Orianna's MLC

My name is Orianna O’Neill, and I am writing in support of the Metropolitan Learning Center. I began attending MLC in 2005, and started sixth grade in Ned’s classroom. From my first day at MLC, I knew this was a special place. “Oh,” I said to my parents, “This is what school is supposed to be like!”

I had countless amazing experiences during my seven years at MLC. From the adventures in the swimming pool during gym in sixth grade, through the field trips to Seattle, Newport, Sunriver, Ashland, and Camp Hancock. This adventure culminated with my graduation, where my Metro teacher, Steve, gave a beautiful speech just about me.  Each day was offered an enticing learning adventure from assignments to invent empanada recipes to memorizing French verbs to new painting techniques on the same day. I took electives that I had chosen myself about everything from American Sign Language to beadwork.  I sat around a campfire and heard stories from the childhoods of my teachers. I created characters in Storyline that did everything from travel back in time to Lewis and Clark’s expedition to running for president. I wrote a novel with half of my eighth grade class. One of my lasting gifts to the community was painting sixteen tiny penguins hidden all over the building.

In addition to all of the amazing things that happened in the classroom, there were so many other stories from outside of the classroom. My friends and I ran Project Second Wind, the annual food drive, and helped MLC despite the small size of our school we collected more cans/food than the rest of PPS schools for several years. We created the yearbooks, made chalk murals on the blacktop, and helped organize the Halloween celebrations. Because MLC fosters such a wonderful community, I had a close friendship with the adults in MLC, even the administration. Through these friendships, I helped establish the school’s colors, merely because I was after school hanging out with the secretary on the right day.

A very important part of the “MLC Experience” is the electives. I taught many different electives over my years at MLC, improv games, sustainability, directed a play with the middle school, and taught a very popular Harry Potter elective that lasted three years. Teaching these electives prepared me for my current job teaching theatre summer camps at Northwest Children’s Theatre and School, as well as my future career as an educator. As a small school without the resources to have large drama, dance, music, and athletic programs, the electives are our way of letting students branch out from the core-curriculum being offered in the classroom. To cut these electives would be a huge disservice to everyone involved in MLC. Without electives, MLC would lose a huge part of their magic -- the power to explore. Students need the opportunity to discover who they really are.

Even though MLC students are not graded on a four-point scale, we’re still held to a very high standard of academics. To achieve an E (exceeds) in a class, one is required to put in a huge amount of work, perhaps more than even an AP or IB course. The whole “no grades” thing is not in any means a free ride through high school. It is an invitation to work on one’s own scale, instead of the prescribed one given to a student as an A or a B. I, too, was subjected to standardized testing, and made it through. I got a 1910 on the SAT, and a 31 on the ACT, proving once again that MLC doesn’t leave us lacking on the core-curriculum. By giving you the numbers that which College Board has labeled me, I'm not trying to prove that I'm "smart" or "special." I'm trying to prove that even though I never had a single grade, all through high school, I still was able to pass the standardized tests pushed upon me. We don't need grades.

MLC taught me many things, but none so much as who I am and what I have to offer the world. Through the writing of personal statements and exploration of what our five character traits mean to me, I discovered my own voice. The character traits, Compassion, Courage, Integrity, Self-Discipline, and Respect, are incredible tools to give a child to live by. Instead of rules, we offer five words to model one’s life by, and it’s been found to be extremely productive. In addition to the self-identity that MLC taught me, I also learned who I am as a learner. The reflections that we wrote after each class, and after each field trip and experience taught me how to analyze my own learning, to know why I learned something well, why I enjoyed this activity, and why I was or was not engaged during that lesson. I learned specific academic subjects and lessons, of course, but I also learned how to learn and how I learn, which is perhaps even more valuable.

I’m about to begin my second year at Beloit College, a small private college in Wisconsin. Even though I’d never had a GPA when I graduated from high school, I’ve been successful in a “real school,” with a GPA of 3.883 and having been placed on the Dean’s List both semesters of my first year. I’m also currently on track to graduate in 2016 having completed four majors, something very few people accomplish. Again, I say these things things to show just how successful an alternative education can be. I attribute almost all of my success to MLC’s wonderful learning environment, which allowed me to blossom into the person that I am today. MLC made it possible for me to take my classroom experiences and make them into something that can blossom in the "real world." Without the creative education that MLC provided me, I would never have been able to do what I love.

The long and short of it is, whatever MLC was doing, they got it right.   The direction of the changes being brought to the school are worrisome, because in my opinion, the school was a solid example of what a school should look like, not an example of a school that needed fixing. My younger brother will be starting his junior year of high school in September, having transferred to MLC in elementary school because he needed a more welcoming environment. I hope, for his sake, that MLC is able to remain the haven of safe learning and exploration that it was when I was attending. Please, save our school.