The Aerospace magnet
Westchester High school should give up the ‘Aerospace‘ designation in their magnet title and hand it over to a more deserving school, Monroe High school. While they’re at it they probably should give up the Math and Science designations as well since there is nothing out of the ordinary that this school provides that other regular high schools don’t or shouldn’t.
Magnet’s should be offering something quite out of the ordinary like King Drew Medical magnet, Dorsey High Law magnet or Hamilton High’s Academy of Music magnet.
I’ve been advocating for a time now that there should be more than one path to a real diploma. A college bound path and a technical science/arts path.
Monroe HS at least recognizes that there is another path and it has an educator, Lewis Chappelear a former engineeer leading it. Kudos to the district for recognizing him. Chappelear was named California Teacher of the Year with four others. We need more teachers like him.
According to the Los Angele Times article, the district heard that Chappelear started an electronics class. District officials heard about the course and were “searching for places to spend money earmarked for technology focused programs.”
Quoting the L.A. Times “One day they pulled up at Monroe, pulled Chappelear out of the class, and unexpectedly, asked him if he wanted to start an engineering program at the school”
“That was the first day of the rest of my career,” he said. “They gave me the freedom to build my dream program.”
What… money?? Did the Westchester Aerospace Magnet know about the districts interest in funding some school with an interest in Technology focused programs?
Had either principal Anita Barner or her previous predecessor Dana Perryman ever thought of trying to obtain a teacher with a technology focused interest?
The L.A. Times goes on to say that “Dozens of students also are enrolled in online classes at Cal State Northridge and have internships through a collaboration that Chappelear forged with local aerospace companies.”
Read the rest of the article at:
ref; http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-teachers25nov25,1,7979400.story
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