By ALISTAIR BOMPHRAY
I have a physiological reaction to the school bell, especially the electronic variety that currently tells me when to eat, pee, make last minute copies, tuck my shirt in, and just generally feel anxious. The bell sounds and my body goes, “Oh no—here it comes.” And so it does.
I visited June Jordan School for Equity today in San Francisco. The first thing I noticed—no bells. It may sound like a trifle, but it’s precisely the kind of thing that can indicate (and, to a lesser degree, dictate) a school’s culture.
No bells says, “Relax, man,” along with the intriguing implication that students don’t need a ninety decibel bell going off in their ears to remind them to get to class on time.
No bells says, “We’re all adults here.”
No bells says, “Something different is happening here.”
Of course, it’s not enough to make superficial reforms; they must be embedded in every aspect of a school’s culture. But no bells is a nice first step.
To be fair, I did see one of the June Jordan teachers in the hallway counting down—which means tardiness is likely a problem. But it is at my school too. Only I suffer the additional indignity of having my armpits salivate thirteen times a day.
One problem is that schools are much better at punishing kids for not coming to school than they are at getting kids to want to come to school. If kids were excited to go to class, they wouldn’t be tardy, right? A Draconian tardy policy—headache-inducing bell system included—only alienates students (and therefore teachers) further.
A simple shift in thinking—from how-do-we-punish to how-do-we-reward—could pay immediate dividends in our failing schools, and eventually pave the way to more comprehensive reform.
And maybe then we could put that bell to rest forever. Or at least play Ace of Base’s greatest hits over the PA instead.
My school has no bells. The world has not all fallen to pieces. We pick ourselves up and move on to the next thing when it is time to do so. Every once in a while a teacher goes a bit over or lets the kids out a bit early, but usually it’s only because that’s what a lesson required.
There’s a great book called The Rise and Fall of the American Teenager that, in part, chronicles the way that the industrial revolution formed schools into factories. When will the technological revolution have its chance to reshape schools? How many normal adults live their lives according to a bell? Not so many anymore.
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