On Thursday, Oct. 13, Forum Council met during seventh block, as per regular schedule. This week, FoCo continued working on the primary objectives outlined earlier this year by forum council presidents Zoë Simmons and Matthew Castilho. During the meeting, Forum representatives split into three groups: middle school outreach, Spirit Week ideas, and the CR Redesign Committee.

Middle School Outreach:

One of the objectives outlined by the FoCo presidents included persuading more students who are graduating from eighth grade to apply for the Community raffle. To do this, FoCo has decided to propose a revamp to the middle school outreach program, most commonly known for hosting a presentation later in the year at most middle schools in AAPS.

The recent and most drastic addition to this proposal by FoCo is the development of a small video interviewing current students at CHS, aimed at finding the student perspective of Community. The rest of the FoCo proposal relies on the slideshow presentation to deliver hard facts (ex. block schedule, classes, clubs) to the eighth graders.

One of the main focus points of the proposed presentation is to counter any misconceptions about Community, such as how ‘alternative’ CHS is compared to schools like Skyline or Pioneer. FoCo representatives debated how far the changes should go: if the school is presented too radically, prospective middle schoolers may put off CHS as a risky option to enroll; while on the other hand, if the school is presented as too mainstream, some students who wouldn’t normally want CHS’s alternative structure may be attracted to a school they wouldn’t enjoy. Additionally, straying away from the alternative side of CHS could disinterest some students who are looking for a more alternative school.

While middle school outreach has less of an immediate impact on CHS, the proposed changes will hopefully assist potential new students and provide Community with clear direction toward the intended identity FoCo plans to build around the school.

CR Redesign Committee:

Similar to the middle school outreach proposal, the CR Redesign Committee is preparing to revitalize another CHS program — the Community Resource (CR) department. The CR department’s primary role in CHS is to allow students to create their own classes, which has been a staple part of Community since its induction. Likely due to COVID, the program lost popularity with underclassmen and many juniors, putting its operation in the focus of FoCo presidents and representatives.

FoCo representatives were unanimous in the belief that the CR program is an integral part of the CHS experience. With concerns of the CR program losing traction, a committee was appointed to assist the CR department.

The CR Redesign Committee chose to develop a proposal for the CR department that would focus on making the CR program more appealing to underclassmen and juniors after a year of being neglected online.

The main goal of the proposal is to spread awareness to students who don’t know about or fully understand the CR program. FoCo hopes to make the CR website and CR contact information more accessible, utilize seniors who already take advantage of the CR program and reshape some of the traditional CR operations to make creating CRs more convenient. Specific details of the proposal are planned to be announced later.

With the entire committee onboard with the proposed ideas, the biggest hurdle the CR proposal needs to overcome is the CHS administration, which is expected to be less responsive to the structural/operational changes that will be proposed.

FoCo hopes the proposed changes will offer new life to the CR program and strengthen the parts of Community that make the school unique.

Hello, I’m Charlie Beeson, forum council representative for the Dudley forum and correspondent for The Communicator. In the past, Forum Council was run on the belief that all Community High School students should have a voice for themselves wherever and whenever any school-wide decisions are made. Forum Council is meant to be that voice by providing students with an organized way to make their opinions known to the CHS Faculty and Administration.

Recently due to COVID and other factors the connection between the student body and Forum Council has severed. Feelings amongst the student body reflect that Forum Council has dissociated itself from typical students and turned into an echo chamber. The focus of these reports is to help provide students who are interested in what Forum Council does and how it operates with accurate and relevant information on recent events in Forum Council, helping to re-bridge the connection between the student body and our FoCo representatives. I hope you find these reports useful in passing information along from Forum Council to the student body.