etext__/violence/violence4.txt Rowan High-Jinks : An account of one person’s time at Hattiesburg High School, Rowan Campus-by Patrick Moore (special to ATI) (Dedicated to Mrs. Andrelle Nicholson, who had the unmitigated gall to reject one of my original compositions and give me an "F" because she thought it was copied, and Mr. Wally Gregg, who took it upon himself the task of suspending me from school without so much as the benefit of a hearing, or even telling me.) PROLOGUE For my part, I was one of those that scored unusually high on achievement tests, but did poorly in classes. There was just not enough in the HPSD to keep kids like me from looking outside the window, because the classwork was so goddamned boring. When I graduated in 1982, I began to discover what the HPSD failed to offer. I took my ASVAB in 1984, and scored high enough to have my pick of any job in the military I wanted. I chose communications. In 1987, I began working as a direct support technician on FM tactical radio equipment, which was a prize job. I was only one of 5 in the entire battalion qualified for such work. Frank Zappa once said, "If you want to get an education, go to the library." I learned more in the Hattiesburg Public Library than I did in the classroom. I spent so much time there that the staff allowed me access to areas normally off limits to normal patrons. I knew the Dewey Decimal System by heart, and the staff allowed me the unusual privilege of setting up and running microfiche machines. On more than one occasion, I corrected new staff members on the proper way to thread a microfiche. (I bet I can still thread and run an old microfiche machine!) Yet, in the classroom, I felt trapped. Trapped because I wanted to take a different direction than what the school board prescribed. The system didn’t take into account wildcards like me, or offer anything besides the daily drudgery of classwork. TIMELINES DATELINE 1970: Hattiesburg High recieves a desegregation order. Beginning at the start of the 1970-71 school year, Blair High (Hattiesburg’s white high school) and Rowan High (the Black school) were ordered to admit students of all races. However, many parents find ways to skirt the order. 1972: The Justice department looks at the Hattiesburg school system, and declares that the HPSD hasn’t taken effective steps to enforce the desegregation order. As a result, Rowan becomes the city’s 10th grade school, Blair the 11th and 12th. 1979: I begin my 10th grade year at HHS-Rowan, and learn about schoolhouse politics. I thought the REACH program was off-kilter, giving preference to children of well-to-do parents. By now it was full-blown favoritism. 1980: I am given an assignment to write a report. I turn it in, within a few minutes I get it back with an "F" and the word "COPIED" at the bottom. Two months later, I find myself on suspension. Why? I had a habit of arriving to school early, and decided to grab a smoke before school. How did I find out? One of my teachers told me, after he saw my name on the daily absentee report. It seemed that Mr. Wally Gregg had decided to suspend me for 1 day because I was smoking, and didn’t bother telling me. (Can you say violation of the 4th amendment?) So, I took a day’s vacation. Then, in May 1980, I get news that somebody had torched Rowan School. Not that it was any big surprise. Tensions had built up over the past few years over the treatment of students by the faculty. I can only wonder what pushed someone over the edge to actually do it. It didn’t take police long to find a suspect. It turned out the person that did it had flunked several grades, and was thoroughly fed up with his treatment by Rowan officials. The next year, I went to Blair. Things went far better there than at Rowan. I began getting A’s and B’s, and had teachers who were genuinely interested in my achievement. So, if there is to be something taken from this, it is this: just because you have a few setbacks in High School does not mean you will do badly once you leave.