Bloomington High School North, Nikean, 2010, Page 154

Description:	Even though junior Avery Norris wasnew to poetry she still enjoyed poetryclass. The class allows students to do alot of free writing. Once you get startedyou just kind of go, Norris said.Photo by Hannah LukemeyerSenior David Herendeen, sophomoreAlex Ebbinghouse and freshman Robert Meya focus on their final project forEtymology; creating a game board thatuses vocabulary words.Photo by Neena ArmitageIn his English 9 Honors class, freshmanTareq Hanania edits a paper. Hananiaenjoys his English class. We manageto have fun and still learn at the sametime, Hanania said.Photo by Hannah Lukemeyer£nglish classes are not often instillersof social change. They teach studentsto write analytical papers and preparethem for the SAT, but social issuesarent often discussed in Englishclasses. This, however, is quite the opposite inthe case of Tajharjha Gibsons senior Englishclass.Earlier in the year, Gibsons class did a unit onsocial issues that teens face such as gun control,cyber bullying and teenage pregnancy. Oneof the main topics of the unit was hazing, withwhich Gibson is all too familiar.At Warren Central I taught a student namedChad Meredith. He was an honor student, lovedby everyone and always did the right thing, Gibson said. When he went to college he joined afraternity at [the] University of Miami. During initiation they made him swim across a lake in themiddle of campus. He cramped up and called forhelp, but his fellow brothers refused to call 911until over an hour later. Chad ended up drowningdue to negligence.Now Chads brother, Jerry Meredith, giveslectures about hazing to various high schoolers, including Gibsons senior English classes.Gibson believes that Jerrys talk on hazing has apowerful effect on the students.Some of my students came up to me on theanniversary of Chads death and said hey, Iremembered that. It really affected them.Senior Marlaina Allen said Jerrys talk madean impact on her.Its usually hard for us kids to express howwe feel. But, when Jerry came last time hestarted crying and thats what made me getteary-eyed, Allen said.Allen says that not only did Jerrys presentation greatly affect her emotionally, but it alsohelped her understand the issue of hazing.It opened a lot of peoples eyes. I never realized that [hazing] was that serious in college.This talk helped me see the struggles that peoplego through every day just to fit in, he said.This was just the kind of reaction from students that Gibson was looking for.She had hoped that the unit on hazing andother teen issues would help her studentsmake their own decisions without adults andteach them that the choices they make do affectthe people around them.If they can start thinking more about their future and the choices they make then this lessonwas worth it, Gibson said.154 english
Source:	http://cdm17129.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/hs-bloomnorth/id/6376
Collection:	Bloomington High School North

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