The Athlete’s View - Winter 1998
PASS Adapted for Advisory Period
It’s almost 9:00 a.m. at Gage Park High School on Chicago’s southside. An uncanny stillness fills the three-story, brick building that serves a student population of 1,300. Secretaries, uniformed security guards, teachers, and students sit in perfect silence. A visitor might ask, "What’s going on here?"
Dr. Audrey Donaldson, fifth-year principal, explains, "Everybody knows it’s time for concentration practice at Gage Park High School. We get to be quiet, do nothing, focus. "
During the summer of 1997, the Chicago Public Schools mandated a 25-minute, daily Advisory period for all high schools, what many of us might remember as homeroom. The goal was to provide a time for academic support, character development, and career guidance, in addition to managing the daily maintenance activities of taking attendance and giving announcements.
Donaldson thought of the PASS program, which had begun at Gage Park in 1994, and was making an impact on character, behavior, and grades. So Donaldson contacted Dr. Joel Kirsch, president of the American Sports Institute, to see if PASS concepts and activities could be adapted to work in the Advisory period. In response, ASI created the Advisory Teacher’s Guide and three training sessions. Sixty Gage Park people participated in the training, including 48 teachers.
Sterling Spencer, a veteran teacher with 24 years experience in the Chicago Public School system, participated in the training. He says he first had mixed feelings about the Advisory. "I knew I was going to have some students who were going to rebel. I took that as a challenge. I coach basketball and softball, so I took on a coach’s mentality. When you coach, you blend different types of personalities and cultures to make a team. You’ve got to pull them all together so they realize there’s no ‘I’ in team, no ‘me’ in team."
Brian Bedford, a student in Spencer’s Advisory, likes it. "We’ve got different ethnic groups in the class and it brings us together to respect each other. It makes us all feel like we’re one family. It’s not, ‘He’s red or he’s black.’ We’re all here to do one thing and that’s to get an education."
The Advisory period is filled with components of the PASS class. It begins with Mrs. Dobbins, an administrative assistant in the main office, announcing over the loudspeaker, "Let’s get ready to clap-in." The teachers stand before their classes, arms fully extended and parallel to the floor, palms together. Students attentively mirror their teachers. "One, two, three," says Mrs. Dobbins. Throughout the school, 1,300 students, in unison, give two, sharp claps, one right after the other.
Mrs. Dobbins reads a success quote of week. It might be from Plato, Shakespeare, Michael Jordan, or Eleanor Roosevelt. Then the entire school population goes into the concentration practice.
"I like the concentration practice," says Spencer. "We’ve built up from two to five minutes, and it’s helping students learn how to focus."
Deangelo Brown thought Advisory was going to be boring. "But when I got the hang of it, I started to like it," says Brown. "Now I look forward to coming to Advisory and doing the concentration."
At first, Ariana Santos thought the concentration was ridiculous. "But Mr. Spencer explained that concentration skills would help in school. He was serious about it, and I started to like it," says Santos.
Another popular component of the Advisory is the Student of the Day. James Virgini explains, "When I was Student of the Day, I stood in front of the class. They said positive stuff about me, no negative stuff. That’s probably the only time somebody said something positive and nothing negative about me."
Brian Bedford transferred to Gage Park. "I was scared about it, but they welcomed me pretty good, and they showed courtesy to me, being a new student," says Bedford. "They didn’t make me feel uncomfortable."
The Student of the Day enables every student to be known and recognized by his or her peers. After getting a round of applause, the student ends the Advisory by leading the clap-out.
"Every student is a leader, for at least one day," says Spencer. "I have some introverted students who never speak in front of a group. Now they’re up there learning how to take control and gaining confidence."
"The Advisory period met with some resistance," Dr. Donaldson says. "Teachers were skeptical about how the students would respond."
In a school-wide meeting in October, PE teacher Barbara Polasek announced that she was a failure and just couldn’t get the kids to concentrate. Donaldson called on PASS teacher Tommy Miller to give her some coaching. In December, Polasek submitted this message for The Communicator, the teacher’s newsletter: "I am a failure no more! Thanks to Mr. Miller’s help, we have mastered the art of concentrating. Both juniors and seniors are observing the concentration period in the gym. If we can do it, anyone can!"
Principal Donaldson concludes, "My goal was to present a routine that would engage teachers and students every day. I wanted something that was significant and I wanted structure. That’s just what I got." |
