Introduction
The job offer that I received over four years ago came with much more unsolicited commentary—other than the expected congratulatory remarks—than I’d ever anticipated. Making the move to a small (and insanely notorious) inner-city charter school to a much larger public high school in the suburbs seemed like a beneficial one to me for several reasons, but other residents of the area who were familiar with the school had less than stellar things to say about the things I should expect from my new place of employment. Glasgow High School has been around since the 1970’s, and according to most Newark, Delaware residents, has been stuck in a perpetual downward reputative spiral since the late 1970’s when students from the near-distant city of Wilmington began being bused out of the city and into the suburbs in order to attend school.
The busing from Wilmington into Newark that still continues today is typically looked upon with a negative attitude, both by students and the communities surrounding the high school. Suburban students often voice complaints to me, in confidence, about having to share “their” school with students from the city. Likewise, students from the city gripe about the bus ride to and from Wilmington, and the fact that they are on the corner awaiting the bus’s arrival before daylight in order to make it to school by its 7:00am start time. While students are anything but shy when it comes to voicing concerns, there seems to be a total lack of understanding about why this procedure is in place and has been for over 35 years. This unit gives students a chance to truly explore the reasons behind their unusual conglomeration and represent their combined cultures in a collaborative piece of three-dimensional art. By merging local history content and information on public art, students will gain the unique experience of creating original art informed by collective history and experience.
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