学进去

There are 225 students in Common Ground’s campus, who attend class on 20 acres (英亩) of land surrounded by West Rock Ridge State Park. Students take classes outside, learn how to tend to the land and grow food for local communities where access to fresh produce is insufficient.

Teachers at Common Ground say their students seem to be more engaged in the classroom when compared to most students at traditional public high schools. They say this is due in part to the autonomy that students are given over their education. “In class, students aren’t just being lectured; they’re experiencing their lessons,” O’connor, a senior at Common Ground said. “We’re very hands on. We’ve had science classes where we go outside and do experiments within nature. We’ll go into the wetlands and do experiments where we interact with the fish or the frogs out there.”

Samantha Townsend, an English teacher at Common Ground said the school encourages students to be active participants in their learning process. “There’s more cooperative learning here where they work in groups and have the opportunity to make a choice about what works best for them in their learning,” Townsend said. “If a student would prefer to write a poem rather than write an essay, then we allow them to tap into their unique passion, skill, or interest.”

“They’re looking at the world in a very different way. They’re thinking about climate change. They’re thinking about the types of food we eat and the impact it has on our bodies and on their communities,” Cherry Pacquette-Emmanuel, High School Director said. She said she wanted students to take their experience at Common Ground and understand their future careers could be anything they want it to be. To not just have a career to have a career, but make sure their life’s work is making a difference. “The fact that the concept for Common Ground came about because there’s some educators that wanted to do things differently and have created this really unique space,” she said.