While reports of border walls and travel bans dominated the national news cycle, Bromfield students and teachers were looking beyond their own locality to a wider world. Beginning next year, interested students will be able to choose courses and activities that allow them to graduate with a global competency certificate in addition to a high school diploma.
At the School Committee’s Jan. 23 meeting, social studies teacher Bryce Mattie outlined a global competency program that emphasizes language study, travel experience, service, and coursework in a wide range of subjects. She said she hopes to launch the program this spring, so that students in the Class of 2020 who elect to participate can plan their courses for the fall.
“The idea,” Mattie said, “is to cultivate a passion—we have enough grades and scores stuff.”
After some questions and discussion, the School Committee unanimously approved the global program, with the caveat that students must know it is initially a pilot project.
Other Massachusetts school systems have similar programs. Needham adopted a global competency program a decade ago, and many Massachusetts schools have since followed suit, including Hingham, Swampscott, Hamilton-Wenham, Arlington, Sharon, Norwood, Marlborough, Natick, and Belmont.
Bromfield Principal Scott Hoffman, who was also at the School Committee meeting, said, “I’m totally supportive of this.” He noted that the Harvard Teachers Association also supports the new program, which was developed by a committee of administrators, students, and teachers across disciplines.
One of the students on the committee that helped put the program together is senior Ariel Jones-Mollod. While she will have graduated before the global competency program goes into effect, Jones-Mollod said in a phone interview that she sees this program as something that will benefit younger students, perhaps including her own sister. She described the program as having a different emphasis from regular coursework. “It’s a chance for students to get away from the very grade-focused way our school works,” she said.
Courses, travel, and service
Students will be able to apply for the program in the spring of their freshman or sophomore years. To make sure that the program is open to as wide a range of students as possible, the basic requirements are simple: maintaining a 2.7 grade-point average and adhering to school rules. Working with an adviser, students in the program will choose their high school courses and plan their outside activities with the global certificate’s requirements in mind.
Those requirements include four years of a world language, 10th-grade global studies, and at least two other “globally focused” courses—in effect, one each year in the upper grades. Bromfield currently offers more than enough courses for students to meet this requirement: ancient, medieval, and European history; world, classical, and British literature; current events; and economics. Superintendent Linda Dwight pointed out that students can also choose courses through the Virtual High School, ranging from art history and world religions to climate change, epidemics, or international business.
Beyond their coursework, students in the program will have to complete 40 hours of service with a global focus. They can combine this requirement with their senior project, Mattie said. A good example of such a project, Mattie wrote in an email, is a February-break trip to the Dominican Republic, during which students will work on educational and environmental projects, adding up to about eight hours of service. “If students wanted to use this as their GCC [global competency certificate] project,” she wrote, “they would have to find some way to continue the theme of our service abroad locally, for another 32 hours.”
The trip to the Dominican Republic would also help students fulfill the GCC program’s travel requirement. The program plan states that international travel is preferred, but “domestic travel experience with a community other than your home community” can also qualify. For any travel to count toward the certificate, the student must submit a description of the trip in advance and get approval from the program adviser.
School Committee Chairwoman SusanMary Redinger asked Mattie about the possibility of waiving the international travel requirement in cases of financial hardship. Mattie replied that a nearby community could meet the requirement.
A final component of the program is attendance at six multicultural events outside of classes before graduation. World music concerts and international films are among the many possibilities. Mattie said she was especially pleased with this requirement because students on the committee had come up with the idea and advocated for it.
Jones-Mollod, who called herself a “very vocal advocate” for the cultural events component, said it would encourage students to take advantage of the many art museums and other cultural resources in the area and also to broaden their own experience.
“Bromfield is definitely a bubble,” Jones-Molloed said, “and it’s important to branch out and learn about other cultures, especially to get accurate information about other cultures. … And you could learn to rap in French!”
Mattie and Dwight told the School Committee that the program will need a coordinator, who will also act as adviser to the students enrolled. Mattie said she expects about 30 students to take part initially. However, if many more than that sign up, additional teachers may be needed as advisers. Dwight told the School Committee she expects to fund the pilot program stipends from one of the schools’ revolving accounts (accounts that can be carried over from year to year and are not part of the annual budget).
