Small classes, big rewards: ‘Second home’ schooling
BRIAN HOFFMEISTER; For The News Tribune
The Clover Park School District’s 5-12 Learning Community changes lives.
I’m a prime example.
Before attending the 5-12 Learning Community, I felt like a nobody. I had very few friends, if any, and was usually classified as the “theater/choir geek.”
I wasn’t very popular because I didn’t wear brand-name clothing and I wasn’t big on school sports. People thought I was weird for this.
I learned to live with it because I thought that there was no alternative. Speaking in front of people made me uneasy.
Then I started going to the 5-12 Learning Community in fall 2005, when the school opened in Lakewood. From the very first minute, it felt like home.
Students I had never met in my life came up to me to start a conversation. Kids pulled me into their crowd and made me feel better about myself.
Eventually, 5-12 gave me the confidence to do the job I set out to achieve. That December, I ran for Associated Student Body president and have been the ASB president for three years.
Several aspects make 5-12 different from traditional schools.
In a school of just 180 students, classes are small. Teachers really look at your work and, when they are not satisfied, they will sit down and help you. Try doing that when the teacher sees 250-plus students a day.
And unlike other schools, where it seems teachers worried more about how much they were paid or that they didn’t get fired, 5-12 teachers seem to actually care about students. For example, as juniors prepared for the exam in Advanced Placement (AP) Language last month, my writing skills fell behind. I wrote to my teacher and asked for help. His response was not, “No I don’t have time,” or “You just need to get better.” It was, “When and where?”
The school’s small size also means it can’t offer all the classes a larger school would. That’s pushed me to go into the community and join organizations. Since 5-12 does not offer choir, I have sung in the Tacoma Youth Chorus for three years.
The school’s name “5-12 Learning Community” stems in part from its unique grade configuration, offering instruction in grades five through 11 this year, and adding 12th grade next year. We don’t mix fifth-graders with 11th-graders in core classes such as math. But in several non-core classes such as drama and advisory, we have some age diversity. For example, my advisory includes kids as young as fifth grade.
Being in the highest grade, I can officially say we aren’t dismissive to younger kids. In many ways, we treat them as if they are our own brothers and sisters. No matter how much other people think that younger kids would be pests, we like them; they are family to us. They give us a new light and “popular” young opinions.
This week, we’re completing Week Without Walls, a 10-day experience in which students choose one of three areas of study – Green Space, Hunger and Homelessness or Got Art? – which allow us to learn more about the global economy through hands-on work and projects. I’m in the “technology” group documenting the activities of the other groups. We are shooting film, capturing still images and putting all of that into a video for community viewing.
It’s another example of how 5-12 has given me the opportunity to make a change in the community and the ability to believe in myself.
It is a second home to me, and – without it – I would be lost.
About the author
Brian Hoffmeister is finishing 11th grade at the 5-12 Learning Community, a public college preparatory school that shares the Oakwood Elementary School campus in Lakewood. Next fall, 5-12 will have a new name, Harrison Prep School, and move from its portable buildings at Oakwood to its own campus at the former Lake City Elementary School. He writes about the personal impact of the three-year-old school.
