THE HIGH SCHOOL DAZE

Everyone has memories of their first day when they were ushered to the local public school. The eight years spent in that institute of learning still conjure up fond recollections of happenings, people and situations.

The three day of high school entrance examinations were perhaps three of the most traumatic days in the students' early education years. You had all summer to recover from the brain strain of entrance examination preparation and anticipate the next adventure into the schooling process.

High school for most students was a strange adventure: new school, different teachers, and most of the students came from other school sections. The whole atmosphere was a mega change from the country schoolhouse and the motherly schoolmarm.

For many students the experience of having men teachers in the school was entirely different. It was an accepted fact the middle-aged single woman was the best teacher for a rural school. Some of these people even became fixtures in their schools and taught several generations of the communities children before they retired. They were part of the community and commanded respect from the children and the parents who had been students in her school.

High school was different; you entered the halls of learning in awe; you displayed a reserved character, not a vistage of the rough and tumble boisterous kid who was the school clown.

The size of the structure was enough to intimidate the new students and the stern address of welcome with the rules and regulations for the particular school implanted a feeling that you had entered an establishment that precluded anything but education.

You were presented with the list of books, a timetable, the instructions from several teachers about the subject matter, what was expected of you in their class, and the homework necessary to gain a high school education.

No more first name identity; you became known by your family name or "you in the back seat".

You had never heard a word of french in your life and to be greeted by a fussy lady teacher - who had just returned from a summer vacation in Quebec - with "Bonjour", and then rattle on in French about "Castor est un chien", or "Pierre est un petit garcon" was like being transported to a foreign country in recent days.

Strange subjects like algebra, Latin, chemistry and art were on the curriculum.

Another radical change was the mode of dress of the students. Boys wore long pants, shirts and ties, and in some cases even Sundy suits. Girls looked different; they wore dresses like the ones they wore to church and had absolutely no resemblance to the kid who could bat the ball over the back fence, or wore dresses made from Monarch flour bags to school. Girls became young ladies during the summer. Girl students had the natural look; cosmetics were not permitted by the school.

The first term of high school was an experience. You were considered a "nothing", devoid of any intellectual achievement and a raw student to be moulded by a higher form of education.

If you graduated and accomplished something in society. Who took credit for it? The same teacher who claimed you had the intelligence of a lower form of life and had little possibility of accomplishing anything.

Note: Published in W.J.D. McAlister's weekly column in the Burlington POST.

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