By:Tom Jordan
One good turn deserves another, just as one good apple is sometimes not enough. South Side High School has awarded two seniors with the One Good Apple Award for their outstanding work on a project for the ASSESS program, an acronym for Alternative Senior Studies for students Exiting South Side. Every senior participates in the program, which is designed to give graduating students experience in various career fields.
These kids have all sorts of choices in terms of what they'll want to do. The ASSESS program gives them a chance to investigate things they're interested in, said social studies facilitator Rick Angler.
Joe Young and Elizabeth Boylan received the honors after they collaborated to organize a special day of education to reduce bias crimes.
With the help of social worker Naomi Bisk, Young and Boylan arranged for representatives from Bias Help, an educational group that supports the victims of bias crimes, to speak at South Side. The students also set up student workshops focusing on confronting stereotypes, the legal consequences of such crimes and the effects they have on their victims.
The good apples held bake sales throughout the month of April, which they called Take a Bite Out of Hate Crimes in order to fund their project, and they hung posters at the school meant to raise awareness.
What was beautiful about it, Bisk said, is the kids did everything from presenting the idea to the social studies teachers to running their own bake sale. They had to reserve the auditorium and create a schedule. There's a lot of paperwork that goes into all of that.It's a monumental task and they made it run like clockwork.
Angler called the project, which Young and Boylan worked on for four weeks after they attended a seminar in March, one of the best ever.
Some of the projects are really good, some are just outstanding. That was the case with Joe and Elizabeth, Angler said. Theirs was a terrific program from start to finish. It was creative, informative and well planned. It was what all projects should strive to emulate.
There have been several outstanding projects since ASSESS was instituted in the 1990's, Angler said. One year a musically inclined student sang an aria, and a few years ago a group of students raised over $2000 for breast cancer by riding their bicycles to Montauk.
But Young and Boylan's project was equally impressive. There are some teachers who don't plan as well as they did, Angler said.
I loved this topic from the beginning, Bisk said. Other kids do noteworthy things, but this affects everyone and they attacked it with a total passion.
