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And thus came my Junior year of High School. All but one class was
based on grasp of subject matter versus endurance trial of hand
written pages. The one hold out was 'Chemistry' class. But as for
the rest, all the classes went swimmingly and, in fact, I was so
delighted with the first quarter I decided to review the open spots
in my schedule and find little quarter long classes I could pop into
the holes. One of those was 'Public Speaking' for third quarter,
which I had stayed away from given my stuttering, but I was feeling
confident and in the preceding weeks I had learned how to take a
class for a while and if it wasn't working out one could drop it
before the end of the quarter to keep the 'F' out of the record.
Chemistry was either the first or second class of the day. The
teacher was about a decade past his prime and would pepper his
lectures with stale humor that was based on the fact that one or two
students in the classroom would find it funny and laugh, and thus the
rest of the students would then laugh in reflex. But our class just
had a handful of students, somewhere around ten, and so his jokes
would just fall flat. As the advanced science studies students had
Chemistry the previous year, he probably assumed we were the slow
crowd and that was why we weren't laughing. The grade being
based on half knowing the subject matter as reflected in tests, which
I aced, and a quota of handwritten material, which I struggled with,
it kept my quarterly score for this class out of the 'A' range for
the whole year.
I really enjoyed the social studies classes I took, most all of them
one quarter long courses with a single focus. While I don't remember
most of them given their brevity, one was a Geography class which
focused on maps and world features. This was the first time I had
this particular teacher and he was very engaging. One bit he taught
us that really struck a bell for me was how objects in orbit worked.
He started out by noting how most used the analogy of the ball on a
rubber band and spun the ball around as if it was in orbit and the
rubber band the pull of gravity. Wrong, he explained, and
drew a circle on the board to represent the Earth. Being in orbit
was like being shot out of a gun fast enough that you miss landing on
the Earth. He drew a tiny stick figure holding a gun at the top of
the circle and showed how a normal gun shot would fire, then
eventually fall to the ground. He then drew the faster shot, that
still fell downward, but as it was fast enough, its downward fall
matched the curve of the Earth and thus perpetually missed it, though
not being fast enough to break free of Earth's orbit. That explained
how people in orbit were in constant free-fall and not plastered to
the outside edge of the ball on the rubber band analogy due to
centrifical force. This account really worked for me and I greatly
liked it, yet what it had to do with the 'Geography' subject matter
itself, I don't recall. Anyhow I decided to find and sign-up for
more classes with this teacher for Senior year.
I had 'Basic Composition' again this year and, thankfully, it was
with a different teacher. A required class for Sophomore year, the
then teacher I had it with wanted about twenty pages of hand written
material each week, a level I hadn't been able to keep up with given
my physical problems writing by hand. When I took the card for this
replacement class, there had been no teacher specified on it because
the school wasn't sure at that time if they could hire a new
part-time English teacher or not. If not, then it would be with one
of the existing staff and my fear was it would be the same guy I had
the previous year. But it wasn't. 'Mrs. Shaw', though an
experienced teacher, was still fresh enough to have an enthusiasm for
her subject. Nicely balanced with lecture & discussion, test
taking and some pages of hand written material, I was at the top of
the class and she was very impressed by me... Though I
probably did have an unfair advantage as I was a junior in a class of
sophomores!
'Public Speaking', oddly enough, had many of my elementary school
classmates in it, kind of giving it a reunion feel even though we had
all been in the same building in the intervening years since
Elementary School, I think having so many familiar faces may have
helped. For you see: I greatly
surprised the class. For some reason, when at the front of the
class to give a speech, I didn't stutter much at all, it was the
opposite of what I had expected to happen. Impromptu, Scripted,
Informative, Persuasive, I just excelled at giving these speeches.
The only time I significantly stuttered, oddly enough, was when I was
talking about computers and computer programming while using the
school's computer as a display prop. For our Final, we were to pick
a historic speech or write one of our own, and give it from the stage
of the auditorium. I decided to write my own speech prompted by the
recent assassination attempt of Ronald Reagan. A satire, I was going
to portray a figure from our community who was going to sacrifice
their life with a staged assassination so that my political thoughts
would reach such a level of notoriety that it would become indelible
and compelling. The political figure I'd be portraying was a
self-important version of me and my political goal: To increase
tourism.
The speech was punctuated with the mock assassination itself.
Jonathan was going to be the assassin with a cap gun, but we found
out that was a suspendable offense. Brainstorming, Jonathan
discovered that one of his clip boards made a loud snap when the
clasp was held all the way open and let go. We tried it in the
auditorium a few days before and sure enough it was loud and
reverberated in the room. But as he would now have to manage the
clipboard 'effect', we had to get someone else to stand up and 'hold
the gun'. As these speeches were taking place in the auditorium,
other students would be wandering in and out anyhow so our computer
cohort Luke had a free period at that time and offered to come in.
Other students gave their speeches, I did mine, Luke stood up at the
end making a gun shape with his fingers and Jonathan let the clasp
snap! I fell back to the hardwood floor of the stage and bumped my
head. But it had been worth it, though a bit more of a
dramatic piece than a true speech, the teacher still gave me top
marks, and also for my whole time in the class. On a point of
reflection, did I truly do better than the majority of my classmates
during the course? Or was it that I had defied expectations given my
stuttering and lack of it during the public speaking bits? I
suspect I did a good effort in the class but the teacher elevated me
a bit given where I was coming from.
'Intermediate Math' class was again with Zack Hatch and I was again
at the top of my class. As Zack had provided me permission to jump a
grade from 'Intro To Algebra' in my freshman year to
'Transformational Geometry' for my Sophomore year, he was going to
give me permission as the math department head to take 'Calculus' for
my senior year. Whereas in Eighth grade I had been held back from
joining the majority of my classmates taking 'advanced studies' due
to reasons out of my control, I would be ending my time at High
School as one of the chosen few in the most advanced math
class there was. I was proud of this coming achievement and I
couldn't wait. The one caveat was, I'd still have to take 'Advanced
Math' as well during my Senior year, but given my skills, Zack had no
doubt I could handle both classes at the same time. It helped that
Zack would be teaching 'Advanced Math' next year as well, though I'd
have to get used to a different math teacher for 'Calculus'.
This had been the best year of my school life, both academically, but
socially as well as it seemed to my other class mates that I had
broken out of my quiet shell. Little did they know that I was
drowning myself in my academics, work at the grocery store, software
development for local businesses, and computer game playing at home
on my own Trash-80 computer as a means of distracting myself from my
physical 'Situation'. I scantly realized it myself.
By the last few weeks of my Junior year of High School, Zack seemed
distracted by something, though I didn't know what. Then one day he
asked me to stay behind after class for a private talk. As I had
lunch next anyhow, I could easily be a little late for it and he
waited until the last student had gone and I came up to him at the
front of the classroom. He explained to me how the school
district had been screwing me out of my education for years and I
should talk to my father about this and hire a lawyer to sue the
school district. I was stunned by this and also very confused as
I felt things had been going well. But he explained that the
district had been legally required to provide me with speech therapy
since the mid-nineteen seventies and they hadn't. For the past three
years, Zack had been referring me for it, but the school district had
been ignoring his requests. He had finally gone to the district
office and had been told that, officially, I
didn't stutter. Not being able to imagine how that could be, he
looked into my file to see when that had been determined. What he
found was a time in fourth grade when I had been asked to read a
portion of a book and as I hadn't stuttered during that, I was deemed
not to suffer from a stutter. Not only that, but as teachers had
repeatedly referred me for re-evaluations because of my stammer,
rather than re-evaluate me the school district would play other
tricks. Such as they placed me in 'special ed' pull-out in fourth
grade to make the fourth grade teacher think I was getting 'extra
help' and he saw in the records where they had taken me out of Latin
class in eighth grade so the Latin teacher would no longer be able to
fight to get me speech therapy as I would no longer be her student.
Having seen my two hander writing technique, Zack suspected that I
had occupational issues with my hands as well which had held back my
performance over the years and the school had been required to
accommodate for that, too. Instead he found they labeled me as
'lazy' in the records so they wouldn't have to address the issues.
But more important than all this, there was evidence in my records
that I was to have been provided extra educational
opportunities above and beyond what the average student
was offered which the school district had flat out not honored.
I had no clue what to say.
But at the same time, I knew I couldn't talk to my dad about it as he
was not a supportive figure in my life and, given my age of sixteen,
I doubt I could go to a lawyer on my own. And I had no clue
how to find a lawyer anyhow...
I finally stammered out that, ''It's probably too late to do anything
about it now,'' and left the classroom. I mean, after all, this
had been the best year of school in my life, why would I want to
screw that up and jeopardize my Senior year of school by suing the
school district? Still, as I arrived for lunch and quickly grabbed a
small bite to eat in the remaining time, I sat by myself and pondered
this a bit more. Was this sort of thing the reason why I had been
denied a spot in the advanced science studies curriculum at the end
of eighth grade despite being on the honor roll? But again I
pushed it aside reaffirming to myself that this was the best
friggin' year of school and my Senior year would be the same.
Why screw it up?
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