Longer school year?

Currently the Minneapolis student school year is 172 days. There is a fair amount of national talk - the President for example - about a longer student school year. How many days should be added?

Learning to Learn

An important quality in this age is the ability to learn. I believe high school needs to establish a foundation of skills and information but the most important being the ability to know what one does not know and then have the skills to figure out how to acquire the new skills and information.

Now how that gets reduced to a few words into a mission statement is be a different problem.

Most Important

If we could reduce all the concepts to 3-5 words - what would those be? What captures the most important qualities of a solid, significant and successful high school education?

draft words

Southwest recognizes the importance of cultural diversity and global interdependence. Southwest is committed to providing the educational foundation for students to be successful, responsible and responsive.

The above is not exactly all that original but may be a starting point. Others comments? ideas?

Repeat of current Southwest Mission Statement

"Southwest High School is committed to promoting academic excellence, creativity, critical thinking, lifetime learning skills, and physical well being for all students in a safe learning environment. Southwest recognizes cultural diversity and global interdependence and nurtures a respect of the environment. Southwest functions in a collaborative relationship of staff, students, parents, administrators, and community members."

The language needs to concise and clear. It should represent a challenge and be meaningful.

One comment is economic diversity - cultural and ethnic diversity. Should those be words or implied words in the mission statement? How can it say something people can use as a guide and yet not be so long?

Should the first statement be a statement of the obvious and the second is the commitment? Rather than recognizes -- is the school's mission leading to actions in these matter? What would that sound like?

Meeting the Challenge

Just some thoughts and questions ---- We need every student to be successful. The definition of success becomes an interesting problem. Does that mean monetarily wealthy? Does that mean famous? How do we know when a person sees him/herself as successful? How can a school support a student's search for success? How can the standard be the same (high) and yet different? Should not our purpose be the same for everyone? How do you support 14 year olds as they explore options and opportunities in their own unique manners?

Strenghts to build on

What are the strengths the school should build on? How can we word our commitment to preparing our students for living and working in a global society successfully?