Linus J. Guillory Jr., PhD LOWELL PUBLIC SCHOOLS Chief Schools Officer Phone: (978) 674-2163 155 Merrimack Street E-mail: [email protected] Lowell, Massachusetts 01852 TO: Dr. Joel Boyd, Superintendent of Schools FROM: Linus J. Guillory Jr., PhD, Chief Schools Officer DATE: September 27, 2019 RE: Update on the Latin Lyceum The following report is in response to a motion by Gerard Nutter & Andy Descoteaux: Administration to explain the change in philosophy regarding class location for the Latin Lyceum and Freshman Academy. Robert DeLossa prepared a response for Head of Lowell High School Busteed. The entirety of the response is reflected herein. From: Robert DeLossa To: Marianne Busteed Date: 25 September 2019 RE: Response to School Committee Motion with regard to the change of Freshman location to FA for Lyceum Students With regard to the question of whether the decision to house the teachers of Freshman Lyceum students in the Freshman Academy reflected a change of philosophy underlying the Lowell Latin Lyceum, I can state categorically that it did not. The underlying philosophy of the LLL remains the same as it has since the beginning of the Lyceum. Below I will point to two different areas to consider. The first is that the move to the Freshman Academy actually is more consistent with the philosophy of the Lyceum than the previous arrangement. Second, the move to the Freshman Academy better supports the individual needs of Lyceum students, who because of their academic giftedness and creativity, often need more social-emotional support than the previous arrangement provided. That support is physically located in the Freshman Academy. Traditionally, Lyceum students were physically removed from their supports; this negatively affected a number of freshman students each year. The question of philosophy Latin Lyceum – September 27, 2019 Page 1 That philosophy is based on the mission of the Lyceum, which has been constant since its inception: · The Latin Lyceum at Lowell High School provides a humanistic, classical education to students who have shown strong academic potential through testing, prior performance, and recommendations. · The Lyceum nurtures students to be leaders in the school and broader community, and the Lyceum prepares students for rigorous competition in college, career, and civic engagement after high school. · Lyceum students, in turn, are expected to exhibit significant accomplishment through their focus, work ethic, motivation, service, and integrity during the course of their studies at Lowell High School. Furthermore, the strengths of the Lyceum have been the same since its inception. Let me focus on the first of those strengths that we present when we talk with students and parents about what makes the Lyceum experience superlative: · It uses a cohort model focused on a rigorous academic experience. · All instruction in the Lyceum is at the Honors, High Honors and AP level. · 4-year program with specific academic course requirements. · Cross-disciplinary connections with common teacher groups. Two of these points are important to the decision to move the freshman Lyceum teaching cluster into the Freshman Academy (FA). The first is that the cohort model is at the core of the Lyceum experience. Students learn from each other as much as they learn from their teachers. By situating high-achieving students in groups of other high-achieving students, the Lyceum is able to leverage student excellence to magnify the individual potential of each and every student in the program. Second, the cross-disciplinary connections with common teacher groups also has been critical, inasmuch as it allows teachers to interact with students in ways that make even more meaningful learning experiences because they are able to guide students in tandem across multiple disciplines. It also means that teachers can be more responsive to individual students because they talk with other teachers about students they have in common; if one teacher sees the early warning signs of difficulty, there is a greater chance of it making its way to other teachers for management than in a general education setting. The move to the FA enhanced both of these points. It meant that the cohort of freshman would have a more cohesive atmosphere in which to enter the Lyceum by having a discrete, identifiable hallway (wing), in which teachers are located. It also meant that teachers are in easy proximity one to the other. The question of student support It is well recognized at this point that academically gifted students have higher social-emotional support needs than many other demographic cohorts in secondary schools both when their specific talents are not given a sufficient “space” to grow (see, for instance, Reis and Renzulli 2003) and when they find, often for the first time, that material is hard for them to master (see, for instance, Clinkenbeard 2012) and they mis-attribute their difficulty to personal, intellectual defects, rather than the difficulty of the material and the necessity of, for example, more effective study habits. 2 Those of us who work with Lyceum students know that every year a number of them (it varies, but is usually between one-half dozen to a dozen throughout the program) experience acute anxiety that can be debilitating. This is due to a number of factors, but the problem at a personal level responds best to the sorts of support that are situated within the Freshman Academy. For those students, frontloading supports in their freshman year can make the difference between success and failure in the program. Further, there have been consistent requests from some freshman students to be nearer to their non- Lyceum friends during lunch and other non-academic break-time. Ms. Rothschild has heard these requests numerous times over the past several years. This access to friends from middle schools and neighborhoods also provides emotional support to all students. For our freshmen, this occurs only within the freshman academy. Concerns from some parents and students I have heard concerns from some parents and students about the new experience for sophomores, who now go into the Freshman Academy, when they previously did not go into the building. This breaks down into two types of concerns. The first is around the nature of feeling “constricted” by the rules and physical closed nature of the FA. The reality is that the major issue that has been openly expressed to me (i.e., not being able to “hang out” inside the building before school) actually represent either a misunderstanding of what is possible at the FA (students there can meet before school with a teacher’s permission) or the fact that students were engaged in what was technically impermissible behavior in the 1922, but were allowed to engage in it nonetheless. We cannot structure a program on the basis of “but they were getting away with it.” A second real concern deals with travel times, which have increased for the sophomores. I have investigated this and there is one legitimate concern revolving around one mathematics class in the 500s and another class in the FA. That needs to be addressed. However, other concerns I heard actually represented a typical amount of movement for LHS students in terms of the length of the walk. It also should be noted that non-Lyceum upper-class students also take classes in the Freshman Academy, but they are concentrated along one side of one building to minimize the disruption to the rest of the FA. Work Cited Clinkenbeard, Pamela. 2012. “Motivation and Gifted Students: Implications of Theory and Research.” Psychology in the Schools 49(7): 622–630. Reis, Sally M. and Joseph S. Renzulli. 2003. “Current research on the social and emotional development of gifted and talented students: Good news and future possibilities.” Psychology in the Schools 41(1): 119–130. 3 .