The following was sent to me by a very close friend; Cecilia Smith, who graduated from MLC in 2012 as a valedictorian and is soon to be starting her sophomore year at Ohio Wesleyan University.
Most
kids at MLC have probably been through a variant of a conversation I’ve
experienced too frequently: a parent of someone attending a traditional school
will ask, “So what’s MLC about?
Then
comes a barrage of questions, always the same formula.
How many
kids actually graduate?
How
many go to college?
How
many go to out-of-state (this can be replaced with “private”) college?
The
parent is trigger happy, shooting these questions at me with a smirk and
skeptical voice, as if they are triumphantly disproving my success at MLC with
cold, hard, reality. Beneath the curiosity lies often lies a smug subtext. The
“real world” is much too tough for my hippie-softened brain.
I’ve
surpassed those real world expectations. Like Orianna, I attend an out-of-state
and private university. Also like
Orianna, I’ve made the Dean’s List both semesters my freshmen year of college
and have boasted above-average standardized test scores. My “success” at MLC
(because these same parents asking about my college track record believe
measuring grades with a different set of letter undermines my intelligence) has
translated into real world “success.”
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| See? "Success" indeed! |
And
yet, if MLC has taught me anything, it’s that “success” is not measurable in
numbers; success is measurable in opportunities, experiences, and personal
satisfaction. Success is a path each person forges for themselves, and MLC is a
place where you can slash that path with a machete or where you can gently push
aside the leaves, occasionally test-tasting the berries.
My
personal experience at MLC has been a tight amalgam of both – I’ve found myself
given opportunities and forced into them. Additionally, with the channels of
communication I had with the teachers and administration, I’ve also been able
to make my own opportunities. I was
forced into dancing in the Solstice pageant, given the chance to teach
electives to kids of all ages, and worked on several independent projects with
the teachers. Where but MLC would I be able to work with a professional film
company to make a documentary about artists in Portland? What about performing
in a play during which we literally had to improvise the entire second act? And
where else would I be asked to question everything and everyone, including the
teachers?
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| The Solstice Cast of 2011! |
Because
of MLC’s alternative curriculum, I’ve established life skills many college
students don’t have. Presenting portfolios to panels of outsiders and peers
every year was practice for presenting myself to potential employers and to
potential colleges. The endless amount of PowerPoints prepared me for the many
PowerPoints in college, and eventually, for the many inspiring and
heart-wrenching speeches I hope to give. Writing reflections with every
portfolio piece, too, contributes to developing time-management skills and
study methods. Though typing an extra essay with every project seemed
cumbersome at the time, I’ve realized how much it helped me comprehend my own
learning.
Most
importantly, however, MLC has taught me about context. Everything summed up in
the previous paragraph relates to context: explaining personal production,
pulling together and summarizing information, and defining idiosyncrasies. MLC
goes further still by asking its students to contextualize themselves in
society; the character traits demand
students think about others and I remember many times teachers at MLC asked
students to simply think about the world at large.
Like
the week high schoolers who didn’t go on the Ashland field trip spent debating
the BP oil spill, attending seminars at Mercy Corp, and watching docu-dramas
about the AIDs epidemic. Sure, it was depressing and scary but it served as a
reminder that one person’s existence is just one person’s existence. And though
one existence is limited on one sense, its influence can be infinite when
awareness is realized and change enacted.
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| The cast of Bianca's Theatre class's play, It's Only A Play, performed in 2012. |
This
was my awakening and it was MLC that opened my eyes. I can pinpoint a turning
point in my life when taking a psychology class my junior year of high school.
We learned about sociology, and social inequality in such a way I discovered a
new passion. MLC, through its history classes, literature classes, and even sex
ed. classes, ripped away my blinders, a catalyst to my now indelible desire to
right the world’s wrongs through social movements and political activism. It’s
why I chose to major in gender studies and minor in journalism. It’s why I want
to start a charity project for orphans next semester at college, and it’s why I
continue to read, to learn, and to contextualize.
MLC
was the place where I first found myself. I found support in great teachers,
motivation I didn’t know I had, and friends who I would die for. I credit MLC
for giving me so much freedom to grow
and for solidifying a foundation I will build on in the upcoming years.
The
changes at MLC scare me because there needs
to be a venue for alternative education. There must be an entity encouraging students to find their own happiness
instead of simply churning out cattle for an increasingly disenchanted society.
True education – as Professor William Cronon meant it – requires a special kind
of investment, and I fear MLC’s recent, more traditional, approach to education
spotlights the success in the “how many students can we get out of here?” kind
of way. I want our schools in the United States to truly attempt teaching kids
to be the best they can be and that goes past letter grades and test scores,
and even the Dean’s List. It comes down to why MLC was originally created: to
create a community where kids can grasp their dreams and support each other –
and maybe, eventually, the rest of the world – through the many paths in the real world.
