At MacLaren’s Lord High School, educators have begun a new practice: recognizing students of the month from among its roughly 90 high school students. Recognition is one of the school’s core values, developed cooperatively by school and MacLaren staff as part of a broader effort to build a shared organizational culture supported by a partnership with Breakfree Education. Students may be recognized for academic accomplishment, but they are just as likely to be honored for their persistence or positive engagement with school.
For all students, this recognition was a surprise. One youth reflected, “I’ve never won anything like this before because I always used to act up.” Several youth expressed pride while one described feeling “proud, proud, proud of myself.” A third said the recognition “made me realize, like: I’ve come this far and accomplished this much – I can do more.” While a couple saw it as “just a piece of paper,” they nonetheless acknowledged that being noticed for their effort mattered.
For many, this recognition marked a change in their relationship to their school. One youth explained that before coming to MacLaren, “I never really went to school,” while another dropped out at twelve-years old. Others described feeling negatively about learning “since elementary school”; they attended but “did not do the work,” “got frustrated,” or “got into trouble.” One youth remembered, “I practically slept or drew all class periods.”
They also expressed feeling differently about Lord High School. One student felt he benefitted from “small classrooms” and “extra teachers that…give you that support, that motivation.” Lord teachers, remarked another, “make you want to do work,” and credited Mr. Hatch with “telling me, it’s there – you just got to find it!” Others noted that Lord made credit recovery easier and that they were able to “get credits faster” that at their prior school.
Nearly all could point to something that motivated them within their school day. Math came up again and again, but a couple students spoke with excitement about their current unit on World War I. A couple others praised Moody, MacLaren and Lord’s vocational space, where they could learn everything from welding to auto repair to CAD design and robotics. Whatever the subject, a number of students described a turning point – a moment when something “snapped into my head” and they realized, “I actually kind of like doing this.”
It was clear that these experiences at Lord, even prior to this recognition, had shifted their sense of their futures. Nearly all students were a few credits shy of finishing their diploma and all intended to finish; most were poised to become the first to earn diplomas in their families. Some intended to go to college in subjects ranging from finance to counseling to culinary skills. One student on the cusp of getting out credits his time at Lord with helping him “find that path” so he could “leave all this behind” upon his release. Most poignantly, one student interpreted his recognition as a vote of confidence, “that I can do better in the community.”
While there is distance between “Student of the Month” and a successful crime-free life, this young man is certainly moving in the right direction. Congratulations to Lord’s January students of the month – we are excited to see where life takes you.