One year ago, yesterday, began the the most challenging year in my life. My daughter was hospitalized for the third time in nine weeks, but we began to unravel the problems that she was having.
Fast forward to this year. She is off on a school trip to the UK with a group of her classmates. The stresses we face are typical junior year stresses, not ones caused by medical issues. She is happy, completed a successful junior varsity volleyball season, and her academic acheivement is as high as it is ever been. We have had a number of opportunities to share, especially around music, where she loves going to and finding the smaller bands that “just may make it big.”
As I start the second year full year of blogging on this space, I am hopeful that the positive energy she has is will translate into a positive energy on this space. I am really excited about the projects at school and the direction that we are taking.
In this blog, I try to focus on technology and education. But for today, I would like to put this aside and talk about the country, politics, and the United States Election.
It was just over 40 years ago today, that our students and young people descended into Grant Park in Chicago, across from the Hilton Hotel, to hold a Festival of Life. Amidst an unpopular war, an economy that was soon to be challenged by foreign companies, the Democrats assembled in Chicago. What emerged was a splintering of the country, and a changing of the guard, from nearly forty years of Democratic majority and leadership in the United State to 40 years of Republican majority and leadership. What arguably the most lasting image from this time was the police assault in front of the Hilton Hotel. The entire event took place under the T.V. lights for seventeen minutes, live, with the crowd shouting, “The whole world is watching.”
Fast forward 40 years, 2 months, and 10 days. The whole world will be watching the same location, in Grant Park, across from the Hilton Hotel. Will this be the moment that the United States heals itself and comes back together? Will this mark the end of one era and the beginning of a new era, where the United States matures and takes the next step in the journey, part of a larger, inter-connected world? Will the youth of this nation begin to assume the leadership and begin to work together with all to develop solutions to the problems of the country and the world?
The parallels are eerie. I am fortunate enough to be able to attend the rally tonight and am very excited about being part of this potentially historic.
And I will be starting the chant in the crowd, “the whole world is watching”
One the traditions at our school is Morning Ex. Originally, the headmaster’s class which met every day and often included calisthenics, it has evolved into a twice a week experience. All of our students and faculty, from Junior Kindergarten through twelfth grade, come together in our theater to have a shared experience.
Each presentation is something special. We will have play and concert previews, presentations on a topic which a member of the community is passionate about, or an experience that a group had. Each experience enriches us and presents possibilities.
With our ISACS visiting team on campus, this year we held our Morning Ex on a topic on which I am passionate, baseball. As a member of the Society of American Baseball Research, I was thrilled when I was asked to help present.
Today’s Morning Ex was presented in nine parts, or innings, we started off with a poem, like we always do, showed clips from The Natural, Field of Dreams, and the Kirk Gibson home run off of Dennis Eckersley in 1988. Teachers read Casey at the Bat and The Girl Wonder, and we were treated to the seventh inning stretch and a rousing rendition of Take Me Out to the Ballgame.
I was responsible for the second inning, which was to talk about how baseball has became the National Pastime. I had all of three minutes to do so. Below is the visual that went along with the conversation:
The gist of the narrative was how the Mills Commision put forth what is now known as the myth that Abner Doubleday “invented” baseball in Coopertown in 1839. In fact, it is now shown that baseball was brought over from England, the same way that cricket and rounders were.
The game evolved regionally in the Northeast United States and Canada with four different sets of rules, stipulating different numbers of players. It wasn’t until 1845 that Alexander Cartwright set forth the Knickerbocker Rules, which seemed to take root.
The grame did not grow as the national pastime until the Civil War, the explosion of transportation, and western migration after the war. It was a game played by amateurs. Oftentimes, cities and companies formed teams and played against each other in heated competition, including the world amateur championship in Cleveland played in 1910 which reportedly had over 100,000 spectators.
As towns and company teams became more competitive, they began to use paid, or professional players. In 1869, the first “professional” team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings was formed. More cities followed and leagues developed over the next 25 years.
From the turn of the century until 1950, major league professional baseball was concentrated in the northeast. Western trips were to Chicago and St. Louis, southern trips were to Cincinnati or Washington D.C. It wasn’t until after the war, with better transportation, that teams moved westward spanning both coasts.
But not all were included. People of color were excluded from 1888 until 1947, when Jackie Robinson broke the color line. After that, waves of blacks, led to the inclusion of Latin Americans, which lead to the current growth of Asian and Australian players in the majors.
And the game became international, via the World Baseball Classic and the Olympics. Once again, no longer do Americans hold a monopoly or a position of power in the game.
As an administrator at an Independent School, I realize that there are processes which allows us to attract new students to our campus. Over the past few evenings, I have been processing the information that I have collect during my conversations about Internet Safety that I do for all of our students, from fourth grade through twelfth grade. Here are a few informal responses that I have gotten back from our students, from 6th - 12th grades:
1. For most of them, the mobile phone is used more for sending text messages than talking
2. Most of the students (over 80%) have visited YouTube in the past month
3. 50% of our 7th Graders have a social network account (Facebook or MySpace), 75% of our 8th Graders, and the number increases when we get to the high school to the point that nearly all seniors are participating in these networks
I am not surprised by these replies, as I am the father of two girls, who are within this demographic.
So I wonder, are there new ways beyond the current processes that we currently use to create a buzz for school aimed at prospective students? Could we:
1. Create a networking messaging account on a service such as Twitter, Plurk, or the like. We could then update it with news and announcements about what is going on at North Shore, to create a desire to want to come here. Prospective students would be able to access these via their computer or via SMS (text messaging) depending on how they choose to access the information.
2. Create a YouTube channel and put short marketing videos that students may find. When they go to search North Shore, they will get content driven by us, rather than just the drivel that some of our students have created. We could create short, 2-3 minute videos which highlight various activities, homecoming, the plays, choral concerts, exciting classroom projects and present them in quick burst on a site where students are already drawn. We could engage a students to produce these videos.
3. We could use students to act as social networking/digital ambassadors, the same way that we use them as guides for prospective students shadow day, to keep in contact and follow up to ask more questions. These students would use the existing social networks to reach out to prospective students, making them want to come to such a “hip” and together school.
These are just a few of my thoughts. I am hopeful that this will spur further discussion and conversation.
Today, I began enjoying my teacher’s appreciation gift from Starbucks Coffee. From Starbuck’s Ideas in Action Blog:
It’s not an apple to welcome teachers back to school, but a cup of coffee. In recognition of teachers, Starbucks is offering school teachers, grades K-12 a complimentary tall cup of brewed coffee on Mondays during the month of September. Bring in your teacher identification to any Starbucks. We appreciate the many ideas you’ve shared on MSI to recognize the wonderful work of teachers.
I am not a coffee drinker. I have been fortunate that my local Starbucks have been allowing me to get a free cup of tea. Living in the Chicago area, I stopped on my way to school, after-school, and during my evening errands. What a pleasant way to begin the year.
Today, I began enjoying my teacher’s appreciation gift from Starbucks Coffee. From Starbuck’s I
