Spearsville HS launches pilot program
, News Editor
09-16-2009
Seniors at Spearsville High School will now be required to complete a senior project in order to be eligible for graduation.
This decision comes after Monday’s Union Parish School Board meeting which saw board members unanimously vote to launch a pilot program at the school beginning this year.
“We see that the state is already in the process of moving in this direction,” Union Parish accountability supervisor Glenda Reynolds said. “While it is not currently in place as a state mandate, we would like to go ahead and implement the program at Spearsville.”
Spearsville High School principal David Gray will be overseeing the venture, which will include the creation of a committee to review the senior’s projects in an unbiased manner.
“We are taking special care to make sure that if someone has something against one student, there will be enough opinions on the board and different personalities that you will be able to have an impartial review of the student’s work,” Gray said.
Projects will take seniors through rigorous research of a subject of their interest where they will be required to perform 20 hours of field experience learning about a trade, interviewing a professional involved in their chosen field and research.
In anticipation of the board’s approval, Spearsville seniors are already at work on their projects.
“We have tentatively set it up as an elective, and parents and students have been notified that this had a possibility of becoming mandatory,” Gray said. “The students are really enthusiastic about their topics. Several are learning about vocational trades while we have one student who is learning about being a photographer and another about kinesiology.”
The project will use a three-prong approach to teach the students about an approved topic.
“There will be a research paper as well as some type of product to be able to show what they have spent their senior year learning,” Gray said. “They will also have to sit before a board to present their projects.”
Gray is hoping the project will be part of a larger change taking place at Spearsville.
“If you create the culture you want, you eliminate 75-80 percent of the problems when kids know right off what is expected of them,” he said. “We want to use a top down approach with this rather than take the normal stance we have had of working our way up from the bottom.”
With a project like this, Gray said a number of skills come in to play.
“These kids are not only learning about these different topics but they are learning how to be articulate when speaking to professionals about their jobs, as well as time management,” he said.
Although a daunting task, Gray said his seniors will rise to the challenge.
“I have no concern at all about these kids being able to pass this,” he said. “We have the resources, and we know our kids are up for it.”
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