Nothing beats overdue grad school papers to get me back into the blogosphere! So as School and Society fester in a window buried deep below this one, let me catch you up!

The paper I’m writing is about the Senior Pinning Ceremony that happened last Friday night. Parents presented their seniors with a pin of commitment “with the promise that [they would] do all in their power to assist, support, and encourage [their children] to meet [their] goal of graduation” from high school on time in 2010. The seniors, in turn, gave their parent a flower and accepted the pin, promising to “put forth [their] best efforts, in each class, throughout the year” so that they can graduate. Teachers at the bar beforehand (including myself) were somewhat skeptical of the whole thing, but it was really a very inspirational evening for everyone who attended. I asked my students about it on the following Monday. Here are some of their responses:

It was great for the community to come together in support of our seniors. Now we just need to remind them of their commitment every single day from now until June 15th!

Plus one for the new principal.

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In Adolescent Development at UPenn a week ago, one topic that we discussed was the family dynamic when a child passes the education of a parent—when parents can no longer help with homework, or when children become the first in their family to go to college. Don took me to the opera Saturday night (Curtis’s production of Stravinsky’s The Rakes of Progress), and I asked about his perspective on this matter. He told me that this was a very difficult thing for him… though he didn’t identify it until many years later. Don dropped out of college, and told me that was one of the best decisions he’s ever made. He’s got a pretty sweet set of jobs, connections, and opportunities at this point so nobody will argue with that. Once again, I posed this question to my students on Monday. Here are some responses:

This isn’t something I have dealt with personally. Have you? Respond in the comments with your story.

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The Physical Science objective on the day before Thanksgiving was SWBAT (Scientists will be able to) identify the explosive properties of different groups of the periodic table. I collected hydrogen through electrolysis of water (in an apparatus I remembered from 8th grade Physical Science with Mr. Trierweiler) and blew that up. I burnt magnesium ribbon. I dropped sodium metal into a bit of water. And I brought a camera to take pictures of it all… and remembered that I had brought it just as I was finishing the clean-up. Excitement!

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I stayed in Philly for Thanksgiving, and feasted with a crowd of neighbors, their families, and international friends. Chris’s Greek friend Iannis brought a fantastic dessert that Eileen and I couldn’t pronounce. She thought it was “galapagos something”. I thought it was “galactic something”. In fact it was Galaktoboureko. I made Sweet Potatoes and Swiss Chard, which I’ve made for home Thanksgivings a couple times, and banana bread because the bananas were begging for it. Tonight was BBQ Pulled Turkey, which actually came out really well!

Tomorrow is a music day (yay), featuring Rosa Sat and Moses Hogan’s My Soul’s Been Anchored in the Lord, with an extra-early rehearsal to get them ready (I had the Hogan memorized in high school, so it’s been an easy job for me.) Then VNA rehearsal at night.

Sorry to disappear for two weeks then spew a novel at you again. I’m working on it.

Now back to grad school…