Everything Counts in Large Amounts

New Art for a New Era

The class of 1968 made a donation to the school this year and with those funds a project one of my students had been working on for 2 years was able to come to fruition. Its quite exciting to see it up in the LMC after so much time of planning.

In my graphic design class several years ago, I gave an assignment about art in public places. My art students made proposals to create artwork around the school. I had my mentor from the UW come and talk to them about signage and way-finding. For the final exam students submitted proposals to administrators about the possibilities. Out of this class came a very gifted student, Alexa R., who asked me to become a student aide during her junior year. Instead, I asked her to work with our librarian and principal to create a new digital painting for the LMC that would go up to replace a very dated painting. Once in the works, I heard from several teachers that the dated painting had its place in our school since it was a good showing of history. So instead of replacing the old painting, I asked that custodians take down plaster sculptures that had become quite dirty with time next to the paintings. The paintings would be moved over in their place and the new art would then take center stage and make a new history. The digital art features 50 years of yearbook photos scanned in and collaged in throughout the artwork. The student spent approximately 300 hours on this artwork which included months of class time searching and scanning yearbook photos. 

Graduation Day

I don't always go to my senior's graduation but this year's was particularly special. With two yearbook classes, I had the more seniors this year than I ordinarily do in any given year. My yearbook seniors are a special bunch causing me much grief but also great pride-- this year especially. Every year, for about 8 or 9 now, I take the left over June Senior editions of the student newspaper for parents. This year I ordered an extra 500 copies for them. I got to the Kohl Center at 8:15am--early enough to get in before security was set up. I was early enough to help with set up the ceremony as well. I volunteered to be an usher, organizing the M's, N's and O's in alphabetical order.  I brought mints for kids and took photos. Once the kids were lead in by the marshals (which Josh was one), I stayed back to help clean up and chat with admin. I missed the beginning of the ceremony which showed the senior video but got in in time to hear all the speeches including Geof's, which was supposed to be less than 10 minutes but went on for more than 20. His message was special and it was especially meaningful knowing it was his farewell to our school on several levels. He will be a missed figure in our structure.

I walked away feeling very much at peace about the school year. It had been a good one. As I waved goodbye and good luck to my M's, N's and O's in line as they marched in, I felt a real sense of joy for them. Two of the girls in my line were my editors in chief, one for the newspaper and one for the yearbook. They were gifted young women that while I had encouraged and guided them with their work, while I did not feel like I had done all that much work for them. Earlier this week at a couple of grad parties, I had had a couple of parents and one grandparent thank me for "all my work" as a teacher. I even had one tell me that I had changed the trajectory their child completely. The thing is, it's hardly work at all. I love what I'm doing! There is great joy in that.

Significant Senior Artists

About 12 years ago (maybe 13?) our department decided to celebrate special art students-- students who might not otherwise be celebrated before graduating. The first couple of years, I did not take photos or if I did, they were in black and white film. We did not do a gathering but rather had the students put on a gallery show. Eventually we got routine going, a special luncheon after finals, certificates, cake and a photo taken and the gallery show kind of went out the window. The first group photo documented in Facebook is 2007 but I'm pretty sure we had at least one group before that, maybe 2. I think about how much documentation has changed with the onset of the digital camera. Now we take photos of everything. We used to not do that.

My students used to be primarily metals students and now they are primarily digital artist and yearbook editors. The criteria for students to be chosen as a significant senior artist is not only a student had made artistic production an integral part of their experience at Madison Memorial, but one who had taken at least 3 art classes and had exemplary attendance. These are student who had been positive influences and inspiration to his/her classmates. Often it's hard to come up with 3 kids for this honor, occasionally an art teacher only picks 2. Only once did Geof ask to have 4. 

The Last Day of School

Every semester I take photos of my students on the last day of classes. I will see many of my students again, some during finals, some at graduation or at grad parties and a few in my classes next year, but a few I won't ever see again. I've learned to take my photos on the last day of regular classes rather than finals because not all kids show up to the finals, especially if all of their work is done, even if there is an activity or required reason to be at the final. I've learned to make finals a time for making up work. It give me more time to give students who need it, as well as a bit more time for grading and cleaning and doing all the other things we need to do at the end of the semester. 

Distribution Day

I was nervous. The kids work on the yearbook all year but it's created by students and I am a terrible editor! The kids planned the whole distribution time. Joe thought it was way too complicated BUT it went perfectly. We limited entry to students who had purchased books. Last year anyone could come in and mill about. I pushed kids to leave once they picked up their book. Last year kids stayed to sign each other's books. I had music playing quite loud to entertain ourselves but it was too loud for students to stand around and talk. I didn't hear of any complaints from students, teachers or administrators. I heard from one junior student that students were all raving about the book. One of my editors told me he combed the book for typos or misspelled words and he could not find a one. I heard from one student that some kids were eagerly scraping off our white out and giggling about the caption. I'm still a little nervous about that situation. By the end of the school day I was drenched in sweat and exhausted-- perfect time to get to the pool.

Bad Caption

Every year I get pies for my yearbook students to celebrate our getting to see the yearbooks in print! I call it "preview and pie" day. My 4th hour students had a great time looking through the books yesterday but when my 7th hour kids came in there was a bit of a buzz then it was pointed out to me that a caption on the baseball page was "foul." I had to ask a male colleague what it meant and then I went to talk to the head principal about what to do about it. He asked me to spend my Saturday blacking out the word out of all 1250 yearbooks. He also felt that blacking out with a sharpie marker was fine but I decided to use white out tape since it looked a lot better and students will hardly be able to tell that there was an issue.

I sent my editors in chiefs emails last night explaining the situation and how I was coming in on Saturday to white out all the books. The principal talked to the baseball coach about the situation and since the culprit was a baseball player, the coach decided to make the whole team come in on Saturday to help me. I was hoping for help, but then my editors decided to organize everything to get it all done today. Many kids ditched their classes to work most of the day. I saw a few kids work harder today than I had seen them work all semester. I was very impressed with the eagerness to make sure neither I or the baseball team would have to come in to work on Saturday.

The boy who actually put in the bad caption worked almost as hard as my editors in chiefs. A couple of principals came in to see the progress. Our head custodian helped the students drive the books over to the photo lab so they could work in my room but I did not have time to assist them as I had other work to do. They finished all 1250 books, 111 cases just in time for the school day to be done without any assistance from me. The kids will all be gone tomorrow for the senior picnic and no one has to worry about doing anything this weekend.

 

End of Year Traditions

As the school year comes to an end, there all kinds of traditions that happen. After teaching for 16 years I've created many of the traditions myself, many that have to do with the newspaper and yearbook. One of the first of the season is the Senior Editors luncheon where the senior editors chose the leadership for the following year. Ten years ago I inherited a bunch of editors, and because my daughter, Jessi was a freshman working on the paper, I wanted to make sure there was a process that would not involve me directly since I knew Jessi would eventually want to be an editor but would not her mother being the one who picked her. It worked out perfectly to have the seniors do all the choosing. The have a great sense of knowing who will take good care of the paper. Every year the kids take the paper a little further and I feel like I have less to do.  Picking a day were all the senior editors can meet together is difficult, as they are all quite busy, so it has often been on a Sunday brunch time like today. I love how serious they take it all. 

Next: Senior Convocation Award Ceremony (I take photos for the paper) Monday; Yearbook preview day with pie on Wednesday; Senior Edition Layout and dinner with new editors on Thursday; Senior Picnic and Film Fest on Friday; Spring Art Sale next Wednesday & Thursday; Yearbook distribution on Thursday, May 30; Senior Party on next Friday, June 1st, Last day of yearbook BBQ and pin ceremony on the last day of class.

The Countdown is on!

32 days until graduation but only 23 days until the last day of class; 16 actual class days. My seniors are slipping away. Today they seemed disheveled, like it was a Monday after a difficult weekend. After today, there are only 2 more Monday's left of regular school. It is hard for me not to remember how crazy this time is-- crazy for me as a high school senior, crazy for me as a mother of a high school senior. I watch them with excitement and a little pity. They have accomplished a lot and most don't want to do anything anymore. I understand some of their apathy, I tolerate with patience, knowing that my getting upset about any of it won't really help. I yelled at them the other day because they were ignoring my instructions. They all looked at me like I had lost my marbles, but they stopped ignoring me. 

#19 in Wisconsin High Schools

Memorial High is ranked #830 in the National Rankings. Schools are ranked on their performance on state-required tests, graduation and how well they prepare students for college. The US News report is out and we are the best rated high school in Madison. Middleton took #10 in the state (compared to our #19) but they have a quarter of the economically disadvantaged students than we do and twice the facilities. It is kind of fun to see the numbers and know that even with our sub par infrastructure, our school is highly rated. It makes me proud as an art teacher knowing my students are going to post graduate schools (both art schools or art programs in traditional colleges) as the most prepared art students in their classes. And as a parent, I know my 3 daughters got a great education at the school I teach. Each of them went on to very different post graduate situations that they were more than prepared for and excelled in their college situation, each at highly rated universities-- Erika via MATC to UW, Jessi at the Naval Acadamy and Monika at Claremont College. 

Let them eat cake!

I am a strong believer in making time to celebrate. Today was the day to celebrate the finishing of the yearbook. I sent the last proofs into the company on Monday after school. It seems crazy that the book really all done. If none of the kids do any more work from now on, I'll be okay. My seniors picked up their caps and gowns today and after school was graduation speaker try outs. A month from Monday is final exams. The end is so near!

I got a big Costco cake for both of my classes to share. I had the kids vote on an MVP and gave out awards to the winners-- 2 in each class. I wanted to make sure that the students who worked the hardest were rewarded. It was very obvious to me who should win and those students did win. We spent the hour eating cake and chatting about the Prom coming up, parking drama and the end of the school year.