A group of juniors and seniors connected through their Temple Emanuel started a campaign to reduce stress caused by the competitive and grade-oriented atmosphere at South. The first way the group plans to accomplish this is by eliminating the competition that honor roll cards provide, changing the way these awards are received at South.
In the past, honor roll cards were presented during advisory, but starting this year, they are being mailed home. The group of students who implemented this policy started out with a desire to promote social action in Newton then narrowed down their cause to stress. They met last October to discuss ways of reducing stress at school and came up with honor roll card distribution.
“I think that certain people who didn’t get cards were being judged,” group member and senior Sam Levenson said. The group’s goals seem to be shared not only among students, but among faculty as well.
“Anything that brings down the competitiveness at South is good,” science teacher Joanna Vrouvlianis said. “This way, parents also get to see the cards.”
Along with Levenson, the group consists of senior Caroline Hass and juniors Tamar Gaffin-Cahn, Becca Goldstein and Anne Orenstein. When they started the project, the group talked to history teacher Robert Parlin and guidance counselor Marcy Davidson, both of whom offered to help the students in their quest to make change at South.
“I helped them think of concrete steps so there would be some outcomes,” Parlin said.
The outcomes did, in fact, come about quickly. A few days after school ended last year, the group met with Principal Brian Salzer to discuss their goals for changing the policy of honor roll card distribution. When they first met with him to introduce the idea, Salzer was surprised at the concern and hadn’t realized that so much stress was present in the South community. He became enthused, however, and jumped to effect this change. Within just two hours after the meeting, he called the group saying that the new policy would be enforced.
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“[The new system] further serves to ensure that the cards will be delivered into the hands of parents rather than potentially being forgotten for weeks in a student’s backpack,” Salzer said in his newsletter, the Principal’s Perspective.
Although many parents, students and teachers agree that this change will solely be beneficial, others have mixed feelings. “If there is going to be an honor roll, then honor the students,” English teacher Alan Reinstein said. “You don’t have to be secretive about it.”
The bulletin board listing the names of students who made the honor roll will continue to be displayed because the group feels the board isn’t as public and obvious as the cards.
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Although the new honor roll card policy only marks a small change, it will hopefully work to start lessening the emphasis on grades and competition. Levenson thinks that the step this group has taken has no disadvantages. “There was no drawback,” he said. “It can only help.”
