As a SOAR and an Academy at SOAR parent, you want it all.
This year I am thrilled to say I have heard from many pleased parents, who have
told us their child loves school and learning for the first time, and that
their kids feel successful.
However, there have been some parents I've spoken to
lately who I feel we haven't met their expectations with their children's
academics. I take the blame for that. In my efforts to please the client and
meet everyone's needs, I've become a little less than real, and I need to be a
little more upfront about what we do and can't do, for good reasons. Perhaps I haven't been perfectly clear.
The Academy at SOAR is not an ordinary school. It is an
extrordinary school. The Academics are important and they are strong. But the
academics are not what makes SOAR and The Academy special. Strange as it sounds
coming from the Academic Director, academics are not the most important part.
It is everything else that SOAR gives kids besides
traditional academics that makes S0AR
special.
Yes, we've gained a reputation that precedes us, which is
why perhaps people come to SOAR and the academy expecting to pick their child's
education off a menu of what they want in a perfect world. Even at SOAR it
doesn't work quite like that.
Here's how it works. I don't tell you how it works
because I have decreed it, for I have only been at SOAR for a mere two years.
SOAR is what it is, because their are student needs not
being fulfilled by traditional schools, whether they be public or private.
SOAR is what it is, because traditional methods of
traditional instruction delivered in traditional ways, with traditional
measures to show for it don't work with non- traditional students.
I'm not saying that doing what has always been done and
expecting miraculous results is the defition of insanity. It is just time for a
reality check, for myself included. We can't bt definition of who we are do
things the way they have traditionally been done. Otherwise, what option would
that really provide your kids.
So what can you expect? You may have to strap yourself in
for an expectation shift.
Traditional schools are traditional results oriented,
where the measure of success is a product, usually a test score. I've had
parents tell me what their children have done at" other" schools,
thereby implying, or stating directly what they expect to see coming from their
child at SOAR. Well, I will say again, that is not how it works.I mean no disrespect
when I say this. We don't define success
in merely traditional senses. That is not to say we don't have high standards
for student academics. When a parent tells me what there child accomplished at
"another school" implying that we are in some way missing the mark, I
want to say to them, "and now you are at The Academy at SOAR, so how did
that other school work for ya?" But I don't, because that would be too
blunt.
Kids,students come to SOAR for no other reason than
things didn't work out where they came from. So why, logically, would we do
things at SOAR, the way the schools they came from did it?
Now I know that SOAR parents want their child to not get
behind in school, stay on track for graduation, and gain the skills necessary
to be successful now and in the future, wherever they are headed. Parents want
to know their child is going to get the credits they need. I don't fault
parents for that, and I don't say that isn't one of our goals with your child.
It is but "one" of the goals.
At SOAR, we are Process
oriented, and "Success Oriented" as much as Product oriented. We are
charged with the task of meeting the need of the whole child, something
traditional school environments don't always seem so concerned with.
At SOAR we have the flexibility, the skills and resources
to meet ALL our students, YOUR CHILD'S needs. That means, however, that we have
a much bigger job to do, and the same ole' 24 hours a day to do it. So
sometimes we have to prioritize. And our priorities aren't always the same as
your traditional schools...what you're used to.
But, I reitterate, isn't that why you picked SOAR when
you found SOAR? Because we offered something different.
Case and Point. On expedition in DC last night, our team
had nightly meeting which involved highlights from the day, pluses and deltas
(things we did good and things we could do better) among other processing
activities. As the academic guy, I've provided not only the plans but the
implementation of the academics this expedition. We were going to work into nightly
meeting a processing of prompts responded to, reflections of things learned and
experience not to forget from our expedition logs.
(Expedition logs are a personal journal or diary of
sorts, where students write, not specifically for a grade, but to reflect and
gather written snapshots of their adventures- an component of project- based
learning)
The team had some interpersonal issues. They had some
conflicts that they needed to work through and it got heated. I decided fairly
quickly that I was tossing academics (I.e. Expedition logs) out the window for
the evening. Your kids were working through some social and team issues that
were more primary needs.It's along the same lines as kids not being able to do
their best work if they haven't had a good nutritious meal.If we don't nourish
the soul, the mind can't do its best on academics. A traditional school doesn't
do that.
I had another student on another day whose parents
expected to see more high quality writing samples from their student. This student
had been writing quite well in his expedition log. This student was
demonstrating the ability to be a strong leader within his team. Verbally, he
was demonstrating that he is as sharp as they come. He wasn't writing the 5
paragraph essay on a weekly basis yet. The parent was concerned. How can I help
this parent to understand that what their child is gaining both in school and
out of school is so much more valuable than a perfect essay a week. I
understand. When you're not with your child everyday, work products are all you
have to judge the quality of their education. That, and my word.
There was another parent with a similar concern. Their
child did not have writing samples of a multi-paragraph essay. This student
struggled with handwriting and was becoming more and more willing to word
process. I was working on praising the " successive approximations"
of the eventual goal of that multi-paragraph paper, but the student wasn't
there yet. And that was ok. This particular student was growing socially within
the team and the academic setting, was doing his work, and participating
wonderfully in class. Something he didn't do at the beginning. Another example
of how the success or lack-there-of is being measured traditionally, when a
SOAR education doesn't fit the traditional mold. Again, when you're not with
your child everyday, work products are all you have to judge the quality of
their education. That, and my word.
So what is my message here? I have seen, in just a short
time at SOAR as the Academic Director for The Academy at SOAR how SOAR changes
kids lives in ways that go so far beyond academics it's not even funny.
Academics are important, and we are doing them better than ever before.
This is what I ask. Trust us. But don't simply take my
word for anything. Call me. Email me. Ask me questions. Ask any of us
questions. Grill us. Stay connected.
Know that if you don't get the answer from us that you
would expect from a traditional school, or the results you would expect from a
traditional school, in a perfect world with your child, that it is not bad, or
deficient, just different. On the contrary, a SOAR education is so much more
than a traditional school could hope to give a child. We are all very proud of
that.
So the results you can expect, may be easy to see on
paper at times, but much of the time they won't be evident until you talk to
your child, or see them in person at the end of the semester. They are results
that are life changing. They are results that will last a lifetime.
