Stuyvesant High School: Alec Klein: "A Class Apart"

Today, while driving, I heard on the Diane Rehm Show that Alec Klein, Stuyvesant graduate, class of 1985, was guest speaker. Mostly I heard "something something Stuyvesant something something" while answering a non-stop stream of questions from my two girls and trying not to shush them. Of course I had to hear about the show on my car radio and still 10 minutes from home, cell phone battery beeping in its death song because I hadn't charged it properly. My wonderful aunt called and I answered the phone with "NPR, right?", totally taking her off guard with quick wit (or so I tell myself) as is my way. So of course I arrive home totally frazzled, rushing my 2 kids, running around plugging in radios, frantically redialing the telephone, heart rate through the roof. Luckily, I got through and was accepted and spent most of the show taking deep breaths. Turns out that the heart rate was not due only to running in the house with two kids. But I digress.

This Alec dude is the real thing. I very much enjoyed everything about him as a speaker and he is the kind of person I'd love to hang out with. An excellent listener and speaker, a pleasant voice; a great combination of qualities.

I, of course, was so darned nervous about being on the radio plus I was playing a bit of a devil's advocate so I hope the poor undeserving guy didn't find me a total bi-yach. Oh well. Can't be helped.

Being the Stuyvesant Geek that I am, I of course had to make an outline of what points I wanted to touch upon. Of course I was on hold forever and most of them did feel watered down by the time I spoke at the very end of the show. But still, I felt I brought something to the table and my aunt was kind enough to call me afterwards and say I came across well. I just hope my mom never, ever listens to the program. She's a nice lady, really.

So anyway, Alec talked about how students prepare for the entrance exam to Stuyvesant and how students and parents alike feel it's going to prepare them in some way for entrance into an Ivy League college. That was not my experience at all; with a 99% college bound class of 850 students, each requiring 3 letters of reference for every single college application, we were limited to 7 or so college applications. Because my average was just a hair under 90, I was pretty ordinary. Add to the that the fact that I did not find my niche at all among the students there and I definitely didn't have any sort of backbone or even awareness to seek out a guidance counselor, I got well and truly lost in the fray. If I had perhaps done more extra-curricular activities, I might have stood out from the extraordinary in some way, but I didn't really do all that much. But without more confidence, raw talent, and skills, I was unlikely to stand out from my classmates enough to be in the top 20% who had a chance to get into an outstanding college. Had I attended my local inner-city school, as I did for one year of junior high school, risking life and limb on the bus (I do not exaggerate on this point) and learning to lie low, I would have been a star, adored and coddled. In 8th grade, I was given the opportunity to skip straight into 9th, which I gladly did. They still didn't know what to do with me and sent me to a nearby college to sit in on a few classes. Imagine if I'd gone to a local high school how outstanding I would have looked to any college I applied to.

Alec pointed out that it doesn't really matter where you go to college. You can in fact get a good college education in many colleges and universities and excellent preparation for your chosen field.

Agreed.

However, it does matter what you study. I didn't manage to excel in much in Stuyvesant and I was left only being accepted to schools where I applied based on my math scores. High School math was a joy. University math was a different animal. I don't know who could imagine the two are related. A few months into my college career, it became clear that I didn't have the skills required to do that level of math. I felt alone, terrified, trapped. I was a math major and now I hated math! To make a long story short, I wound up on a career path I felt stuck in in order to pay back those darned debilitating student loans.

Alec pointed out that the dirty little secret is that 90% of people wind up in careers they hate. Another excellent point.

Alec: two, Ellen: zero.

In the end, I question our entire education system from soup to nuts. I am unschooling my daughters and am 100% confident in what I am doing. They may go to school at some point, or perhaps not until college, or perhaps never. They may simply take whatever classes they choose and never get a degree. What is the big deal about a degree? I have no issue with prerequisites but most fields to not require one to actually complete a degree. And how many people do we know with degrees totally unrelated to their current field? Me, for example. Not one single course I ever took as an undergrad has any bearing on what I do now. I learned it all on my own, as an adult unschooler. The value in this method of learning can not be underestimated. It may not be for everyone, but perhaps it could if we were not so dumbed down.

One point I did not get into was how I learned to cheat in high school, having never dreamed of such a thing before that. Never underestimate the level of cheating at Stuyvesant High School. In fact, the New York State Regents exams were stolen and I was freely given answers to the Chemistry Regents by a brilliant but perhaps philosophical student who felt it unfair that some should be paying for answers. How even though I purposely got 20% wrong, my teacher still thought it awfully suspicious that I'd done as well as that in a class I clearly didn't grasp. How unfair it felt that in subjects where I did excel, I was asked, or more accurately, forced, to share my answers. I cheated on the Spanish Achievement and placed too high in University Spanish. I was lost and cheated on my first Spanish university exam but was caught. That was the first time I had ever been caught cheating. Were the Stuyvesant teachers ignoring it or was I really that accomplished a cheater?

Getting back to my thoughts on Stuyvesant, I do not know what I think of it all. It was a powerful, pivotal experience in my life. One that marked me forever. I dream of high school still, not really of college. I think about going back to high school and looking up classmates, reconnecting with some, just catching up with others. I'd love to find Kendra Behrends, who didn't even graduate with my class (she went back to private school, lucky girl) and I'd love to know what happened to my high school boyfriend. I have caught up with Janice, who I also went to college with, and who I just saw a few months ago. I have had the brief pleasure of catching up with Frank McCourt on two of his tours, the last one only a few months ago.

And I have to admit that it saddened me deeply when I learned that the old building was being torn down. I never actually returned to visit it but just knowing it was there, as I remembered it, was a comfort. I have little desire to see the new digs even if there is a pool now.