The person who captured my attention while reading Another Planet was Katie Hallberg. She is the director of the school’s talented and gifted program and also a math teacher. Her accomplishments include launching the “Synergy” program: a special program for the talented and gifted students of the school to gather together and push themselves beyond the normal high school curriculum. She also built the Calc Corner. The Calc Corner is:
A place set aside for the study hall her Advanced Placement Calculus were required to take so they could keep up with the work she heaped on them daily. But as much as a place that her Math students could struggle together through the volumes of solids of revolution, Calc Corner was a safe space for the school’s brains, a tiny piece of turf where they could cluster together over lunch, make popcorn in the microwave over and debate religion over politics without feeling abnormal.
I chose Hallberg mostly because I wish I had had a teacher like this in high school. I graduated valedictorian of my small school with a 4.0 GPA. That looks great on paper, but it doesn’t show my high school experience. My high school did not offer AP courses. I was so bored with class that I fell asleep in school at least twice a day. When teachers graded “on the curve,” my classmates would moan and complain when I got a high score. It didn’t matter to them that the reason I had gotten a good score was that I took the half hour at home to read the chapter unlike them. Their complaints started to slowly wear me down. I stopped trying my best.
When I went to take my ACTs, I had not done any preparing. I scored a 29, which was good enough to get into the school I wanted to with a good scholarship. Still, I wonder if I had a teacher like Hallberg to push me to my academic limits, if I could have done better. Just being exposed to some more difficult concepts is all it would have taken me to understand many of the questions on the test. Just a couple points on the ACT could make the difference between a good scholarship and a full ride.
Katie breaks the rules of the game by asking for more of her students. In Prior Lake, the rule is to nurture students; pushing them beyond their abilities is cruel. The argument Katie throws out is that students will never truly know their limits until the teachers push them to and past them. Clearly her philosophy is not shared by the other teachers. The teachers of Prior Lake deem her a snob for her actions. They don’t like how she would rather spend time with her students than gossiping in the teacher’s lounge.
The social theory of Privilege and Penalty is illustrated by Hallberg’s struggle. Students with higher intellect are labeled “outcasts” by their peers. The students push the smart students to the bottom of the hierarchy where their needs are forgotten. Teachers are even guiltier of this than children. They structure their curriculum around the needs of the average students: totally ignoring the needs of the talented. They then dole out punishment when the talented act out because of boredom. Katie Hallberg would instead nurture the gifts that push these students to the bottom. We need more teachers like her in our schools today.
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
High School and the Evils of NHS
Think back to your own school experience: high school, junior high, even elementary school. What are some of the groups you remember? Did your school have "jocks"? "Preps"? Goth kids? Gamers? Care to place yourself in one of those groups? Can you remember any of the rules?
My high school graduating class was 63. I knew everyone’s name and had met most of their parents. In my hometown there was one elementary, one junior high, and one high school. In fact, all the school was linked together by hallways. Moving up schools didn’t mean meeting new people and having more options for friends. Of course, there were the students who transferred in from other schools, but those were rare.
Elementary classes were small; the average class was about twenty children. Up until about fifth or sixth grade, your friends were the children of the same sex who were in your class. In fifth grade, sports started to be an option for us. This started separating children into people who played sports and those who did not.
This trend continued into high school and intensified. Our school offered four sports a year, and it was very common for people to play all four. It made sense that athletes hung out with athletes because they spent most nights together either at practice or at a game.
Other groups existed too. Farmers hung out with other farmers. I guess they were fit what the articles classified as “hicks,” but to me that word has a negative connotation, and farming is such a common practice that it was not looked down upon.
Then there were people whose parents let them stay out late and hang out with older people. I don’t know exactly what to classify this group as. They did not have much guidance and experienced many things before most other people. An appropriate name might be the “wannabes.” I would not say they wanted to be like the athletes or anyone else, but they wanted to act older than what they were. They experience sex, drinking, and other things with older people.
As we entered high school, groups started to differ. In junior high, people played sports because it was the popular thing to do. Now people who weren’t as talented athletically began to quit. They had already solidified their social position and became what most people call “preps.” They were still friends with the athletes though. Other people became more interested in music, speech, and drama and started forming their own group. I call them the “arties.” The farmers remained the same. The wannabes were now the ones showing the younger kids sex and drinking. Some people swayed more to one group, but for the most part, everyone stayed in the same position they had in junior high.
This grouping did not bother me for the most part. I must say that I was definitely an athlete. I was also in band and ending up graduating Valedictorian. I was the girl who got most of the breaks because I made the game winning shot at the basketball game, then was the only person who aced the physics test. Still, I could see the game at work. One circumstance where it was most obvious was National Honor Society.
The National Honor Society says its goal is to recognize students who excel in areas of “Scholarship, Leadership, Service, and Character.” In order to join, students must be nominated and approved by multiple teachers. The point of this is to go beyond just grades. The effect is the more privileged students are accepted into the society in place of more qualified students. It is a glorified parent popularity contest. Students whose parents are on the school board or a member of the booster club always get in. Other students with better GPAs and who were much kinder to other students were rejected. The student’s parents have more of an influence on the selection process that the morality of the student.
I know one student in particular who graduated ninth in our class, participated in band, dance, and student council, and was never inducted into the society. Why? There is no legitimate reason for her not to be inducted, but then her parents were not friends with any of the teachers, so I guess there was no pushing force to get her in.
Although NHS does not make or break a college application, it does help. It is unjust to deny a qualified student that honor because of the politics of parents.
If this opinion seems like the ranting of a scorned student, furious to be denied acceptance, it is false. I was inducted into the society as a sophomore. I was very honored at first, but as I moved through high school and was more involved in the society, I lost respect for it. I saw too many qualified people be hurt by being denied acceptance. I saw even more unqualified people inducted and act arrogant towards others. My advice is to let students vote on members, because students know the character of other students much more than any teacher ever could.
My high school graduating class was 63. I knew everyone’s name and had met most of their parents. In my hometown there was one elementary, one junior high, and one high school. In fact, all the school was linked together by hallways. Moving up schools didn’t mean meeting new people and having more options for friends. Of course, there were the students who transferred in from other schools, but those were rare.
Elementary classes were small; the average class was about twenty children. Up until about fifth or sixth grade, your friends were the children of the same sex who were in your class. In fifth grade, sports started to be an option for us. This started separating children into people who played sports and those who did not.
This trend continued into high school and intensified. Our school offered four sports a year, and it was very common for people to play all four. It made sense that athletes hung out with athletes because they spent most nights together either at practice or at a game.
Other groups existed too. Farmers hung out with other farmers. I guess they were fit what the articles classified as “hicks,” but to me that word has a negative connotation, and farming is such a common practice that it was not looked down upon.
Then there were people whose parents let them stay out late and hang out with older people. I don’t know exactly what to classify this group as. They did not have much guidance and experienced many things before most other people. An appropriate name might be the “wannabes.” I would not say they wanted to be like the athletes or anyone else, but they wanted to act older than what they were. They experience sex, drinking, and other things with older people.
As we entered high school, groups started to differ. In junior high, people played sports because it was the popular thing to do. Now people who weren’t as talented athletically began to quit. They had already solidified their social position and became what most people call “preps.” They were still friends with the athletes though. Other people became more interested in music, speech, and drama and started forming their own group. I call them the “arties.” The farmers remained the same. The wannabes were now the ones showing the younger kids sex and drinking. Some people swayed more to one group, but for the most part, everyone stayed in the same position they had in junior high.
This grouping did not bother me for the most part. I must say that I was definitely an athlete. I was also in band and ending up graduating Valedictorian. I was the girl who got most of the breaks because I made the game winning shot at the basketball game, then was the only person who aced the physics test. Still, I could see the game at work. One circumstance where it was most obvious was National Honor Society.
The National Honor Society says its goal is to recognize students who excel in areas of “Scholarship, Leadership, Service, and Character.” In order to join, students must be nominated and approved by multiple teachers. The point of this is to go beyond just grades. The effect is the more privileged students are accepted into the society in place of more qualified students. It is a glorified parent popularity contest. Students whose parents are on the school board or a member of the booster club always get in. Other students with better GPAs and who were much kinder to other students were rejected. The student’s parents have more of an influence on the selection process that the morality of the student.
I know one student in particular who graduated ninth in our class, participated in band, dance, and student council, and was never inducted into the society. Why? There is no legitimate reason for her not to be inducted, but then her parents were not friends with any of the teachers, so I guess there was no pushing force to get her in.
Although NHS does not make or break a college application, it does help. It is unjust to deny a qualified student that honor because of the politics of parents.
If this opinion seems like the ranting of a scorned student, furious to be denied acceptance, it is false. I was inducted into the society as a sophomore. I was very honored at first, but as I moved through high school and was more involved in the society, I lost respect for it. I saw too many qualified people be hurt by being denied acceptance. I saw even more unqualified people inducted and act arrogant towards others. My advice is to let students vote on members, because students know the character of other students much more than any teacher ever could.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Republic of....
"It may be an easy thing to make a Republic," wrote Horace Mann in 1848 (1957, p. 92); "but it is a very laborious thing to make Republicans; and woe to the republic that rests upon no better foundations than ignorance, selfishness, and passion.”
Is this true?
When it comes to the first question, the answer is very simple. The most important fact is the time is the scarcest resource we have. Looking for ways to make mundane tasks faster only frees up more time to do other things. Whether each individual person decides to use that time productively by reading to their children or wastes it by sitting on the couch watching hours of television varies. The opportunity is there for the choice.
That choice determines whether Americans as a whole are selfish. Grouping together people as diverse as the population of the
That being said, many Americans are ignorant about the culture of the world. It is common for people in the
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