educational candy shop

My heart raced with excitement; my brain exploded with ideas and possibilities as I toured the new El Dorado High School facility during the open house.
I love the smell of new opportunities engendered from fresh cut wood and paint. Walking down the wide, central hall called ‘Main Street,’ I anticipated the rush of students that would follow the opening of the doors the first day of school. Talking with teachers in the different wings of the school, I remembered entering and enrolling in a new school and the thrill of possibilities I felt as I studied the class options.
My husband and I explored the EHS home economics class rooms filled with cooking centers and sewing machine stations. We studied the new industrial cooking classroom where the industrial cooking teacher proudly displayed the new equipment. This year she does not have to just show a picture of industrial equipment found in the food businesses – the students can actually cook with them. Several visitors wondered if the school would offer a night school for adults interested in learning to work with the equipment.
Peeking into the chemistry and biology labs took my husband and I back to our college and high school science classes. Yes, I know the classes can be quite hard, but the information we gained into the secrets of the universe can never be replaced. I pounded my head over chemistry, but now when I cook, I understand enough about how baking soda works that I can explain ‘why’ to a 4-year-old.
Walking back behind the stage of the new auditorium and drama department, seeing the neatly arranged props and costumes … and the space for so much more, reminded me of the times I participated in a community play. The organization of the props promised possibilities ahead for the students.
So many new opportunities, so many possibilities – that was the same feeling I found at the third high school I attended – a large, city high school in southern Utah: Cedar City High School.
Cedar City had embraced and built their school with a full commitment to the then popular modular system. Modular scheduling allowed 40, 60 or 80 minutes for classes depending on the amount of time teachers actually needed to present the information and practice it.
The schedule blocked out 80 minutes for chemistry – enough time for chemistry labs and an explanation of the difficult subject. We never needed the 40 minutes designated to the accounting class. The teacher handed me the book and work book and told me to work at my own pace: Just do a certain amount every day. If I needed a technique explained, he sat at the front of the class ready to help. Having enrolled in that school a month-and-a-half after everyone else, I was already late in starting accounting, but I loved the paperwork, filling in the spread sheets and the magic of balanced accounts. I caught up and completed the book that year.
But the real fun at Cedar City came in the Advanced Placement Classes – a relatively new challenge in education. Eager to be in college, I grabbed at the chance to take college level English and American History classes in high school. I hear that same embracing of the challenge each year when I interview the county’s National Merit Semifinalists.
The EHS tour hinted of that same feeling of an educational candy shop. With the first nine-weeks of the school year completed and the reality of another school year ahead, I hope the students at EHS, as well as other area high schools, take a moment to step back and enjoy the educational opportunities they enjoy.
(Joan Hershberger is a reporter at the News-Times. E-mail her at jhershberger@eldoradonews.com.)