SIUSLAW NEWS | SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 29, 2020 | 7A
You guys are leaders on this
campus who have been giv-
en permission to do that. If
there’s someone you were
thinking of when those com-
ments were shared, you have
every right to talk to them
and say, ‘We needed to hear
what you had to say,’ and then
bring that back to leadership,”
she said.
With that, the time was
turned over to the students.
Academics
The datapoint of the dis-
cussion started with the state-
ment “The school is meeting
my academic needs.”
According to Lane ESD,
44 percent of elementary stu-
dents said “sometimes,” while
56 percent said “always.” For
middle and high school stu-
dents, 71 percent said “some-
times” and 21 percent said
“always.”
The second statement read
“I have access to intervention
and enrichment services.”
Of that, 44 percent of ele-
mentary students said “nev-
er,” 17 percent said “almost
never,” 28 percent said “some-
times” and 11 percent said
“always.” Of the middle and
high students, 14 percent said
“almost never,” 48 percent
said “sometimes” and 20 per-
cent said “always.”
“I don’t think there’s mid-
dle schoolers here, so we
don’t need to talk about that
unless you guys want to,” JJ
said. “With the second point,
the elementary students said
‘never,’ which I agreed with,
I think, because elementary
kids don’t get as many oppor-
tunities. But middle school
and high school is 48 percent
‘sometimes,’ which I don’t
think is very good, really.”
JJ then read the question
posed by the data: “Based on
your school experience, what
might be causing people to
answer this way and how can
we improve instruction, en-
richment and intervention?”
The students had some
questions about what words
like “enrichment and inter-
vention” actually meant, be-
fore Opal gave her thought.
“Number one, I’m not sure
that this data is completely
correct,” she said. “Because
one thing, this is a survey, and
some people definitely don’t
answer honestly on these sur-
vey questions. I know that for
a fact.”
Her second point had to do
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if like, if they do something
wrong or if we have trouble
with our assignment, that we
should come to them and
check up on it, instead of
struggling through by our-
selves.”
JJ asked, “Do you think the
assignments are too hard, too
easy?”
Opal felt that a lot of the
teachers in the school were
on the same page when it
came to the difficulty of as-
signments.
“I feel like there are a few
teachers that are trying to
push the students in their
own individual ways, to do
their work and the like, and
are trying to step up the aca-
demic level and help the stu-
dents want to succeed, suc-
ceed,” she said.
However, there were some
teachers that could use a little
help.
“I feel like there are other
teachers that are not doing
that in a good, productive
way. Or not trying to do that.
And so I think all teachers
need to get on the same page
and say, ‘Hey, there are some
classes that we need to make
advanced classes,’ and ev-
ery teacher should be able to
teach an advanced class. Like,
have the ability to let the stu-
dents who want to succeed,
succeed, and keep working.
I feel like at Mapleton, for so
many years, the students who
have struggled have rightfully
gotten a lot of attention, but
the students that have wanted
to succeed have not gotten the
same amount of attention.”
JJ nodded his head, saying,
“That’s a really good point.”
Stewart, who described
himself as a quiet person, was
asked by JJ if he had anything
to say.
“I still don’t have anything
to say,” he said to laughter at
the table. “Actually, I guess
one thing I have to agree with
is on Phillip’s end, because
some of the teachers don’t
really grade any of the work.
They don’t look at it and
there’s a teacher that has lost
work and you have to redo
it over and over again. It just
messes with your head and it’s
not giving you an opportunity
at all to do any sports or after
school activities.”
“That’s a good point,” JJ
said.
“I said something, are you
happy?” added Stewart as the
others laughed.
Doing their part
“I feel like it’s harder for the
students to succeed in class-
es if the teachers aren’t do-
ing their part,” Micayla said.
“You’re here to learn how to
do something, what to do.
We’re here eight hours a day,
every day. If our teachers ar-
en’t doing their part, how are
we supposed to learn what we
need to do or how we’re sup-
posed to do something with-
out them?”
“So you’re just saying it’s
harder for students to succeed
when teachers are being lazy,
or when they’re not trying?”
JJ asked.
Micayla thought about it
for a second.
“Some teachers are like,
‘You’re not at school, it’s okay,
you don’t have to do that.’ You
were sick, when you weren’t
really sick. They kind of just
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with enrichment.
“Lots of times, our school
has been known, and is trying
to get better but it’s not there
yet. It just doesn’t have the
opportunities and options for
the kids that really want to do
well and succeed and go on to
like, a really good college or
do something much bigger
than going to LCC or some-
thing,” she said.
Micayla turned the con-
versation to how teachers
communicate lessons to the
students.
“I think teachers kind of
put stuff up on a board and
they’re like, ‘That’s how you
do it, do that, here you go,’”
she said. “They need to go
into depth with what we need
to do and kind of like teach it
to us, not just put it up on a
board and be like, ‘There you
go, that’s what you do.’”
JJ asked, “So you think
teachers should have more
one-on-one?”
“I think they should be
better teachers,” Micayla re-
sponded.
JJ turned to Phillip for his
comments, to which he said,
“I’m going to make sure it’s
not too much for you, because
it’s going to be a fat minute.”
He addressed the academic
needs question.
“We have some teachers in
this school, and I’m not going
to name names, that simply
don’t grade their stuff. And it
really hurts us as people that
want to do sports or stuff after
school. I want to be able to go
home and not have our par-
ents yell at us because, ‘Why
do you have an F?’ What do
you mean I have an F? ‘Well
it’s because you didn’t turn in
this, that and that.’ I did turn
that in, though. ‘Well it says
here that you didn’t.’ And you
come to find out, your teacher
isn’t doing their job. Or they
lose your work. And it’s like, ‘I
did this, but I’ll happily do it
again.’ And it just makes it to
where you always go in there
with a negative vibe.”
JJ asked, “So you think or-
ganization is a big part of that
too?”
Micayla quickly answered
yes, followed by Phillip.
“Teachers harp on us for
organization, but they don’t
follow through. They’re kind
of being hypocrites on that,”
he said.
Opal, whose father, Lou,
teaches at the school, gave a
more nuanced view.
“The teachers that we have
are gonna make mistakes,” she
said. “We make mistakes and
we lose our stuff, or we forget
to turn it in. But I think it gets
to a point where if you lose a
ton of kids’ assignments over
and over, that’s not right.”
The other students agreed,
at which point Opal pointed
to student responsibility to
help solve the problem.
“One thing my parents al-
ways taught me was to advo-
cate for yourself,” she said. “If
you have a problem with the
assignment, you need to go to
the teacher and tell them and
explain to them in a reason-
able way. Not like, ‘This is a
horrible assignment, why did
you assign this, this is stupid.’
You have to do it in a real-
ly reasonable way. But like, I
think the teachers should be
explaining to us that we need
to advocate for ourselves and
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tap you on the hand. ‘Oh
yeah, you’re okay,’” she said.
JJ pointed out, “Sometimes
that’s required, though.”
“Well, tapping your stu-
dent on the hand and saying
‘It’s okay,’ but you’re holding
other students to a higher
standard,” Micayla said. “That
shouldn’t happen.”
“I think sometimes differ-
ent students have different
needs,” Opal added. “But
teachers should be careful
and know what those needs
are and make sure they’re
helping the students’ needs.
And if a student comes to
them and is like, ‘This is not
okay, why are you doing this,’
they should have a reason
and be able to explain that to
us. In a way that doesn’t put
the other students’ privacy in
danger.”
Phillip brought the discus-
sion back absenteeism and
graduation rates, which the
students had discussed earlier
in the meeting.
“I’m going to tie these to-
gether,” he said. “Some of
those times when students
don’t graduate on time is
kind of because of the lack of
teachers caring. Also, being
chronically absent, if my stuff
isn’t going to be graded any-
way, why should I be here?”
“Why should I put in the
effort?” Micayla echoed.
“Exactly,” Phillip said.
“Why should I put in the ef-
fort, why should I be here?
Why should I even try? That’s
why Mapleton for the longest
time has been that school that
no one goes anywhere.”
Opal shared her views on
the matter.
“My dad is a teacher,” she
said. “Teaching is really, re-
ally hard. I think that being
a good teacher takes a lot of
effort. Doing the hard, hard
work that teachers have to
do to help students is a really
hard task, and I think some
teachers might not want to do
that work while the others do.
And I don’t know how you fix
that. There’s a lot of teachers
that are really working hard
to help students succeed.”
All of the students nodded
their heads in agreement, ac-
knowledging that there are
good teachers at Mapleton.
“And they’re really putting
in the work to help students
go where they’re supposed
to go,” Opal said. “And then I
feel like there are other teach-
ers that are here to teach kind
of, but not put in the work
that’s needed, I feel like.”
“And that ties back to what
you were saying before, with
some teachers putting in the
work for academic success,
and some aren’t,” JJ said.
At that point, JJ asked why
there were such big differenc-
es in views on enrichment
services between elementary
and high school
“Do you feel like elementa-
ry students don’t have as qual-
ity teachers, or do you feel like
we just aren’t doing very well
on surveys?” he asked.
Phillip thought that it was
tied to how each school is tra-
ditionally run.
“When you have only one
teacher for the entire day,
mostly, you can only go over
so much,” he said. “But when
you’re in high school and you
have seven teachers a day,
that one teacher knows just
one subject, and they’ve stud-
ied that in college. So that’s
what they’re going to learn.
But an elementary teacher,
however, goes through it all.
So it makes enrichment a lot
harder. But also, when you’re
an elementary kid, it’s kind
of like your golden days. You
just have fun.”
Micayla added, “Also, when
I think of kindergarteners for
a second, they’re taking this
survey, I don’t think they’d re-
ally understand.”
“Or take it seriously,” JJ
said.
“Or understand half the
words that are on this,” Mic-
ayla said. “I don’t even know
what enrichment means, and
I’m in 10th grade.”
The table laughed.
Stewart added that the el-
ementary students aren’t “up
to where we’re at as to what is
happening in life.”
“Experiences,” JJ said, fol-
lowed by “Maturity level”
from Micayla.
After praising the addition
of a new school counselor to
the district, Opal brought the
discussion back to teachers.
“All the teachers that teach
at our school had to at least go
through college, and then go
to an extra one or two years
of school to get a teacher’s li-
cense. That’s not the same as
some of the goals of the stu-
dents at Mapleton, and what
they want to do later on in
life.”
Micayla pointed out that
many of the Mapleton teach-
ers are fresh out of college.
“I see the struggle for some
of them coming straight
into teaching,” she said. “We
are still a small school, but
they are trying to teach and
their first years of teaching
are probably pretty hard for
them.”
Phillip brought the whole
discussion together, stating
that it was the responsibility
of everyone in the communi-
ty, from district staff to par-
ents and leaders, to support
the students.
“With some of those teach-
ers, they had a set of goals
that they accomplished,” he
said. “Some of those teach-
ers had somebody that was
probably backing them up the
way through. Well, it’s kind
of hard for students to do the
same thing when we don’t
have adults backing them up.
When the students don’t have
the backup up to get to their
goals, it kind of feels like the
adults are being selfish, in a
way.”
At that point, the students
broke up into different groups
again, this time speaking on
topics from Friday school to
school lunch, conversations
which have been discussed in
previous articles in this series.
At the end of the two-hour-
long discussion, district staff
brought pizza to the stu-
dents, praising them on the
thoughtful discussion. When
asked if the students felt com-
fortable having their names
and words printed in these
articles, all said yes.
When asked individually if
they thought they had their
voices heard, Phillip said, “It
will actually help — not only
us as individuals, but it will
show parents and everybody
what we see behind the walls
of the school.”
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