PALO ALTO UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT PALO ALTO HIGH SCHOOL 50 EMBARCADERO RD. PALO ALTO, CA 94301 NON-PROFIT ORG U.S. POSTAGE
PAI D PALO ALTO PERMIT #44
The Campanile
Vol. XCVI, No. 1
Palo Alto High School • 50 Embarcadero Road, Palo Alto, CA 94301 • www.palycampanile.org
English delaning proposal denied at Board level
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Nanotechnology course to be offered in fall
Due to heavy parent opposition, administration halts freshman English delaning
Students to study biology under 100 nanometers in Paly’s new nanotech course
By Kevin Mullin
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he administration halted the English Department’s proposal to eliminate class lanes for freshman year English at Palo Alto High School. The proposal met heavy opposition from parents and will not be put into action next year, although it has not been rejected permanently and is still an option that Paly could pursue in future years, according to Principal Kim Diorio. The English Department developed proposed placing all incoming ninth graders in accelerated English to provide all students with an equal foundation. According to Diorio, this proposal to delane ninth grade English was partly because students who were qualified to take the accelerated course often chose not to. With the current laning system, 15 percent of incoming students who have the intellectual ability to take the accelerated English, according to their standardized test scores, opt not to. This refusal causes an academic setback for those who wish to switch into Honors English later on in high school, as they will not have been equipped with appropriate analytical English skills to do so. Diorio See English, Page A3
Board makes little progress on district bullying policy
The Board attempts to create a policy that reduces the bullying of special needs students By William Shin
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By Grace Kim
Staff Writer
Staff Writer
he Board of Education and Superintendent Kevin Skelly discussed new policies at the most recent Board of Education meeting on Jan. 28 relating to the bullying of special needs and disabled high school teenagers. The Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) two-member policy review committee had previously agreed to back guidelines and policies that would help reduce bullying due to gender, race, disability and mental health. Skelly says that he may have a proposal ready by March in order to fulfill guidelines, as well as effectively protect kids from bullying due to discriminatory factors. There has also been an attempt to create a district-wide bullying policy; however, nothing has gone into effect, even with the community and staff voicing their concerns over bullying and special needs teenagers. Many students at Palo Alto High School do not witness bullying around campus and believe that whether the Board comes up with a new policy, that the students themselves can ultimately help prevent bullying. “I do believe that Paly is a lot better than other schools in that we are a lot more open and don’t discriminate as easily,” junior Winston Wang said. “Rules never actually stopped anything from happening. Because of this, I believe that the end of bullying must come from the students before anything else.” See Policy, Page A4
Staff Writer
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both pathways aim to create a foundation through classroom learning, and in the following two years, that basic knowledge will be put into practice as students will be encouraged, if not required, to have internships. All of this knowledge and experience will finally culminate into a capstone project during senior year in which students will demonstrate the knowledge and ability gained throughout the past three years. The Social Justice Pathway, run in part by Eric Bloom, is an interdisciplinary, cohort, sophomore to senior year experience. The pathway will mainly be a mixture of English and
his fall, Palo Alto High School, in partnership with Foothill College, will offer a new Nanotechnology course. Nanotechnology, a branch of technology, studies biology under 100 nanometers or less than billionths of a meter. Nanotechnology will explore the myths and realities of nanotechnology with an emphasis on applications of topics from physics, biology, chemistry, math and environmental science. A college-level course, Nanotechnology will present concepts though an integrated discussion-lab setting. “NanoTech will be a very handson course, with plenty of lab work and exploration in addition to straight content delivery,” Josh Bloom, who is overseeing the course, said. The course focuses on the natural arrangement of molecules and atoms and how this can be manipulated artificially by engineers to create materials and devices that can go beyond technology. “The applications of this new technology are wide-reaching, from the development of stronger, light, more resilient materials to the treatment of medical maladies at the molecular scale to improvements in the quality of water and making currently technologies more environmentally friendly,” Bloom said. “Nanotechnology has the potential to be revolutionary and help define and improve life in the 21st century.” Foothill College approached the Paly Science Department with this course as an outreach to local high schools. Faculty from Foothill will
See Pathways, Page A3
See Nanotech, Page A3
Project-based learning will be implemented in classes next fall A newly added Social Justice Pathway course will combine project-based learning, real world applications to provide non-traditional alternatives By Esther Doerr
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Staff Writer
he Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) Board of Education approved the implementation of one of two pathways on Tuesday, Feb. 11. These pathways aim to create an enhanced learning experience by combining project-based learning and real world application. The Board of Education approved the Social Justice Pathway, but delayed the vote on the Sports Career Pathway. The idea that triggered these pathways was a born a few years ago when the PAUSD urged teachers and ad-
ministrators to think out of the box and come up with new ways to engage a wider range of students. For many students, traditional lecturebased classes do not engage or ignite in them a desire to learn, which is what these new classes aim to do. “There are other ways to learn aside from just in the classroom,” Theresa McDermott said, one of the teachers involved in the Sports Careers Pathway. Though different in content, both pathways’ concepts are almost identical. The Social Justice and Sports Careers Pathways are three-year long experiences that are both overseen by Kathleen Laurence. Each year, there is a different goal. In sophomore year,
New blended learning courses approved for PAUSD Palo Alto Unified School District approves eleven blended learning classrooms for the 2014-15 school year, increasing learning opportunities By Stephenie Zhang
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Editor-in-Chief
he Palo Alto Unified School District (PAUSD) piloted seven blended learning classrooms in the 2013-14 school year: six at Henry M. Gunn High School and one at Palo Alto High School. The Board of Education recently approved the implementation of eleven more proposed for the 2014-15 school year in its meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 11. Blended learning comprises of a synthesis of face-to-face and online instruction to provide students flexibility in their course schedules. Students in blending learning classes take a portion of their lesson online while also meeting face-to-face with a teacher for assistance. PAUSD mandates that students who take blended learning classes must spend at least half of the time in the classroom. The instruction in blended courses remains the same as those in regular classrooms, only the delivery of the instruction changes. “[Blended learning] allows students to go towards their area of interest, go towards the areas they need help with and shoot for the stars in other areas. People learn at different paces, so I think it allows for more
Connor harden/campanile
Students will deviate from a traditional learning schedule and have a portion of their lessons online and another portion face-to-face with the implementation of a blended learning system.
flexibility,” Assistant Principal Kathleen Laurence said. Currently, PAUSD hosts seven blended courses: Programming for Mobile Device by Chris Bell, Gunn; Living Skills by Lynne Navarro, Gunn; Basic College Skills by Nicole Menache, Gunn; Philosophy Through Literature by Jordan Huizing, Gunn; Advanced Placement Computer Science by Josh Paley, Gunn; History of the Cold War by Brian Tuomy, Gunn; and Advanced Placement Music Theory by Michael Najar, Paly.
The Board of Education approved the eleven proposed blended courses for the 2014-15 school year: French 2 by Anne Dumontier, Gunn; Spanish 3 by Emily Garrison, Paly; Advanced Placement Economics by John Hebert, Gunn; World Literature 12 by Kirk Hinton, Paly; Academic Communication by Rachael Kaci, Paly; Facing History and Ourselves by Kindel Launer, Paly; U.S. History by Nora Matta, Gunn; Sports Nutrition by Theresa McDermott, Paly; Reading Between the Lines by Julie Munger, Gunn; Women Writers by
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sPORTs
Ways to Conserve Water
Best of the Big Gym
INSIDE N e w s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A 1- A 5 Opinion............................A6-A8 Lifestyle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B1, B7-B8 Music................................B2-B3 Spotlight...............................B4-B5 StudentLife............................B6 S p o r t s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C 1- C 8
SPOTLiGHT Gender Equality
Is true gender equality in society achievable? B4-B5
Find ways to conserve water during the record breaking drought. B8
The best moments of Palo Alto High Schoolís Big Gym. C1
Ken Plough, Gunn; and Algebra 2 by Sharla Orr and Will Friebel, Paly. “I think it has the potential to build a stronger relationship depending on how the blended learning is done,” Laurence said. “If you’re still meeting, you’re still in the classroom three days a week, but it’s more personalized, individual attention as students need it on some of the days and then a large group on other days.” PAUSD teachers must attend a twelve-week Cohort training to learn how to write curriculum and how to teach blended courses. Teachers who are teaching the blended learning courses piloted in 2013-14 attended Cohort 1; a group of teachers just completed Cohort 2; and teachers attending Cohort 3 will be trained in the summer of 2014. Cohorts 1 and 2 were set up through the Sacramento County of Education and were through Schoology. “True collaboration is the idea that you’re not just sharing, you’re actually creating something better than any person in that group can create by themselves,” Laurence said. “I think it lends itself, with the way the district has set the cohort group up, to have some true collaboration to create.”
See Learning, Page A3