Throwback Thursday -- SOAR
Dec. 31st, 2015 08:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kybearfuzzFrom 6th grade to my senior year in high school, I was part of an afterschool program called SOAR (Students with the Optimal Ability to Reason). Essentially, it was a chance for the smart kids in school to take a class in an odd or innovative area outside their normal school work. It met on Monday afternoons for an hour at our high school and usually involved some outside work between SOAR meetings.
My mom found the original course schedule from the first year and gave it to me over the holidays. I was part of the program from the beginning, taking a school bus from my elementary school to the high school by myself every Monday. I was the only student from my elementary school to go that I remember. It made me feel very grown up to go to the high school. The only class I recall taking that year was typing.
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aceofspace and I were both in the SOAR program, though our participation dwindled a bit when we were juniors and seniors in high school. By then, other activities like the school newspaper and the yearbook seemed to take precedence. Still, we took rocketry or something for the third or fourth time I think. My high school diploma has a seal on it from the SOAR program.
It was a neat program. In looking back, I wish I had taken other classes, like German. I swapped out of the Media class because it involved speaking in front of groups, which terrified me at the time. This particular Media class was taught by a man named Roger Marcum, a tall kind man with a thick black mustache, who intimidated the heck out of me for some reason. He tried to get me to stay, recognizing that I needed to get out of my shy shell I think, but I dodged him quickly. In the few classes I had with him there, he walked around with his fly open for a good ten minutes, the class snickering until he figured it out. He laughed about it, asking why no one had told him. The guy eventually became the chairman of the Kentucky Board of Education, so I know he knew his stuff.
I’m not even sure they still do this program, but it was a nice taste of college for me, getting to pick and choose different courses to take for fun. I’m surprised my mom still had this to be honest.
My mom found the original course schedule from the first year and gave it to me over the holidays. I was part of the program from the beginning, taking a school bus from my elementary school to the high school by myself every Monday. I was the only student from my elementary school to go that I remember. It made me feel very grown up to go to the high school. The only class I recall taking that year was typing.
aceofspace and I were both in the SOAR program, though our participation dwindled a bit when we were juniors and seniors in high school. By then, other activities like the school newspaper and the yearbook seemed to take precedence. Still, we took rocketry or something for the third or fourth time I think. My high school diploma has a seal on it from the SOAR program.It was a neat program. In looking back, I wish I had taken other classes, like German. I swapped out of the Media class because it involved speaking in front of groups, which terrified me at the time. This particular Media class was taught by a man named Roger Marcum, a tall kind man with a thick black mustache, who intimidated the heck out of me for some reason. He tried to get me to stay, recognizing that I needed to get out of my shy shell I think, but I dodged him quickly. In the few classes I had with him there, he walked around with his fly open for a good ten minutes, the class snickering until he figured it out. He laughed about it, asking why no one had told him. The guy eventually became the chairman of the Kentucky Board of Education, so I know he knew his stuff.
I’m not even sure they still do this program, but it was a nice taste of college for me, getting to pick and choose different courses to take for fun. I’m surprised my mom still had this to be honest.
