Tag: Monticello High School

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Arts Culture

Guest of the artist: Local rapper Fellowman releases Death of the Author along with digital performance

Nine Pillars Hiphop Cultural Fest co-founder Cullen "Fellowman" Wade made his new album, Death of the Author, as a tribute to a broad range of influences, from hip-hop to pop to folk, that he felt a deep connection to.

Cullen Wade considers himself a guest in the house of hip-hop. And he’s trying to make the most of his visit.

Going by the name of Fellowman, the Charlottesville emcee recently dropped a new LP and performed it in its entirety during a late December Facebook livestream. The 12-track collection, Death of the Author, is an ambitious concept album from a rapper and producer who’s made only one other full-length project.

“It’s the most personal thing I’ve done,” Fellowman says. “I think it’s the first time when I haven’t been trying to impress anybody. Being a rapper is competitive…A lot of what I have done in the past has been motivated by go-for-the-throatism. I wanted to put honesty over technique.”

And indeed, Death of the Author feels more real than Fellowman’s first record, Raw Data Vol. 1: Soul of the Shitty. Where Raw features smooth, bouncy flows—Fellowman says he’s always studied Method Man’s delivery—Death brings a more staccato, edgy style that would fit right in on a Run the Jewels track.

Conceptually, the new album pays tribute to 14 of Fellowman’s deceased musical heroes. He honors rappers, sure, like Mobb Deep’s Prodigy and TLC’s Left Eye Lopes. But Death is also a homage to punks like Joe Strummer and folk singers Phil Ochs and Victor Jara.

The idea, Fellowman says, was to explore his own attachment to musicians who’ve passed. The release of the album during a pandemic, when death is so readily on folks’ minds, was almost entirely a coincidence.

“I think Prince’s death in 2016—that was one of the celebrity deaths that hit me hardest. I was really upset about it,” Fellowman says. “My sister was asking me, ‘How can you be so broken up over the death of someone you’ve never met?’ And rather than dismiss the question, I wanted to kind of pick it apart.”

What does Fellowman come up with after exploring the topic? He hopes Death of the Author makes listeners think about the “intersection of music and our own biographies.” In “Waterfalls,” Fellowman tells the story of memorizing and privately performing Lopes’ verse from TLC’s chart-topping track of the same name. It was the first time he thought he himself could be a rapper.

In Fellowman’s new version of the song, he again performs Lopes’ verse word-for-word—and this time publicly. He also borrows the “Waterfalls” beat in its original form. “With the Left Eye tribute, it was really important to try to recreate that moment,” Fellowman says. “Most of the songs are built around samples of the artist I’m eulogizing. It was whatever seemed right for the occasion.”

The activist influence of Ochs, Jara, and others weaves throughout Fellowman’s lyrics—on Death of the Author and in his other recordings. The emcee is as comfortable pillorying the soon-to-be former White House occupant and bemoaning climate change as he is dropping pop culture references and clever turns of phrase. For a little from both columns, check the track “Run Straight Down (for Warren Zevon)”: “They say solutions need to be bipartisan / I watch the news and wonder what it cost to buy partisan.”

Fellowman explores the friction between corporate America and consumers in his rhymes, something he comes by honestly as a Monticello High School audio/video production teacher who long ago recognized his musical styling doesn’t have mass commercial appeal.

Last year’s December 26 Facebook livestream, which was also broadcast locally on WTJU, gave viewers a chance to donate to Operation Social Equality Mental Wellness Resource Center, a support hub for people of color. The production had a lo-fi feel, with Fellowman opening his performance singing and playing acoustic guitar, something he says he’s never done for a hip-hop show. A few technical issues caused early stumbling blocks, but Fellowman and his guests found their groove on the mic and between songs.

“It’s weird trying to perform with no audience,” Fellowman says. “You get no feedback—verbal and non-verbal. It can feel like yelling into the void. The way I approached it was sort of more like ‘an evening with.’”

Viewers queuing up the livestream are likely to notice why Fellowman considers himself a guest of the hip-hop scene. He’s a white rapper. And while that’s not as big a deal as it was 20 years ago when Marshall Mathers went pop, it’s something Fellowman wants to be respectful of.

“It’s a conversation that isn’t had as much as it should be anymore,” he says. “I have always approached it like I’m a guest. I absolutely acknowledge hip-hop as being an African American art form and I don’t want to ever be perceived as claiming ownership or unequivocal belonging. As soon as you start to act as if you have a sort of pass is when your pass gets revoked…If you are a guest in someone’s house, you follow their rules. You don’t put your feet up on Nancy Pelosi’s desk.”

Death of the Author is available on a name-your-price basis at FellowmanRap.Bandcamp.com.

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News

Class in session: Teachers say in-person learning has been safe for special education

Albemarle County special education teachers say in-person learning has been a largely positive experience since school started on September 8. PC: Jack Looney

After months of debate, the Albemarle County School Board decided in July to hold the first nine weeks of classes with distance learning for most students. One exception to the mandate was made for students with special needs.

The decision immediately stirred up controversy and concern, with many community members believing face-to-face instruction was not only unsafe, but unfair to test out on vulnerable populations of students. “To have a school that could potentially be filled with vulnerable students in any capacity places the burdens of the illness upon them,” ACPS instructional coach Adrienne Oliver told C-VILLE in July.

But for at least two special education teachers in the district, in-person learning has been a largely positive experience since school began September 8.

At Broadus Wood Elementary, Kimberly Hannis currently teaches four of her kindergarten-through-fifth-grade special ed students in person.

“There are so many different routines than last year, so I’ve had to take a step back, and rethink how to create a calm, supportive environment with clear expectations,” she says. “That’s been challenging, but we’re getting better and figuring it out together.”

Each student has separate workstations, books, toys, and other learning materials, which are sanitized regularly. Because there are very few students and staff inside of the building, she’s able to use multiple rooms for teaching.

Taylor Aylor, who teaches special education for grades nine through 12, also has just four students in her classroom at Monticello High School, allowing them to safely distance from each other.

Though it has not been easy getting students acclimated to all the new rules and practices, both teachers say that masks have surprisingly not been an issue.

“I thought my kids were going to do awful with wearing their masks and sanitizing. These are kids where…there is no such thing as a bubble,” says Aylor. “[But] they have been complying, and are leaving their masks on.”

Both teachers also have students whose specific needs require remote learning. With the help of teaching assistants, they’ve been able to balance the individualized needs of the two groups, and create a structured routine that helps them “thrive,” says Aylor.

At the beginning of each school day, Aylor hosts a class Zoom meeting, allowing her 10 students learning from home to socialize with those inside the classroom. She then works with her in-person students alongside four teaching assistants, while another special ed teacher—also with support from TAs—does live classes with those who are learning virtually.

Hannis also has four TAs in her classroom, who assist students with their work whenever she is not working with them. At scheduled times, she teaches the same content during live classes with her two students learning from home, and assigns work for them to do on their own.

Throughout the school day, students participate in virtual classes with their homeroom, “depending on what’s appropriate for them,” says Hannis.

The decision to teach students in person was not easy for Hannis. But because she is “young and doesn’t have high risk people around [her]” at home, she felt more comfortable doing so.

Aylor has a 4-year-old daughter, and at first didn’t think she’d return to the classroom.

“I knew that my daughter needed to go back into a daycare setting, even if I was going to be doing virtual, just to make sure I’m giving my undivided attention to the kids,” she says. “So [eventually] I was like, I’m going to go in. I’m not just going to submit my daughter to exposure…and me stay at home.”

“And now since the first day coming back, it’s just been like ‘Whoa, that wasn’t as scary as I thought,’” she says.

__________________

Back so soon?

Though the Charlottesville School Board voted to start the first nine weeks of classes virtually, students could be returning to the classroom sooner than expected.

City school officials have shared a reopening plan with the district’s COVID-19 Advisory Committee that would allow preschool through second-grade students to participate in face-to-face classes beginning on October 13, nearly four weeks earlier than initially planned.

Other groups would soon follow: third through fifth graders would return on October 20, and sixth grade and up would go back on October 27.

All families could still opt into virtual learning.

This change still needs to be discussed, revised, and approved by the committee.

Since the proposed plan was announced in an email to families last week, the division has faced backlash from teachers, parents, and even school board members, who feel it is unsafe and unnecessary amidst rising COVID cases in the area.

“We voted to go virtual for the first nine weeks and develop thoughtful criteria for how and when we return to in-person learning, and this change in direction by Dr. Atkins is unacceptable,” tweeted board member LaShundra Bryson-Morsberger. “We made a plan and gave our word; we voted on it! We have to stick to the plan.”

The committee will make a recommendation to the Charlottesville School Board on October 8. Albemarle’s school board will also meet that day, and is expected to hear several reopening options for the next quarter.

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News

Digging for truth: Albemarle students put a new spin on geography

An interactive story map of World War I’s Meuse Argonne Offensive with geo-tagged media, created by ACPS’s Chris Bunin and other teachers in collaboration with Virginia Tech. © 2017 ESRI, ARCGIS ONLINE, AND THE GIS USER COMMUNITY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

For many people, Shenandoah National Park is a great place to hike, camp, bike, and explore. But now, Albemarle’s middle and high schoolers will have a chance to see a different side of the park, and dig deeper into its creation. What happened to the people who once lived there? What are their stories? Can we feel those ghosts in the park today?

Thanks to a $50,000 grant from the National Geographic Society, Albemarle County Public Schools is launching a new social studies project, combining field experiences with geographic inquiry and geospatial technology.

Students will conduct what project leader Chris Bunin calls an “above-ground archeology dig” using high-tech radar at several local historical sites, including the Downtown Mall, Montpelier, and the University of Virginia. They’ll start by thinking of a geographic question for a particular site, focusing on the different perspectives and experiences people have had there over time, based on their race, class, gender, and other parts of their identity.

“When you take some of our cultural iconic places, and even simpler places, in our community, depending on the eye of the beholder…that space and place means something differently,” says Bunin, who teaches geography at Albemarle High. For example, “when some students come to school, they feel very safe and see a place of learning. Other times, people see a place that’s very powerful and uncomfortable.”

“More people need to be able to access those viewpoints, so we can have rational conversations about what’s going on, or what we’re trying to do to improve our community,” he adds, pointing to critical aspects of local history—like slavery and urban renewal—whose harmful effects can still be seen and felt today.

In addition to visiting sites, students will answer their questions using primary resources, including photographs, property sales, interviews, old maps, and texts.

“We want students to see themselves in their community, see their perspective in their community, and see themselves as contributors to that narrative,” says Monticello High School geography teacher John Skelton, who’ll also be working on the project. “And if those stories have not been shown, they can show them.”

With the help of geospatial technology, students will share their data and analyses in the form of an interactive story map of their historical site. Users will be able to click on different icons on the map, and discover video and oral histories, pictures from the past and present, and excerpts from historical documents. Members of the community will be able to interact with these maps first-hand at two public showcases. As the project expands and evolves, library media specialist Mae Craddock envisions students being able to create augmented reality walking tours.

“We’re thinking about cultural geography, not just as a slice in a single time, but rather a slice across time,” says Craddock, who will be leading the middle school portion of the project at Murray Community School.

Bunin and his colleagues came up with the idea for the project while discussing their field experiences with each other last year. With the help of Craddock and Skelton, as well as Murray lead teacher Julie Stavitski and Albemarle High learning technology integrator Adam Seipel, he designed and submitted a grant to National Geographic, called “Revisiting Charlottesville.”

With classes online this fall, the project is a rare opportunity to get students away from their screens. Kids will be asked to research and analyze their own homes and neighborhoods, and think about how they perceive these spaces and how they have evolved over time.

“They’ll take some 360 [degree] photos, use Google Maps to create tours, record audio, and [do] some interviews,” Craddock says. “They’ll really think about their own environment, before we head out to the city at large.”

Bunin hopes students will not only develop a new understanding and appreciation for local history, but have an opportunity to “fix” it in the present day, pointing to a past field excursion he did with some colleagues to a World War II cemetery. A teacher assigned to research a particular soldier buried there discovered that his tombstone was misspelled, and was able to get it corrected.

“The vision for us is that we’re going to have these things happen with us too,” Bunin says. “Things that are just not on the surface, that no one knows about and are hidden in the stacks somewhere—[they’re] going to be recovered or uncovered, so that our community now has [them].”

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Coronavirus News

The ‘college experience’: UVA’s incoming first-years sign on for mostly-virtual semester

Incoming UVA first-year Ella Fendley says she’ll be enrolled this fall, because even online classes were a better option than taking a gap year. PC: Marley Nichelle 

By Claudia Gohn

University administrators around the country have expressed concern about whether students would show up for a non-traditional school year (and, accordingly, pay tuition). UVA’s incoming freshmen have shown that they’re so eager to begin their halcyon college years, they’ll do so even during a pandemic.

According to Dean of Admission Greg Roberts, 42 percent of students offered UVA admission accepted—up 2 percent from last year. As of mid-July, just 74 students have requested to take gap semesters or years, the university reports.

“None of us really thought about taking a gap year, just because we still wanted to have a college experience,” says incoming first-year Willow Mayer, referring to the other rising freshmen she’s spoken with, “even if it might not be the same as it was for other students who’ve already had their first year.”

Like many universities, UVA announced in early summer that the fall semester would be a hybrid of online and in-person learning. Though pressure is mounting for the school to switch to an all-virtual plan, UVA seems to hold out hope for some in-person instruction. The university recently sent an email to students, directing them to take a COVID test before arriving on Grounds.

It won’t be easy for UVA to hold a safe in-person semester, especially where first-years are concerned. All freshmen live in on-Grounds housing, and under the current plan, “double rooms will continue to be the default option for housing incoming first-year students,” the school says. The university plans to enact other measures, such assigning students to specific sinks and showers and closing common spaces.

The promise of a hybrid semester has lured some students who might not have otherwise come. Jack Meaney initially considered taking a semester off, but once he learned classes wouldn’t all be online, he decided to start his college career in August. “It might be different, but it’s still going to be a college experience,” he says.

Others balked at the idea of paying full tuition for a watered-down product. Azaria Bolton says she hasn’t committed yet, and will wait to see what classes look like before signing on. “Is it really worth all this money that I would have to be spending?” she asks. “Or would it be better to just leave it all and then come back to it when it’s back to normal?”

“Once I get all of the [information]…especially when it comes to classes and whether my classes would be in-person or online, that [will] probably be the biggest determining factor,” Bolton says.

Based on the number of students who have requested a gap year so far, students like Bolton and Meaney are in the minority. Most, it seems, will pay tuition regardless of the university’s instructional plans. Mayer says she doesn’t care if classes are fully digital; she’ll be enrolled anyway. “I can keep up with them better since there’s always the due dates and then I can just turn in the assignment right away,” she says.

Ella Fendley, who attended Monticello High School, chose UVA over other colleges specifically because of the pandemic. Given the uncertainty, staying close to home has benefits, she says. And while Fendley considered taking time off, she ultimately decided against it because she didn’t have anything else lined up.

“I didn’t have a plan for a gap year, and I didn’t want to sit around for a year and just not do anything,” she says.

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Coronavirus News

High school seniors modify end-of-year traditions

With schools closed since March due to the ongoing pandemic, Charlottesville-area teens have had to finish their high school careers with makeshift versions of the events they had looked forward to for years. PC: Eze Amos

By Claudia Gohn

Senior year traditions—from proms and sports banquets to senior nights and graduation ceremonies—have long been a way to commemorate the end of high school, giving students the chance to celebrate and say goodbye to one chapter of life before beginning a new one. But with schools closed since March and social-distancing regulations still in place, Charlottesville-area teens have had to finish their high school careers with makeshift versions of the events they had looked forward to for years.

Although many seniors are disappointed, some have found these celebratory moments special. Covenant School senior Madi Alley remembers when she was in ninth grade, watching the seniors in a capella perform their traditional spring concert. Now she’s a member of the a capella group herself, but this year’s concert looked much different. It took place at a family friend’s barn, with only four people in the audience, and the singers stood six feet apart, wearing masks. Still, Alley is grateful to her teacher for organizing a concert at all. “It felt like we were being seen and still cared for,” she says.

At Saint Anne’s-Belfield, it’s a tradition for seniors to break the dress code one day in the spring and paint their school uniform skirts with the logos of the colleges they will attend in the fall. Senior Miguel Rivera Young, who’s going to Brown University, says he and some friends found a modified way to take part in the tradition (which isn’t limited to girls): They spread tarps across a street, and painted the skirts while physically distancing from each other. Then they took photos, standing six feet apart.

But there was no substitute for some once-in-a-lifetime events, like prom. For Monticello High senior Catherine Taylor, prom was one of the main things she was looking forward to, and she had begun making plans for the night. “We all already had our dresses because it was so close.”

Having these memorable events within arm’s reach, only to be snatched away, has devastated many seniors. “At first it was really, really heartbreaking,” says Albemarle High senior Cora Schiavone. “I was just
really upset because there was so much I was looking forward to.”

Swimmers Charlie Cross, a senior at AHS, and Noah Hargrove, from Western, are mourning the cancellation of their summer league, where they would have had senior night and a last chance to swim on the teams they grew up competing with. While Hargrove’s year-round swim team coach put together a virtual form of senior night, “it wasn’t even close” to the real thing, he says.

Like everything this spring, many long-anticipated events weren’t typical of senior year, but they were better than nothing. “I would rather have the big graduation with everybody,” says Ally Schoolcraft, a senior at CHS, which held a “victory lap” and photo op for graduates last week. “But for the time being, I think they did good with the resources that they had.”

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Coronavirus News

How coronavirus has changed the college admissions process

Rebecca Hill is the executive director of the Better Future Foundation, which is currently providing college counseling to a group of low-income students at Charlottesville High School. PC: John Robinson

While schools are closed to prevent the spread of COVID-19, districts across the country have adopted alternative grading policies for the remainder of the academic year. Charlottesville City Schools’ middle and high schoolers who had a passing grade when schools closed on March 13 will automatically receive an A for each course, while those who weren’t on track to pass have been given online learning modules. Albemarle County has taken a different route, allowing high schoolers to choose between receiving a pass/fail/ incomplete or a letter grade.

For rising seniors applying to college this fall, these changes could make an already stressful process more challenging. How will colleges judge their academic performance during this unprecedented time? Will grades from this school year even matter?

According to college counselor Rebecca Hill, the answer is yes and no. It’s “still going to be necessary” for rising seniors applying to college to pass this school year. However, “because a lot of the school systems…have agreed to give students passes or A’s just for being able to complete work through March 13, final grades [won’t] have as much weight.”

While colleges will still take a critical look at students’ grades from before the pandemic, as well as the ones they receive in the fall (assuming schools are back in session then), they may place a heavier weight on other parts of their applications—including personal essays, extracurricular activities, and letters of recommendation—that demonstrate not just their work ethic, but their character as well.

Essay prompts, for instance, may ask students to describe what challenges they faced during the pandemic, and how they worked to address them, explains Hill. And students who found ways to help their community, such as grocery shopping for immunocompromised neighbors, might stand out among other applicants.

Colleges may also look for more ways students challenged themselves academically, both during the pandemic and throughout their high school careers,“whether that’s taking an online community college class [or] doing research for their own personal project,” says Hill.

But Hill acknowledges these changes may create more barriers for low-income students, who may not have the time or resources to be involved in their community or take on additional academic work.

Instead, they may have to work a part-time job, in addition to other responsibilities, in order to support their families.

“The jobs that work for them…don’t typically lend towards a lot of professional growth,” she adds. “But that doesn’t mean that…their essays won’t compel colleges to really think critically about what the particular circumstances were that they had to live through.”

Longtime counselor Parke Muth worries that college budget cuts could also put low-income applicants at a greater disadvantage. With universities currently “losing millions or, in some cases, billions from their endowment,” they may reduce their admissions staff, as well as offer less financial aid.

“If you say you’re going to look at [applications] holistically, but you have a smaller staff and resources, how do you do that?” says Muth, who worked in the UVA admissions office for over 30 years.

And at the many colleges that have gone test-optional for the next academic year (due to the ACTs and SATs being pushed back to June and August, respectively), it’s also unclear how schools will compare applicants with test scores to those without them, Muth points out. He encourages rising seniors to still take one, or both, of the tests—if they don’t get a good score, they can choose not to include it with their applications.

According to Adam Southall, a college counselor at Monticello High School, colleges have said that they aren’t going to hold students’ circumstances against them. While he is hopeful that admissions offices “will continue to do the same holistic practices they always have,” he remains concerned for marginalized kids.

“I have a feeling that it won’t be for another year that we see the educational fallout,” he adds. “Who got left behind?”

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News

Changing the game: Esports come to middle school

Amy Brudin, director of educational technology at the Peabody School, was selected as a middle school scholastic fellow by the North America Scholastic Esports Federation. Photo by Zack Wajsgras

Amy Brudin has always been a gamer. She grew up playing games like Myst and Doom, back when computers were “way less cool than they are now.” And today, she loves playing games on her phone. 

So when Brudin, director of educational technology at the Peabody School, first learned about esports—the world of team-based competitive video gaming—she knew it was something she wanted to get her students involved in.

On October 31, she was selected as a middle school scholastic fellow by the North America Scholastic Esports Federation, which has developed its own curriculum for schools to connect gaming with STEM learning. As a fellow, Brudin will receive resources, instructional coaching, and community support from NASEF.

But esports is not just about playing games, says Brudin, who teaches fourth through eighth grade technology classes at Peabody. She is also focused on “creating an environment that is welcoming to all different kinds of people,” as well as educating students on the career opportunities within the gaming industry.

After graduating from UVA in 1994 with a master’s in education, as well as a bachelor’s degree in math, Brudin began teaching at Washington, D.C.’s all-female National Cathedral School, where she “got into girls’ education” and “what makes things good for girls.” 

With Peadbody’s esports program, Brudin hopes to get more young women interested in gaming, and, in turn, help change gaming culture for the better.

“Representation matters,” she says. “Seeing other girls playing games is how you get girls into games.”

Peabody’s esports program is still in the planning stages, Brudin says. As she figures out what games and lessons are appropriate for middle school, she wants to learn more about what’s happening at the high school level, specifically at Monticello High.

Over the summer, the Virginia High School League announced its pilot esports program in conjunction with Play VS for the 2019-2020 school year. More than 30 Virginia high schools, including Monticello, expressed interest in participating in the program, while Western Albemarle and Charlottesville High said they would consider joining in the spring if enough students were interested.

“Right now [esports] is such a new thing. It started out at the professional level, then it made its way down to college, and now it’s in high schools. The middle school part is something I don’t even know where it’s going yet,” says Brudin. “We’re really trying to figure out what’s going to work for our school.”

Nonetheless, Brudin envisions Peabody’s program offering an after-school esports club for all middle schoolers, as well as doing some classroom activities to introduce esports to students.

Brudin expects to have the club up and running next spring, and hopes her students will have opportunities to compete against other clubs. 

“But right now middle school clubs are few and far between, so we might have to wait for other groups to catch up,” she says. 

Correction December 4: Brudin grew up playing the game Myst, not Missed as originally reported. 

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News

Game on: Monticello High will compete in Virginia eSports pilot

Rocket League is one of the three games students will be able to play as part of VHSL’s eSports pilot program. (Photo captured via PlayStation 4)

Virginia high schools will put a new spin on the word “athlete” when they launch an eSports competitive video gaming league this fall.

The Virginia High School League announced earlier this summer that it’ll be rolling out a one-year pilot program for the 2019-20 school year that includes three different video games: League of Legends, Rocket League, and SMITE. Schools can put together teams to participate in any of the three games, with one match played each week during both the fall and spring semesters. Matches happen, and are watched, online, so student competitors may never meet each other in person (so much for the “good game” handshake).

Billy Haun, executive director of VHSL and a former Monticello High principal, sees an eSports league as an opportunity to engage students who might not be involved in other school activities, and doesn’t see them replacing traditional sports.

The digital era has seen a rapid rise in the popularity of eSports worldwide. A study conducted by Goldman Sachs found that eSports’ monthly viewing audience averaged over 167 million people in 2018 on streaming platforms like Twitch. That’s a bigger audience than those for the last Super Bowl, World Series, NBA Finals, and Stanley Cup—combined.

After receiving several calls over the last few years about eSports, VHSL decided to try a pilot program in conjunction with PlayVS—the official eSports league of the National Federation of State High School Associations. According to VHSL Assistant Director Darrell Wilson, over 30 Virginia high schools have expressed interest in participating this year, including Monticello High.

Three teachers have volunteered to lead the team at Monticello this year, and 20 students have already expressed interest. The high school will pay for the program under its athletics budget.

Although there’s a $64 licensing fee per game, Albemarle County Public Schools spokesman Phil Giaramita says the overall cost of the program is relatively low compared to other sports. Monticello will use an existing computer lab for gaming, and all competitions will be played online, so there are no travel fees. As of now, Monticello is the only area high school committed to the league, but Western Albemarle and Charlottesville High have said they’ll both consider joining for the spring season if enough students express interest.

Haun admits he expects some pushback from parents who might oppose public high schools providing opportunities for students to play more video games, but he says “a lot of kids are already playing eSports, they’re just not playing competitively or under guidance of adults.” VHSL hopes to encourage students who wouldn’t be playing organized sports anyway to get involved with an activity that caters more to their interests.

While eSports may appear unproductive, one researcher has found that most studies about the cognitive effects of video games show the games can help with mental focus.

Marc Palaus Gallego is a Ph.D. graduate in cognitive neuroscience with the Open University of Catalonia in Barcelona, Spain, who conducted a study on the neural basis of video gaming in 2017. He found that while results aren’t always consistent, there appears to be an overall positive effect on brain development—as long as kids don’t spend too much time in front of the screen.

“Apparently, those who are experienced in video games are more efficient in optimizing the mental resources to focus on a task, specially tasks with strong visual components,” and that can be observed when the difficulty in a game increases, Gallego says in an email. He believes that as long as kids balance extended video gaming with some other kind of activity, there’s no major risks to their brain development.

And while some studies have found negative effects from video gaming, Gallego doesn’t put too much stock in their results.

“These detrimental effects seemed to affect attention, inhibitory control, the processing of social information, and lower verbal IQ,” Gallego says. “However, there are numerous examples of other studies which found improvements in the same areas, so it’s difficult to generalize.”

The three games VHSL is offering each require varying levels of strategy and collaboration. Rocket League, which is a soccer-esque game using rocket-boosted cars, requires players to be in constant communication with one another to set up shots and play efficient defense. League of Legends and SMITE are arena-style battle games, where players concoct strategies and think quickly to best opponents both individually and as teams.

Giaramita says that “engagement in school activities correlates with academic success” and gamers represent an untapped group of students that schools typically struggle to get involved. An eSports league gives many students who have difficulty finding friends a new avenue for breaking the ice with classmates and securing a more enjoyable high school experience, he says.

They’re not your typical jocks, but the number of students interested in competitive gaming will only continue to grow. With the pilot program, Haun and VHSL are hoping to help young gamers bring their passion with them when they go to school.

Categories
Arts

MHS drama teacher Madeline Michel wins a Tony Award by investing in students

Monticello High School drama teacher Madeline Michel will receive the 2019 Excellence in Theatre Education Tony Award for her work with the school’s drama program. MARTYN KYLE

Madeline Michel sits on one of the couches lining her classroom, balancing a sparkly gold laptop on her knees as she tells two students about being summoned to the Monticello High School principal’s office.

Principal Rick Vrhovac called her in for a “meeting,” she says, her voice slightly sarcastic as she makes air quotes, “about next year.” Once she got to the office, Vrhovac told her she had a phone call (Michel did not want to sit through a phone call), and that he was going to put her on speakerphone (“super unprofessional,” thought Michel).

The call was to inform Michel that she had won the 2019 Excellence in Theatre Education Award from the Tony Awards and Carnegie Mellon University, an honor that recognizes K-12 drama teachers for championing arts programs in their schools. Michel will accept the award, which comes with a $10,000 grant for the Monticello drama program as well as two scholarships for Michel’s students to attend Carnegie Mellon’s pre-college summer program, at the Tony Awards on Sunday, June 9, in New York City.

“In the principal’s office, of all places!” Michel exclaims, tossing her head back in dramatic exasperation, to giggles from Kayla Scott and Joshua St. Hill, two 2019 MHS grads whom Michel insisted participate in this interview, partly because “they’re so much more interesting than I am,” says Michel, but also because everything Michel does, she does in service of her students.

Michel describes her teaching philosophy as shutting up, listening, watching, finding out what’s important to her students and following their lead, offering encouragement and guidance where and when the teens need it. It’s an approach Michel started developing when she began teaching in 1980 in Baltimore, and one she’s honed over her 12 years at MHS.

“She’s not the typical theater teacher,” says Scott. For one, drama is a year-round commitment: During the summer months, when school’s not in session, Michel leads summer writing groups to encourage students to write, produce, and perform original material.

Secondly, Michel isn’t into staging what she calls “fluff.” Monticello drama productions “have to have something in [them] that relates to a problem we’re facing in our world,” she says, or reflect the experiences and interests of MHS students, who come from diverse backgrounds. In recent years, the program has staged, among other productions, In the Heights, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Quiara Alegría Hudes’ musical with a hip-hop, salsa, merengue, and soul score; Leap of Faith, Alan Menken and Glenn Slater’s musical about a charismatic con man posing as a man of faith; A King’s Story, St. Hill’s original play motivated by the stories of black men who have died as a result of police violence; and #WhileBlack, a play that Scott penned about racial profiling.

“She gives us students a platform to talk about anything that’s on our heart,” says Scott. Another teacher might have told Scott that #WhileBlack was too controversial or that a high school student was too young to write this kind of play in the first place. But not Michel.

“She gives us opportunities we wouldn’t have had [otherwise],” says St. Hill, an athlete who would sing and rap here and there, but didn’t take writing rhymes seriously until he joined the drama program on a whim. “There are so many people that I have to speak for, who can’t speak for themselves,” whose voices are lost, he says.

But the skills Michel teaches aren’t just for the stage. “Theater is really just a form of learning how to express yourself and feel confident in front of other people,” she says. That helps in a job interview, a public speaking engagement, a presentation, or even a one-on-one conversation. “It’s about confidence more than any kind of content,” says Michel. “What can you do without confidence? It’s so hard to live life without a sense of confidence.”

Scott, who will attend North Carolina A&T in the fall, wants to be a pediatric surgeon, and though she has a rather extraordinary gift for acting, writing, dancing, and choreography, she says Michel has never steered her to forsake medicine for theater. In fact, Michel (and her children) have helped Scott with biology homework on more than one occasion. Scott and St. Hill rattle off the names of other MHS students who have come to the drama program and discovered new things about themselves, their peers, and the world in which they live.

“I couldn’t think of a better person” to receive this special Tony Award, says Scott, to wide-eyed nods of agreement from St. Hill, who will attend UVA in the fall and is acting in Live Arts’ summer production of Rent. “She puts all of her students before herself.”

“That’s so sweet,” says Michel, her voice quivering slightly as she touches her hand to her chest before taking out her phone and asking Scott if she wants to see a picture of her Tonys dress.

They coo over the beaded gown before Scott counsels her teacher on what kind of shoes to wear. “No baby heels at the Tonys,” advises Scott, much to Michel’s chagrin.

“See, that’s the best part of my job,” says Michel. “Learning from my students.”

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Heat advisory: Former Monticello High student sues athletic director, one-time coach

Patrick Clancy (right), pictured with his brother and mother, is suing the Monticello High athletic director and a former soccer coach for allegedly not heeding guidelines that could have prevented him from suffering exertional heat illness. Eze Amos

A year and a half after 16-year-old Patrick Clancy was hospitalized following a soccer practice on a blistering July day, he filed a $2 million civil suit against the coach, Stuart Pierson, and Matthew Pearman, the Monticello High School athletic director.

“The rules were in place that day, and they were not followed,” says Emily Clancy, Patrick’s mother.

The 8am practice July 21, 2017, was on a National Weather Service heat advisory day. By the time Patrick finished practice at 10am on a synthetic turf field, which can up the heat index 35 to 55 degrees, according to the Virginia High School League, he had stopped sweating, had a headache, and could barely talk.

His brother Ryan, who also was at the practice and felt ill, drove Patrick home. His mother knew immediately that Patrick was in trouble because he couldn’t stand, he was throwing up, and his fingers turned blue. When a shower and cold bath failed to cool him down, she took him to the emergency room.

Emily Clancy is convinced that if she hadn’t been home, Patrick would have died.

And the response she says she got from Pierson, who no longer coaches, was to blame Patrick for not bringing enough water.

The suit alleges negligence and gross negligence, contending the defendants had a duty to Patrick to conduct the practice safely, and “they failed to do so.”

Pierson and Pearman did not respond to phone calls from C-VILLE.

Among the guidelines the suit claims the defendants violated were having no trainer present, no cold water, no shade, no rest breaks, and not taking into account how the synthetic turf would jack up the heat index.

Earlier this year, Albemarle County schools developed heat management guidelines for outdoor activities in hot weather, which include training for coaches, players, and parents, and measuring heat and humidity on playing surfaces during hot days.

However, Emily Clancy says Virginia High School League guidelines already were in place on July 21, but weren’t heeded.

Patrick and Ryan suffered permanent physical and mental scars from that day, exacerbated by the bullying they experienced at Monticello High, says their mother. “No one from the county ever apologized or even asked [Patrick] if he was okay.”

Ryan graduated and Patrick is now at a different school.

Both teens are “100 percent” behind the lawsuit, says Clancy. “Patrick said, ‘Mom, we have to do this because if we don’t, someone is going to die.’”

Deaths from the effects of heat are uncommon but they do occur. In June, University of Maryland offensive lineman Jordan McNair, 19, died of heatstroke.

And in 2005, Albemarle High graduate Kelly Watt, a cross country runner, suffered heatstroke after running on a sweltering July day, and died shortly afterward. A race is held every year in his memory. This year’s is Saturday, November 17, at Panorama Farms.

Says attorney Lloyd Snook, “We hope, through this lawsuit, to make everyone in the central Virginia athletic community understand what our athletic departments must do to prevent these deaths.”

 Correction October 30: The lawsuit is for $2 million total, not $1 million as earlier reported. 

Correction November 13: Jordan McNair died June 13.