So, finally home after epic 3 leg return journey. All that time suspended at great height above the curvature of the earth was great for ruminating on the amazing experiences I had in San Francisco and the possibilities for turning these into action.
Jennifer's class at Mission High School was inspirational because of the extent to which they work against the odds of timetable, expectation and resourcing. California's public education system is in dire straits according to everyone that I have talked to, from our taxi driver to the airport through to a woman I chatted to at the laundromat. Schools are hemorrhaging teachers because of crazy budget cuts- and these tend to be awesome young practitioners because of the way that the system is structured. The precariousness of teaching jobs seemed even more dire when the lack of social structures that I take for granted like public healthcare etc is factored in. This is another reason that Jennifer's class was so inspirational- it's fundamentally harder to take risks in an educational environment like the one generated by the political climate in California. It seems ironic too that California, which must be one of America's wealthiest states, has slashed and burned its education budgets.
This is an educational landscape ravaged by cuts and prescriptive assessment regimes (this ringing any bells people?). My next visit with Jonathon, Lori and Kelli at The Urban School resonated in different ways- in my conversations with these teachers I heard echoes of conversations and discussions that we regularly have at Wellington High.
I've lifted the following straight outa the description of Urban School from www.urbandictionary.com
The Urban School is a small, fiercely independent high school in San Francisco, founded in the late 60's and located in the Haight Ashbury neigborhood of San Francisco. Its students are notoriously intelligent, friendly, street wise, and respected. Intense discussion based classes prompt the earnest students to think deeply and act wisely.
I think that Wellington High is on a journey marked by the same mission as Urban- igniting a passion for learning. What sets Urban apart (and I would suggest, way way ahead) is their emphasis on learning within a community- students are actively taught to be part of their community. This is from the urban school's website: "The most enduring aspect of an Urban education is that students learn to take responsibility for their education and become active citizens in their own communities."
This emphasis was evident in the way that all of the teachers and students that I talked to spoke about the service learning programme. It's offered in conjunction with a challenging academic programme which aims for more depth, less breadth. Three 12 week semesters: 4 classes per semester. One of these classes will be service learning. Over the course of 12 weeks students "get engaged in the community" building partnerships with a community organisation in a field that they are interested in. There's flexibility in terms of how the timetable works here, and students are encouraged to reflect on what they're doing and what they're learning. It's a 4 year programme- very structured in the first two years and much more flexible in the senior years. I loved hearing about this programme from Lori and was inspired by two of her students, Tali Missirlian and Hannah Gorman. Tali worked with an advocacy group for people who are HIV positive and Hannah did a peer reading programme with an NGO in her community. Both girls were very smart, very articulate and totally passionate about what they'd come away with from the experience. Tali and Hannah's image appears earlier in this post.
Some other very cool things about Urban: the entire last 6 weeks of the spring term is spent on an extended field trip built around an inquiry- this year they are following SF's water supply- and exploring some of the social, political, economic, environmental implications of the current arrangement. 6 weeks away, on an investigation, for senior students! There's a teacher whose job it is to manage and coordinate all this... How cool!
So I guess I visited two sides of the spectrum of education in SF- public school where passionate teachers and amazing kids put together something superhuman against the odds of resourcing and a prescriptive assessment system that they are required to adhere to, and a private school who have cut themselves loose of said constraints of assessment, focusing instead on enabling incredible learning in a variety of different meaningful contexts. I was inspired by each, and saw lots of parallels in terms of the challenges and opportunities that exist ahead for us at Wellington High.
Kelli is setting up a new Media Literacy block course for later in the year- I'm excited about hearing about what this will look and feel like.
I feel so lucky to have been granted access to these schools and classrooms to see some of the cool stuff that's going on- and I'd like to thank Jennifer, Jonathan, Lori and Kelli for being so generous with their time!
I will write up some more on Tilt, 9th St Studios and Baycat in the next couple of days, as well as add some cool photos/video. You haven't seen enough of the incomparable Lola yet.