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“Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” — William Butler Yeats
INSIDE OUT
How A School Turns Itself Around
Second Edition
Welcome to the second edition of INSIDE OUT, our online journal of what's happening at Central High School. In our first edition, we said that we had a simple goal: to give the community—inside and outside our school—a better appreciation of how Central is changing. We said that Central has lots of room for improvement, but it's a school where students care and where excellent teachers challenge ambitious students every day.
In this edition of INSIDE OUT, we take up a complaint you hear all the time from high school students across the country: school is boring. We spotlight moments and places at Central where learning comes alive for students and teachers—from building roller coasters in physics to writing and performing an original play.
We also share some discoveries that will surprise you. We compared Central High School yearbooks from 1964 and 2004. Did you know that in 1964 Central graduated 175 students (245 graduated in 2004)—and that 87 percent were white? Or that bowling was the favorite activity of female students in '64 and that half the female graduates wanted to be a secretary?
Lots of folks told us how much they enjoyed the first edition of INSIDE OUT. We hope you like this one just as much.
— The Students of Central High School and What Kids Can Do
With special thanks to Central HS principal Elaine Almagno and school redesign coach Bianca Gray; theater teacher Richard Gurspan and his students, physics teacher Richard Gagnon and his students, the Central High School book club, and Ted Fuller's journalism students; and Barbara Cervone and Marc Berger of What Kids Can Do, Inc.
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Straight talk
“One of the hardest things about teaching is getting kids to work on things that they don't think are relevant to their own lives, things that don't have any real connection to them.” — Susan Friendson, 12th grade English
Click here to read what teachers in Central's book club have to say about making their classes lively. Download a cookbook of recipes by 9th grade literacy students that includes favorite foods from their native countries.
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Photo gallery
“Art is humanity's most essential, most universal language. It is not a frill, but a necessary part of communication.” — Ernest Boyer, Educator
Click here to see pictures of Central students trying their hands at drawing, printmaking, ceramics, music and dance, and cosmetology.
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Did you know?
... That in 1964, minorities made up 2 percent of Central's faculty; in 2004, 15 percent of the faculty was African-American or Hispanic?
...That racing hot rods and collecting jazz albums were some of the favorite hobbies of male students in 1964?
Click here for more interesting comparisons between Central High School in 1964 and 2004, as recorded in the school yearbook. Read also about how the arts are making a come back at Central.
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Learning in action
“Today we're working on monologues. As you know, that's going to be the main part of our play—everyone is going to write his or her own monologue.” — Richard Gurspan, Theater teacher
Click here to step inside Richard Gurspan's theater class and see how students are developing and performing their own monologues—and the commitments Gurspan expects from his students.
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Shout out
“It was good because we actually got to build a rollercoaster, something we thought we couldn't do before.”....“It made me like school.”
In Richard Gagnon's physics class, students did something unusual: instead of just studying the laws of energy, they applied them by designing their own roller coasters. Click here to see what they built and how Gagnon approached the project.
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Central High School | 70 Fricker St., Providence, RI 02903 | 401.456.9111
What Kids Can Do, Inc. | PO Box 603252, Providence, RI 02906 | 401.247.7665
Copyright © 2005
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