Newton North junior Emily Moss doesn’t think schools should be closed on Martin Luther King Day. Writing in an op-ed in Sunday’s Boston Globe, Moss instead proposes “a daylong exchange program across Boston and suburban schools, so that students from different neighborhoods could come together.”
Newton high school students participate in exchange programs all over the world, but most have never visited a Boston public school just 20 or 30 minutes away. It’s as if these Boston schools are walled off, strangely more foreign than the other nations we visit. And the suburban schools are similarly walled off from most of the Boston kids. It’s time to break down these walls.
Excellent Op Ed and Excellent Idea. Hopefully the Educators in Mass will think about implementing her idea!
Great op ed. A talented student with a good idea.
http://youtu.be/crKDDS5D_os
As a tribute to Martin Luther King the Maccabeats and Naturally 7 cover James Taylor’s “Shed a Little Light” in a DC video. Worth watching.
Many years ago when I was a “junior high” student in Newton, I participated in a 6 week exchange program during which I attended school in Boston. It was an enlightening experience. So there is certainly value in what Emily Moss is suggesting.
Excellent idea and outstanding article. I, for one, have been deeply impressed by the millennials I’ve sailed with on Boston Harbor, interacted with on community projects and seen in recent action with the Bernie Sanders campaign. They are almost universally intelligent, articulate, open and friendly, but there’s more than a touch of caution about the future they face individually and as part of a collective community. They are well aware of major and severe environmental, economic and social challenges and upheavals staring their future in the face. They are often accused of being naive, untested and preoccupied with technology, but I think many of them sense trends in society that older generations have either forgotten or never even knew exist.
Excellent idea. Well done, Emily.