School observation

At 9 am, after a quick run to Starbucks (conveniently 2 blocks away from the school), I arrived at Bedford High School feeling a little nervous. I have not been back into a high school since I graduated from one 8 years ago. There was a good deal of excitement fueling my nervousness, too. This was my first time in a school at a teaching capacity, or at least on the way to one. The front hall of the school was crowded with students preparing for a field trip, and the secretary at the main office kindly guided me to a seat between complaints from students about being marked absent due to miscommunication about the field trip. It wasn't long until the assistant principal walked in and my observation day began.
I feel so lucky for the situation I have found myself in. Working at the local Starbucks years ago I was surprised to see my old volleyball coach/history teacher at the counter. Mr. Tracey explained that he had left North Andover High School and was now the assistant principal at Bedford High. I wasn't even close to finishing my undergraduate courses at that point, but he insisted that I stay in touch and contact him if I needed anything because I told him of my interest in teaching. It took a good 3 or 4 years, but I was finally able to take Mr. Tracey up on his offer and had schedule my school observation with him a few weeks ago.
At first we caught up and he updated me on where all my old high school teachers are now, and I updated him on a bunch of his old students. After this we set off to explore the school, which I was completely impressed by. The school has gone under a lot of renovations in the past few years, and apparently the process was tedious and Mr. Tracey played a large role in it so it was exciting to see the pride on his face while explaining the improvements made. What struck me the most was the abundance of resources these students had at there disposal. There's a business wing, a music/art wing, and a pre-school. Most impressive to me was that this school offers students the opportunity to work with pre-schoolers and get them started in early education at such a young age! It just seems to me like this high school is way more of a college prep than I experienced at North Andover High. I think it's absolutely wonderful that the students are exposed to so much - it gives them a great head start on their college careers by offering them the opportunity to follow different fields and see if they like it. This is a process I didn't go through until my 2nd year of college - and not having the ability to do so prior led me to the tedious process of having to transfer schools half way through my collegiate career.
Another thing that struck me about the school is the diversity of their students. This school has students from the town of Bedford, as well as those from Hanscom Air Force Base, and the METCO program through which students are shuttled in from Dorchester and Roxbury. Through the conversations I had while at the school I learned that these different groups may get along on the surface, but there is still a "cliquishness" and sort of segregation between them. This seems pretty natural to me, but it is also important for the school to encourage students to break through these boundaries - and I think they are putting a good amount of effort into doing so.
My focus while at the school was mainly on this METCO program. I met with two of the directors for the program who work at the school in their METCO office. Most interestingly, I met with a teacher's assistant who went through the METCO program as a high school student. We had a great conversation about what it is like to be a METCO student both at the suburban school and returning home. From this conversation I learned that it takes a truly dedicated and determined student to succeed through such a program - but the benefits of it make up for most of the challenges a student will face. Some of these students have to board buses as early as 5:30am, and if they are to participate in extracurricular activities they may not return home until after 10pm - and that's after navigating public transportation (taking a bus to Alewife, and the train to the Orange Line, and then another bus after that) - this is due to the fact that the last bus leaves at 6pm and if a student's activities go beyond this time it is up to them to find a way home. Even though participating in after-school activities may be taxing for these students they are at a disadvantage socially if they do not. It is through these programs that they are able to bond with their peers. Interestingly, Mr. Tracey unintentionally kept noting that the most successful of his METCO students have shined in althetics as well. There is definitely a connection between the two.
Sorry this was long-winded - I had a really good time! I didn't get to sit in on any classes but instead talked to a lot of great people with a lot of interesting information. Excitingly, I was encouraged by Mr. Tracey to get my application in for substitute teaching as soon as possible. :)
I can't wait to start that adventure!

Chapter 7: Understanding Student Learning and School Achievement

The first thing I learned from this lesson is exactly what it means to care for a student as an educator. It is important to have close relationships with students, hold them to high expectations and to respect their families (255). This reminds me of the assistant principal and his personal involvement with my a cousin of mine who was an at risk student. This man was a constant presence in my cousin's life, even to go so far as to attend the funeral of my aunt. I do not know exactly how he tried helping keep my cousin on course, I was younger than him and to be honest our assistant principal attending our family service was confusing to me at first. However, looking back, I'm sure that he had created this close relationship in order to get my cousin back on track. Unfortunately, there were a lot of other factors in my cousin's life that led to him not graduating and later being incarcerated, but it is comforting to know there was at least one adult in his life giving it their all, and it's inspiring to know that it was someone from the academic community.
As a teacher, it is important to scaffold instruction, be available to help students and provide them support. It is also essential to help the student feel a sense of belonging to the school community (256). So much goes into creating a safe, comfortable and supportive learning environment for students. Being a caring teacher is one thing any educator can do to help develop this environment. The definition of caring provided in this chapter reminds me more of "tough love". To be caring as a teacher one needs to set high expectations and hold students to them, provide great support and have rigorous demands that challenge the student (256). It is all about building the student's confidence. Help them believe in themselves and you are in turn helping them develop a sense of independency and competency.
There were many different theories presented in this chapter to tackle the question of what affects a students success rate, but a combination of them creates the best solution because this is quite a complex situation. Some think that genetic or cultural inferiorities exist (257). An important point made in this section is how if a school perceives a student as inadequate for whatever reason, they will only help that student to fail because their perceptions affect how they treat the student and determine to what standards that student is held. Others feel that schools are simply maintaining the status quo by creating future generation of working- and wealthy classes. To me, this sounded a lot like a conspiracy theory and I'm not sure I support it. It seems like to simple and extreme of an answer to the problem. One also needed to consider how the difference between school culture and home culture may affect the student. The school environment may be completely foreign to a student, and this culture shock may affect them, but I do not believe they would be the overall cause for a student's failure.
One thing I would like to research more is the idea that the zero tolerance policy in schools may be having an adverse effect. I would want to see a specific case of of how this policy created an unfair situation for a student and ultimately resulted in their incarceration.