided to write professional sports teams and local businesses seeking donations for store items. The school is expecting the store items to go fast and are open for any donations.

This is the trial year for the program.

You can e-mail Herald Staff Writer Larissa Theodore at ltheodore@sharonherald.com