Seminar - Not to be
Taken for Granted ...
September 2003

Every Tuesday and Thursday from 8:30 – 9:30 a.m. students at Novi High gather for a class called Seminar. Seminar serves as a “home room” class, and can be used for anything such as assemblies, make-up work, and study hall.

Up until the beginning of this year, seminar was the only part of the week that remained constant throughout a student’s career at NHS. As students found themselves thrown into different classes every five months for four years, they always found themselves in the same place at 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday and Thursday. It all changed this year.

In order to better accommodate the incoming freshmen class, new freshmen seminar classes were formed. This split seminars into classes with only freshmen, and classes that contained the sophomores, juniors, and seniors. This meant that a good number of Novi High students were randomly placed in a new seminar class, and it also permanently took away one of the best parts of seminar: the fact that it remained the same.

For a class that was originally intended to allow extra time for assemblies and other school-wide activities, seminar has since been claimed by the student body as “their seminar.” The quote “I hate when they take away our seminar,” seems to echo through the halls every few weeks when the students actually don’t have a free seminar to do what they please. Lately however, the “echoing” has died down; not because the situation has gotten better, but because it has gotten much worse.  Lately, by the time an assembly rolls around, many of the students aren’t even around to complain about it.

On September 23rd, 300 students left the building before a seminar assembly, and few of them returned afterwards to finish out the school day. 1/6 of the student body lined up outside the attendance office for up to an hour, waiting to receive their ticket out of the school. This wasn’t the first time this has happened either. Almost as many students left last year as well.

This presents one of the few problems with the seminar idea. In most schools, students are more than willing to attend a rare school assembly, which shortens classes and provides a nice break in the school day. But when students are given that free time twice during every week of the school year anyways, it tends to eliminate a student’s incentive to go to, and appreciate what is meant to be an enjoyable event.

While 300 students leaving may be shocking, it must be taken into account that these students never would have left if it was a free seminar day. Why? Because there is not one student in Novi High School who doesn’t like seminar. Seminar provides a perfect time for students to take care of what they need to.

While there aren’t many students willing to go to school any earlier than the 7:15 a.m. starting time, or stay late which interferes with jobs and sports, almost every student will use the two free hours every week to take care of make-up work, do homework, and/or study for tests.

There’s no question it was the students who were wrong on September 23rd. By taking seminar for granted and setting a terrible example for younger students, the future of seminar was most likely jeopardized.

Hopefully, the true purpose and importance of seminar will be re-enforced to the students and to the incoming classes in later years. Seminar is something that NHS simply can’t afford to change or do away with. Much of what places Novi High above so many other schools around the nation, is what they do different, and seminar is something they do different.
 

(c) 2003 the Novi Information Network