Kakia Johnson knows about hopes and dreams. She makes daily lists of her goals. Some are modest, like completing Brown Summer High School's (BSHS) English course, "Where Do Hopes and Dreams Come From?" Others are grand, like completing her master's degree in psychology. "I want to make it in the world," the 17-year-old says. "I'm so afraid of becoming engulfed in the ills of this world. I see street people on the corner, drug addicts and hookers, and I don't want to be like them. ...I've set a goal for myself to go to college, to get my master's degree and to do something with my life."
Teachers and students alike come to BSHS for one reason: to pursue their dreams of an education. For students like Johnson, that entails nearly four weeks of classes four hours each weekday, a scant few weeks after finishing the regular school year. For Brown student teachers, it means donating six weeks of their summer in study and instruction.
"I want to see what it is that I could be," says Johnson, who, come September, will be a senior at the Chamber of Commerce Academy, a Providence school-to-work transition program. "I want to explore what interests me. I have an interest in psychology and the whole concept of hopes and dreams intrigues me.
"For the short term, it's fun," Johnson says of BSHS. "In the long term, it will be a reward to me and it will look good on my college applications."
Johnson joins 349 other students taking part in the summer school, now in its 28th year. Since its inception, BSHS has tripled its enrollment and attracted the attention of nationally known leaders in the education field. The school is a teaching lab for University students studying for their Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) and participating in the Undergraduate Teacher Education Program. Students in these programs team teach BSHS classes.
They are supervised by a mentor teacher, an exemplary teacher from the surrounding school districts, and by a clinical professor of education at Brown. Master teachers, that is, teachers whose schools are members of the Coalition of Essential Schools, also teach. The latter are supported by a five-year grant from the National Science Foundation.
Jennifer Breen and Laura Maxwell, both graduates of the MAT program, run BSHS. Both previously taught BSHS classes. Breen, 24, says the goal of the program is to challenge students, who pay $75 to attend the program."I would hope they develop more of an excitement for learning," she says. "It's a really positive experience. It's exciting that kids get to meet with other kids from the city and from other towns.
"And this is as much a learning experience for the teachers as the students," she continues. "They're looking to hone their skills, to develop relationships with students and to see if the students learned something."
The BSHS curriculum, comprising courses in English, science, history and social studies, little resembles traditional high school studies. Course titles indicate as much. Science courses bear titles like "Pool: What's the Angle?" and "Can Wile E. Coyote Ever Catch the Roadrunner?" Social studies classes take on such questions as "Race: What Is It Good For?" and "Who Makes History?" The point is to go beyond the immediate lesson to ponder the "Essential Questions" - defined in BSHS's cheeky glossary, "Educationese 101," as questions "intended to guide, but not determine, the paths of student learning." To explore such questions, students are engaged in small and large group discussions. They conduct laboratory experiments and role play. And there is homework. Students are evaluated not by tests but rather by a demonstration of their knowledge of the course material as it applies to the Essential Question.
Students aren't the only ones learning, says Breen. "I learned that you can't really plan a lesson until you know your students," she says. "I came to BSHS afire with ideas with a head full of theory and all this pedagogy," she says and smiles. "I learned I had to tailor lessons to my students. It's so important to get to know your students, to understand where they're coming from."
Carol Nota, a mentor teacher recently retired from Classical High School, says BSHS offers student teachers an experience akin to teaching in a one-room schoolhouse. Student abilities, like their ages, can vary considerably. "Some students are here to hone their English, and some are here for the enrichment of it," Nota says. "Some are on their way to Harvard and say this looks good on their résumé." The single characteristic the students share, says Nota, is drive. "They're here because they want to be here," she says. "They're all very involved. It's great to see them learning in a different way than they would be learning in most high schools. They're very interactive here."
Nota's job is to observe student teachers Jennifer L. David, a graduate student, and Frank Morris, an undergraduate. The two are team teaching "Where Do Hopes and Dreams Come From?" being held in Barus & Holley. Nota critiques their methods and delivery, but never interferes while the two are conducting class.
On this day, the lesson plan includes acting out a passage from the course textbook, the novel "Bless Me, Ultima" by Rudolfo A. Anaya. The students are instructed to act out chapter one, "The Dream." The students are divided into groups of five. Only one, the narrator, is allowed to speak. The others may only mime, David tells them.
"See how little [David] tells them," Nota mentions to an observer. "The students will discover things for themselves which will help them be better readers, better students."
"Bless Me, Ultima" is the story of a boy whose family is at odds over his destiny. His mother's family wants a priest; his father's, a vaquero, a cowboy. Only the mystical midwife Ultima knows what will be. The students begin to act out the boy's dream of his birth. Girls chosen as the mother in labor assume supine positions and pain-ridden countenances. Others in the role of midwife Ultima busy themselves gathering imaginary bedsheets and cutting the umbilical cord with their teeth.
"Guys, do you recognize there is this huge battle going on?" David asks her students. "One family wants him to become a priest, the other wants him to become a cowboy." The boys mime the actions of cowboys smashing the farmers' gifts of fruit and vegetables, dropping saddles and bottles of whiskey in their stead. The girls make the sign of the cross as they present the afterbirth to a statue of the Virgin Mary. They have given David their answer: Yes, they understand.