Saratoga News

Has it been that long?

1968 will be offered as a history course

By John Pancharian

Though it may disturb some members of the community that 1968 is now considered history, Saratoga High School plans to offer a new course in which students can study the "historical events and people which led the movements for change across the globe in 1968." Principal Kevin Skelly presented the proposal to the joint high school district board of trustees March 3.

"It's going to be fun," said social studies teacher Mike Davey, who will instruct the class if enrollment is sufficient to offer it.

Modeled after an upper division university seminar, the course will allow "It's going to be fun," says social studies teacher Mike Davey, who will instruct the class if enrollment is sufficient to offer it. Modeled after an upper-division university seminar, the course will allow students to pursue individualized reading and present the material to the rest of the class, as well as tackle group reading assignments. Davey also plans to involve the students in mock trials and debates in which they must attack or defend various historical figures and their actions at the time. These trials will go far beyond "should he have inhaled," though. Davey will cover topics such as the British decolonialization of Nigeria, which left hundreds of disparate ethnic groups suddenly with no controlling authority and arbitrary boundaries between them.

Jimmy, Jerry, Janet and "mary jane" will occupy a section on '60s music and culture, but the main thrust of the class "will start with the student rebellion in the United States and then move out globally," Davey said. "I want to explore the idea that the conformity of the '50s led to the explosion of the '60s."

What was Davey doing in 1968? "Being born," he says--which may come as a relief to board members who expressed the concern that teachers who lived through 1968 once already might not want to go back and teach a class on it.

In other items:

* Board members decided unanimously to send condolences to the family of Sean Lisher, a Los Gatos High School student who died Feb. 28 in an auto accident. Lisher was a sometimes troubled student who had begun to turn his life around and was doing well at LGHS at the time of his death. The accident was "alcohol related," though Lisher was not the driver.

* Superintendent Cindy Ranii returned from a trip to Sacramento with news of two items under debate for the June California ballot. One, a $9.2 billion bond issue to repair dilapidated school facilities statewide, had not yet been assigned a proposition number, and Ranii described its chances of actually reaching the ballot as slim. State lawmakers are also preparing Proposition 223, which would mandate school administration costs be limited to 5 percent of a district's total budget. Currently local districts spend from 7.9 percent to 11.2 percent of their budgets on administration costs, with the high school district occupying the lowest spot.

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