The High School is on what we call the “Downtown Campus” and, for us, that’s more than just a geographical designation. Being downtown is a core part of what the High School is and since its founding, we have consciously worked to make the city an integral part of our campus. Back in 1976, when then-St. Francis High School was founded, a great deal of thought went into placing it at the corner of 3rd and Broadway, rather than on our Goshen Campus. Of course, there was plenty of room on the Goshen Campus, but the founders believed downtown was the better choice. The reasoning was that, while the fields of Goshen are a wonderful place for young children to grow and learn, adolescents would most benefit from being in the “real world” as they make the transition from childhood to adulthood and prepare for college.   “The real world” has a number of different components. First, we have proximity to so many educational, cultural, civic, and business opportunities. In non-COVID years, our students are able to easily travel (largely by foot, and also by TARC bus) to the Speed Art Museum, Actors Theatre, the Frazier History Museum, and of course the Main Branch of the Louisville Free Public Library right across the street. And, in non-COVID years, we hold Cultural Day, during which each grade level takes a different field trip to explore a different aspect of the city; for instance, the 9th grade explores the media, visiting places like the Courier-Journal or a TV station, and the 11th [...]

What Parents Need to Know About Our High School Class Schedule To block or not to block? That is the question of every high school administrator in charge of making schedules! High schools in Louisville take different approaches to this, so in choosing a high school, it’s important to know what it all means in order to evaluate what will work best for your student. Here at the High School, we have a rotating modified block schedule. “Rotating” means that Monday through Friday, the classes are in a different order each day. Students find certain times of the day more challenging (some dislike mornings, others feel tired after lunch, etc.). When a challenging class always occurs during one of those difficult times for a student (e.g., a student who hates mornings and struggles with writing has English every morning first period), it can create an unpleasant dynamic and make success in that class more difficult. Rotating the classes around each day is helpful for both the student and the teacher. In addition, at St. Francis, rotating our classes periodically leads to the cherished “double lunch”: when students have a free period connected to lunchtime, they get an extra-long lunch period. Copious time is spent on this rotation each summer to balance classes and ensure an equal rotation of classes throughout the day, as well as provide as much equality of double lunch periods as possible!   As for the “modified block,” our schedule is half block and half traditional. Full block schedules are typically those where half of a student’s [...]

The bi-annual high school rite of passage is nearly upon us: Exam Week is December 14th -18th. I want to share why we do exams normally and how we've altered our plans a bit this year.   Exams are an essential aspect of preparation for college. From synthesizing large chunks of material to sitting for a two-hour test, exams mirror the experience our students will go on to have in college courses. St. Francis students take exams seven times (at the end of every semester except their final one) and of course, many also take AP exams in their junior or senior years. Another reason we have exams is to help students learn to cope with academic pressure and so we offer stress reducers like the Brain Food Buffet, daily "therapy pets," and invitations to the Zen Zone set up in the counseling hallway. This year, having had an odd and stressful semester, we wanted to keep some essential elements of exams but dial down the pressure, since we know that the pandemic and remote learning have already caused students a good deal of stress and we can't provide the normal exam week offerings to help them cope. As well, students taking exams at home requires some modification (open-note, etc.). So we decided to have "regular" on-demand exams in some courses and take-home exams or projects in others. We are keeping the normal rhythm of one day per academic department, and whether it's an exam day or submission of a project, students will have an appointed time to be online [...]

In past articles, we’ve talked about the St. Francis schedule and the faculty; now, we turn to the curriculum itself to share information with you about what we teach and the goals we have for our students in each area. While we are a Progressive school, our curriculum itself is fairly traditional in that we teach all the usual core subjects (including 15 AP courses), plus fine arts and health/fitness. What makes our curriculum Progressive is our teaching methodology (active and engaged learning) and our inclusion of diverse voices and perspectives throughout.  One of the greatest strengths of the St. Francis curriculum is its flexibility. Being small and Progressive, St. Francis allows students to customize their course of study over their four years. There are courses required in every department because we believe a liberal arts approach to high school curriculum -- sampling courses in all departments broadly -- is in an adolescent’s best interest in terms of preparing them for any course of study in college. However, students can also opt to focus on a couple of areas they like best by choosing AP offerings, electives, and/or independent study options in those areas in their junior or senior years. No matter what courses they choose, students are being intellectually challenged in every course. Here is a breakdown by department of what our curriculum includes: Math offerings are an area in which St. Francis stands out from other schools. Students’ trajectories in their four years of mathematics study are customized based on ability and previous course history. Students normally [...]

In interviews, we tell prospective teachers that we are looking for two main things: passion for subject and passion for teaching teenagers.  Passion for subject means that our teachers are self-proclaimed nerds. They love what they teach in a beyond-enthusiastic way, as evidenced by math history facts of the day posted outside classrooms, biology-related comics adorning exams, an announcement of the discovery of a new black hole in Morning Meeting, a play adapted by teachers from the works of Poe for students to perform, international cultural and language trips, and -- most importantly -- excitement around the topic in each class every day. It’s a quality that we prize in our faculty and always want to see on abundant display. Passion for teaching teenagers is arguably the more challenging characteristic to find in teachers. Teenagers are, as their parents well know, simultaneously the most delightfully wonderful and maddeningly frustrating beings on the planet. Therefore, our job in hiring is to find those teachers who genuinely enjoy and appreciate teenagers -- quirks and all. Our faculty find that in treating students with respect and expecting them to have valuable contributions to class and the School from day one, they rise to the occasion most of the time, becoming more articulate, responsible, and independent each year. We know that our method -- to meet teenagers where they are, value them as individuals, believe in them, know they can become who and what they aspire to, and help them get there -- takes effort. But it’s the work of a Progressive school [...]

This week at St. Francis has been largely dominated by the election and conversations surrounding it. Every election is a consequential event in the High School world - we have students excited to vote for the first time and others looking forward to their turn - and of course, a presidential election is particularly meaningful.   I want to share two ways in which we prepared for the events unfolding in our country and the discourse related to them. First, in collaboration with our Goshen colleagues, we created guidelines for faculty in all divisions on facilitating student conversations about the 2020 election. We set these in the context of our "How to Have Difficult Conversations" guidance (created last year and linked here) and framed them with this idea from Rosalind Wiseman's Cultures of Dignity: "Our democracy can only survive if young people are taught that disagreement is not disrespect and we are all committed to creating and protecting the environment for civil discourse." Second, during Morning Meeting on Monday, history teachers Trent Apple and Diane Pecknold gave a presentation on the history of the Electoral College and an overview of the 2020 election, including how to interpret returns and what the timeframe for results might look like. They took a few questions afterward as time permitted and then spoke with many other students throughout the day to answer additional queries. Their presentation helped situate this week's events and contextualize the time it has taken for votes to be counted and the winner announced. Throughout this week, and always, we strive [...]