I recently reviewed one of my personal guilty pleasures--The Incredible Mr. Limpet. You've seen it? It was part of a genre of films in the mid 1960s in which the protagonist was a military liason. Indeed, it's sort of a feel good, piscatorial version of It's a Wonderful Life. But, I digress. (Which, I'm told, I do often.)
At any rate, our protagonist, Henry Limpet, tries to sign up for the Navy, in the days leading up to WWII. He is denied based on his poor vision. His harpy of a wife stops him from persuing his aquarium hobby and, on an excursion to Coney Island, he falls off the pier and becomes a fish--and a secret weapon which defeats the Nazis. But, I digress.
The idea which sticks to me is the idea of a draft. As we start this house system, we all know our top talent--the top-drawer seniors. Noting, of course, that they may have some limited access to this blog (if they look at my profile and get past the fact that I list a Brautigan novel as one of my favorites), we could easily divide them into four groups, contact them, and enlist them. They could draft from a list of juniors and sophomores. The freshmen? Well, I have checked and there are a number of legacies (siblings of former and current students and children of teachers). If they are interested, we could draft from that list as well.
It is not important the order in which they were chosen and those we chose as leaders would be honor bound not to reveal such secrets. The point is that the students would know that they were chosen--and that's bound to feel good. Honestly, I think that we would each come up with about five or six names that we would choose to lead these houses at this important stage. Why not lean on these great young people to help us establish the tradition?
3 comments:
Mel,
Part of the student leadership section I'm working on entails the faculty leadership choosing the student leadership. But since it would obviously need to occur differently the first time out than the way that I'm writing it as a proposed procedure to establish, this sounds fine to me. I support this idea; though I think we might need to officially establish at least Heads of House, even if we don't know what the Houses will be named or what their basic philosophies will be, before we do this.
Maybe not, though; it just seems to me like the Houses and at least some of the faculty leadership should be in place before we have student members.
Mel, I concur with your praise of Don Knotts, but not with your "draft" proposal. From what I understand, a draft is based on certain standards (minimum age of 18, can fog a mirror) along with random selection (birth dates). Your idea is not a draft, but a form of (Take a deep breath and remember that I like you, I REALLY like you!) institutionalized cliques.
According to your plan, we form core groups of "top drawer" students, so to speak, who will then choose the younger students they want to socialize with. First picks from the freshmen class are the "legacies." Then we will find a spot for anyone else who is interested. And we expect the seniors to keep all of this a secret. (sigh...)
Granted, the origination of the House membership is very important, and we want to have some control, but I think we can find a happy balance between hoplites and elitism. As teachers, whatever selection plan we agree on should not be revealed in total to the students, especially if it includes some subjective choices. That kind of information will get out, and it will be hurtful, possibly to the point of discouraging students to join.
My earlier suggestion to have each Head of House choose one or two lead students to work with is similar to your plan, but I recommended not telling them. They don't really need to know. And I still think that the staff should control the initial selection of students into House membership. After the Houses are established, we will have to alter the procedure; at that point, student recommendations would certainly be useful.
The Navy used to have a "buddy program" for friends who wanted to join up together. This could work well for our new Houses in that students (especially in the lower classes) might be more inclined to join if they have one friend with them. During the sign up period, we could have single or "buddy" forms for students who want that option. I think it's possible to do even if we have other criteria to consider.
Part of the mystery and excitement of creating and running these Houses is to shake things up around here, to create new rhythms and synergy within the student body, the teaching staff, and between both groups. Infusing the right level of randomness into the membership process will cause some confusion initially as each House must settle in and assess itself, but eventually it should lead to valuable experiences for all of the students who join.
One last look at drafts. One of, if not the funniest, movies about the draft starred Mr. Limpet's friend from Mayberry, Andy Griffith. I challenge anyone to keep a straight face during the saluting toilet seat scene in "No Time for Sergeants." It's a classic!
Valid criticisms and ideas. I guess you guys can make me the PLO (Permanent Latrine Orderly). (And my draft IS a draft--in the sports sense of the word--though not in the military sense.)
I honestly hadn't seen the "rush week" angle that Jackie saw and expressed quite clearly. I don't think that the top current seniors I have in mind would follow the path of Lambda Lambda Lambda.
My idea was to have them HELP. They might be aware of quirks and tendencies of their fellow students which we as teachers are not aware of. It would be stupid--of course--to let the students have total control. I think it would be a bit foolish not to consult them a bit as this develops.
All in all, though, a simple charm on an old hat could solve this problem.
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