Fauquier County Public Schools
News Release
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 13, 2017
Karen Parkinson, Coordinator of Information
Phone (540) 422-7031
[email protected]
SOUTHEASTERN ALTERNATIVE SCHOOL SYMPOSIUM
SHOWCASES ‘POWER OF’ PROJECTS
Each year the 60 or so students at Southeastern Alternative School (SAS) are presented a theme
that serves as a driving question or backdrop for the year, and this year’s theme was “The Power of…”
Throughout this entire school year teachers and students have woven that theme through all the different
academic content areas at the project-based learning school which offers students a hands-on, interactive
approach to learning. On Friday, March 10, SAS students proudly presented hundreds of projects at the
school’s annual symposium, which was well attended by family members, school board members, school
division administrators and other guests.
Dr. Michelle Neibauer, principal of SAS, explained that her staff selected the theme “The Power
of…” because of its versatility.
“Teachers could easily connect it to any Virginia-SOL (Standards of Learning) strands in any
content area. Additionally, teachers could use this theme as a connecting idea to promote collaborative
projects between classes such as geometry and English or life science and art,” she said. “Project-based
learning is a teaching methodology where students are active, not passive. The project engages students
so they understand content more deeply, remember what they learn and retain it longer than is often the
case with traditional instruction.”
For three hours visitors to this past Friday’s symposium filed through the school’s
cafeteria/gymnasium and into several classrooms to view the projects and ask questions of the students
who were standing by, ready to share what they’d learned and the process they followed in completing
their “Power of …” projects.
The size of some of the displays stopped
visitors in their tracks – starting with The Hobbit
House. Angie Craig, a junior, and Jonathan
Xicotencatl, a senior, stood next to The Hobbit
House, explaining to visitors how and why the
nearly life-size dwelling came to be and what
part they played in its creation. While reading
Tolkien’s The Hobbit in their English class, the
students used their algebra, functions and data
analysis class to research characters and the
images created by the artist both for graphic
novels and motion pictures. Students
determined the mean height of certain
characters specific to the plot, made silhouettes
of them which were on display, and then determined proportional relationships between the characters
and what the accurate size of the Hobbit house should be. Teacher Cindy Kirk came up with the idea, they
said, but they and their fellow English and math classmates had to figure out how to build it, a process
that took approximately three months. Using mathematical skills, Angie figured out how to do the
triangular pattern on the floor after designing a tessellation, and Jonathan assembled the building,
contributed many of the design details and helped with the touchup. Admitting she was, by nature, short
on patience, Angie said “a lot of patience” was one of the main lessons she learned from completing the
project along with working with people she might not have chosen to otherwise. “I had to learn to work
with people I might not have liked,” she said, “and to appreciate all of their own ideas.” Jonathan, who
aspires someday to become a businessman and own his own business, said, academically, he had learned
a lot about measurements from working on The Hobbit House, but, personally, he had learned patience
and creativity.
Another imposing display was a large silver
“skyscraper” which reached impressively toward the
room’s ceiling. Sophomore Kyle Henry, who stood
proudly by the structure, said he found the project
both frustrating and exhilarating – frustrating because
in its early stages the structure kept falling over but
exhilarating once he and a half dozen fellow
classmates figured out to use different materials to
make the skyscraper sturdier and more durable.
“A lot of emotion came out” in the process, he
said. “There were days I was happy with it, but other
days I had a lot of frustration, especially when it
wouldn’t stay together, and I wanted to give up.
We’re all creative here, and once we put all our minds
together, we finally did it,” he said with obvious pride
in the achievement. The Power of the Media was the
message displayed on the various levels of the
skyscraper, which showed the evolution of social
media over time.
A section of the Berlin Wall, complete with
graffiti and (faux) barbed wire, stood near the
entrance to the school’s cafeteria. Eleventh-grader
Lyndsey Massie explained how the World History II
class project came together in fairly short order – with
the assistance of head custodian Richard Newberry,
who helped students fashion the faux barbed wire out
of rope and sharpened pieces of sticks to make it look
real. “We learned, obviously, about the Berlin Wall
and all that was happening there at the time, which I found interesting, and we learned how to make this
[structure],” Lyndsey said.
Seniors Amber Mullins and Dalton Fisher stood by a project entitled “The Power of Allegory”
which emerged from their study of “Dante’s Inferno” in English class. The class project featured two
adjoining doors with each of their small glass panes showing the students’ interpretations of “what hell
would really look like.” “This took a LOT of work,” Dalton said. Amber said she learned from the project
that “Teamwork is very important.” Dalton added, “Not only teamwork but communication was also
important.” While the project was a group one, individual students were responsible for decorating a glass
pane to show a certain level of the underworld – with Dalton decorating the heretics pane with the likes
of Charles Manson and Tom Cruise and Amber decorating the anger pane with a T-Rex, snarling dog and
Hitler. One of the side-by-side doors in this project opened to display the students’ explanations of each
of the nine levels of suffering captured in Dante’s Inferno.
A craft-stick community built on a painted plywood water-and-land base definitely caught the eye
of symposium visitors.
Junior Bobby Prewitt said the
project was a “long process” starting
with a couple days of brainstorming
with three classmates about what
features should be included in their
community and then coming to a
consensus; he admitted with a laugh
that he had finally conceded more
than just a military element were vital
to the community concept. A project
for Government class, the idea behind
the meticulously assembled structure
was to depict our government and
how it would work if it were a gated
community. The four students
ultimately agreed that needed elements, besides Bobby’s beloved military, should be a shipyard
(supplies), a farm (food), a residential area (homes and a church) and a school. Two weeks in the making,
the structure required more than 1,000 craft sticks and 200+ glue-gun sticks.
As students explored the power of searching, the power of performance, the power of process,
the power of equality and many others, other project topics featured at the symposium ran the gamut
from early human life to human effects on the ocean to workforce readiness. Students described their
work to visitors animatedly and engagingly, an added bonus of the annual symposium – to provide a forum
for students to discuss their work with an interested audience.
“I am so proud of the students’ and staff’s creativity and dedication to the PBL process. The
quality of projects and presentations improves every year, and this year was the best yet!” said Principal
Neibauer.