GHS Alumni News: Interview with Garrett High School Principal Matthew Smith

Excerpt from the March 2013 GHS ’70 Newsletter

On January 31, Garrett High School Principal Matthew Smith was so gracious as to talk with me for about thirty minutes about the new school, and the school district’s vision for integrating education and technology. In what follows, I am paraphrasing Principal Smith to the best of my ability, and formatting a long discussion into concise paragraphs. There was no tape recorder, I don’t know shorthand, and my memory is poor, so there may well be some inaccuracies. And some of my writing is more formal than Principal Smith’s relaxed conversation. But I hope to have at least captured the spirit of Garrett’s leap forward as related by Principal Smith.

Principal Smith:

Garrett has stepped forward as a regional leader in what must be the future course of K-12 education. We are implementing what is nationally known as a “one-to-one” program: one iPad for every K-6 grade student and one Mac Notebook for every 7-12 grade student.

Just yesterday a team from the Southern Wells School District spent the day visiting us here in Garrett to learn more about our efforts.

We want our students to be “digital natives.” It isn’t enough to learn how to do this or that, because the instructions will change. Fast. The key is immersion from an early age. Then it all becomes intuitive; the kids, students, and finally adults will find their way; even though the façades may change. They become natives in the digital milieu universe.

This is very important for our children and for our economy. Thousands of Indiana jobs are filled by out-of-staters, or unfilled, or filled but at a sub-par level, because our students lack the necessary digital skills. And I am not just talking about college-required jobs. This is true for a very, very many no-college-needed jobs as well. Information is managed digitally now, and all workers need these 21^st century basic skills. It is the new literacy.

The drive for this direction came from Superintendent Stockdale, and the impulse was born in 2008. But it took a while … a lot of interaction with the school board … but in time we were all on the same page.

At that point, Superintendent Stockdale convened a community meeting: “21^st Century Learning for 21^st Century Students,” wherein he delivered a “State of the Schools” address to the school board.

By January 2011 we had the momentum which carried us through to this new High School dedication in January 2013.

At one point we made a difficult decision to phase out the Family/Consumer Science curriculum [the old Home Economics]. In its place we are teaching web design, digital photography, and interactive media. We took a lot of heat on that, but I am sure it was the right decision.

This is a work in progress. You can’t change on a dime, but we are learning. The kids are great at teaching each other. One may ask “How do you do this?” and another will be right there with “Here, you just do this, do that, and tap ‘enter.’” As kids are immersed in this universe, they become its natives. What they don’t know immediately, they can, more and more, figure out.

What’s the next big challenge, now that the community has embraced the vision, the kids have the technology, and the new high school is built? It is for teachers to develop their own digital skills and curricula. This will take a while. Right now the teachers are about 50/50 on the skills; about half are pretty proficient. But we are learning. We expect to make critical progress toward these goals within the next 3-4 years.

Some of the teachers are not proficient right now, but are fantastic, and their students are blogging about learning experiences in Spanish, world history, and math.

Stephen Rowe:

I’ve taken quite a bit of your time, and know you must have plenty else to do, so is there one thing yet that is so important you just have to tell me?

Principal Smith:

Yes! Do you remember the “We Are Garrett” lettering along the hallway? The letters were made by designing several large train-related graphic posters, from which the letters were cut (according to the design specifications), and here’s the thing: we took the posters to Classic City Signs in Auburn, they did the printing and cutting, but all the design work and digital photography compositing was done by Garrett students. Classic City Signs was blown away that our kids had done this work! They couldn’t believe it. They were really impressed, and the company president asked “Do you think any of them would want a part time job?”

Thank you so much, Principal Matthew Smith.

And what a momentous project, this “K-12/one-to-one” vision and implementation. This is not just change, but revolutionary! And in a town like Garrett, so hard hit by economic and demographic change since 1970.

Surely there will be ‘challenges’ (and outright problems), but I am in awe of the leadership and commitment. Who would have ever thought …?