Post It Note Project

Hi. My name is Bisquit and I am from the Lee Academy Junior class.  We have decided to continue to build upon our first step of recycling cans and decided to do an art project for Earth Day.  We stumbled upon the idea of making art out of recyclable materials and post it notes through a message on Facebook I received from a friend of mine that is doing the project.  If one Google’s post it note project one will find some very interesting pictures and stories.  The original project that was described to me goes like this; students write little pick me up notes on a sticky notes and put them throughout the school.  This is meant to bring the morale of the school up and help those who are having a bad day or just need a little something to get through the day.  We adopted this project to our green mission and came up with Earth Week to make and display the project at our school.  We decided to make it this week because our prom is the actual day before Earth day and we are going to be decorating for prom that whole week.  So, we decided to make this a week long project that students can participate in to win a T-shirt.  We designed this T-shirt and are going to give them to the winning groups and have them for purchase to raise money for our cause and also bring awareness to the growing cause of being environmentally friendly.  We are getting a “two for one deal” because we are making our public sphere aware about environmental problems and we are raising money for our student organizations.  If you would like to add any input or have any suggestions please comment.

Using Recycable materials as Art Projects Newsletter

Hey I'm the Rice Queen. My newsletter is on establishing recycling in schools by using recyclable materials and making them into art projects, this was also the topic for my classical argument. This newsletter reveals the disharmonies on not having recycling in schools and also covers an easy and efficient way to establish recycling in schools.

Presentation Reflection MJ

Hi, my name is Maggie, and I attend Lee Academy. I am enrolled in Mr. Moore's English Comp II class for concurrent credit. Lately we have been working on a recycling project within Lee. The money we recieve from recycling aluminum cans will fund student organizations, which Lee lacks. Two weeks ago my class and I hosted an assembly to explain exactly what we are doing and why.

Our SUPA presentation, Student Organizations: How We Will Create Them, got a tremendous amount of attention. Teachers began thinking about the future of Lee Academy, and the gears in students' minds began turning. This presentation was a great success, and could not have gone much better in my opinion. The whole student body is beginning to participate in the recycling project, which is a huge step for our cause.

We also received a lot of feedback. Teachers and students alike pledged their respect and even volunteered to help. Students expressed how much Lee needs student organizations. Also, parents told us they would also collect cans within their households. As a result of our campaign for a cleaner and more exciting school system, students are thinking more about the future of Lee Academy.

In the next few years, I see Lee as a more environmentally conscious and self-sufficient school. I believe we are inspiring the youth of Marianna, and our future looks promising!

SUPA Newsletter, Volume 1, Issue 7

Hello, I’m The Heckler, and I attend Lee Academy on a regular basis. Here, I am enrolled in a college course, English Composition II. For this class, we were required to construct a newsletter. This newsletter is based on our Classical Argument, and my topic was Education Reform. Both focus on the disharmonies of the American public school system, and even suggest a few ways in which we could change it into something that as Americans, we are proud of. Hope you like it!

Litter Prevention On School Campus -- Newsletter

My name is K-dog, and I am a part of the Comp II class from Lee Academy. This is my littering newsletter, which is also my classical argument. My littering newsletter shows the disharmony of the excess amount of litter on our school campus, as well as explaining the importance of litter prevention.

Bullying Newsletter

My Newsletter is about Bullying in our schools.  It is also about how history has taught us that starting small and working through our human nature can solve a growing problem.

Got Nutrition? Newsletter; Volume 1, Issue 5

I am Scarlet and I am a student from the Lee Academy High School, Comp. 2 Class.  My newsletter which is also my classical argument is about nutrition.  My newsletter focuses on the disharmony of nutritrition in schools and how important it is for high school students to be provided with a healthy lunch.

SUPA Newsletter Volume 1; Issue 1

This is the first issue of the SUPA Newsletter.  It provides Brittany Reisman's argument that music has healing powers over the human soul.  I've recreated her argument here for the purposes of starting the newsletter series, and to provide a template which students can use in creating their newsletters.  This issue doesn't necessarily disclose any disharmonies--unless we believe mankind is missing the mark in receiving the beneficial qualities of music on the human soul--as the original paper is several years old; it was written before my days of using participatory action in the classroom to develop writng as a meaningful practice.  At any rate, if you're like me, and you do believe the disharmony described above, enjoy it here as an example and inauguration of the SUPA newsletter.

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A Little Background for Lee Academy's Group Project

We are an argument composition class consisting of students who are currently juniors in a private school, Lee Academy, in Marianna, Arkansas.

The class is involved in creating a recycling program at their school in order to raise money for student organizations, which are currently non-existent due to financial constraints placed on a school that is supported through private donations and the help of parents.  In working through their project, students follow the premise set forth by Spinosa, Flores, and Dreyfus that Westerners are at their best when they are involved in making history or historical disclosing. 

These authors outline several ontological skills, which this class finds useful in uncovering disharmonies and developing a virtuous citizenry through the cultivation of solidarity.  The first of these skills includes articulation.  This form of disclosure happens in two variations.  First, retrieval articulation happens when we retrieve something we have lost in order to regain its true meaning or purpose.  For example, when the Hudson River was declared a waste dump by the U.S. government, Pete Seeger decided to clean it up declaring that we need to appreciate the Hudson as we did a hundred years before pollution ruined the river for recreational purposes including boating, sailing, swimming, etc.  Seeger was retrieving what was lost—the river as a body that needs to be enjoyed and appreciated not destroyed by pollution.  Likewise, gathering from dispersion, the second form of articulation, happens when we take the most important practices of our lives and streamline them, so to speak, in order to centralize these practices.  One example of this type of articulation occurs when a family, who has multiple extra-curricular activities for their kids, decides to streamline their practices through centralizing what they feel are the most meaningful practices.  For instance, they may decide to continue karate classes over home economics classes because they may feel that safety is more important.  They have a dispersed set of activities which occupies too much of their time, so in order to streamline their lives and make them more meaningful, they gather the most valued practices and focus on these in order to develop their familial style. 

The students in the Lee Academy composition class have gathered from dispersion and they are retrieving what has been lost.  Currently, as I’ve already stated, there are no extra-curricular student clubs at Lee Academy.  Aside from a few sports teams, there are no organizations to develop a sense of the arts, debate, music, farming, etc.  In this case, the clubs that Lee Academy students have gathered include an art club, a debate club, math club, science club, and Future Farmers of America FFA).  In order to streamline their focus, however, these students have decided to focus on developing three clubs through administering a poll at the high school.  The three most popular clubs were an art club, a debate club, and a paintball club.  Through the skill of gathering from dispersion, the Lee Academy students have developed a specific, streamlined style on which they can focus.  Without getting into specifics as to why Lee Academy was founded in 1969, through retrieval articulation, these students have found what was lost at Lee Academy—that rounded education, especially at the private schools, incorporates many extra-curricular activities aside from sporting events that will create a participatory academic institution.

Uncovering this disharmony has led to the next skill of cross-appropriation, which happens when one context borrows from another implementing the ideas, strategies, or concepts that made the original successful.  For the composition students at Lee Academy, they have cross-appropriated from Gandhi and his theory of Satyagraha (Soul Force or Love Force) and peaceful rebellion with respect to their approach in changing social ideals that exist in the current culture of Lee Academy.  Also, when they articulated their history making statement, “We will start student organizations, and we will fund them through a recycling program,” they have cross-appropriated entrepreneurial practices as well as ecological and green practices.  Not only are they raising money through an available source (soda cans emptied at lunch), they are also saving landfill space and raising an awareness of recycling incorporating their fellow high school students in the program. Likewise, they are speaking to the younger students in the elementary sector of Lee Academy to teach them how they can be better environmental stewards through recycling practices.

Finally, through sheer coincidence, as the Lee Academy students have worked with the Spinosa, Flores, and Dreyfus’ ontological skills noted thus far, they have also become an ad-hoc student council becoming ones who have subversively adapted to their situation.  Subversive adaptation occurs when a group has effectively cross-appropriated to change and redesign standard practices.  This might also be where anarchist ideology—a rejection of coercive bodies, governments, etc.—has been cross-appropriated as well, yet while the Lee Academy students are not necessarily rejecting a coercive government, they are rejecting standard practices which have resulted in disharmonious practices being disregarded as standard, working practices.

Through the development of this program at Lee Academy, the Composition students are hoping to reconfigure the social ideals at Lee Academy.  Currently, there is a focus on sports and cheerleading; however, through the work of the junior class, a retrieval of ecological stewardship is being refocused, the myriad of dispersed clubs that could be incorporated into the school are being specified and narrowed to create a style individual to Lee Academy, and this will ultimately change the face of the school to produce a higher quality good—the student and the culture of the surrounding area.

For their first Ning Forum discussion, students were required to respond to the following question:

Think about your role within the group or the project itself.  Discuss how Gandhi’s Satyagraha (Soul Force, Love Force, Truth Force) can be used in your everyday or local public sphere?  What would it mean to use it to “revolutionize social ideals?”  Can you describe how “Civil Disobedience” as “a state of peaceful rebellion” might apply to your project?  What is your vision as to how this process might unfold?  What about King’s view of time?  How are you using your time constructively rather than destructively?   What other opinions might exist?  Also apply Spinosa, Flores and Dreyfus’ ontological skills to your project.  From what contexts will you cross-appropriate?   What reconfiguration will take place?  Does your project reflect gathering from dispersion or retrieval articulation?  How so? 
You may need to provide a little background with your response i.e. who are you, where are you from, what is your project, why is it important to you, etc.

Their posts follow.