Double perfection: Two classes at Western Hills complete 100 percent of homework for year

By Jen Cowart
Posted 6/22/16

It was early in September when Western Hills Middle School math teacher John Santangelo stumbled upon something unusual about two of his math classes – so unusual that he had to stop and …

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Double perfection: Two classes at Western Hills complete 100 percent of homework for year

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It was early in September when Western Hills Middle School math teacher John Santangelo stumbled upon something unusual about two of his math classes – so unusual that he had to stop and double-check, just to be sure, before sharing what he’d found with his students.

“I was inputting the homework into the ASPEN computer system, and as I did so, I happened to notice that two of my math classes had 100 percent of the students having turned in 100 percent of the homework,” he said. “I told them that they were doing great so far this year, and to see if they could keep it up.”

Although it wasn’t very far into the school year, it was already long enough in to be something Santangelo hadn’t seen before. He checked the homework submissions again in October.

“At the beginning of October, they were still going great, and they decided to set a goal to see if they could have 100 percent of the students turning in 100 percent of the homework for an entire term,” he said. “The first quarter was a great thing, but then I told them, we’re really only a quarter of the way through the year.”

The students decided to see if they could go the entire semester without missing any homework.

“Out in the hallway, I’d hear the students checking in with each other to see if they had done their homework,” he said. “Now here we are in June, and neither class has ever missed the homework the entire school year.”

It’s a feat that Santangelo has never seen in 28 years of teaching – not for one class, and definitely not for two in one school year.

“If they were absent, they wouldn’t even take the given extra day to get it in. They’d look on ASPEN for it or they’d check in with their classmates to see what the work was for the next day, and they’d come in with it done,” he said. “When we got a new student in one of the classes, the first thing they did was tell her about the goal so she’d be on board, and she was.”

According to Santangelo’s students in both classes, this was not an easy thing to accomplish, and every student felt a strong responsibility to help make it happen.

“We all wanted to make sure that we weren’t the one to ruin it,” said Caroline Thomas, a student on Santangelo’s seventh-grade Hurricanes team in one of the classes.

Layla Glatman, her fellow classmate, agreed.

“There was lots of math homework,” she said. “But we had an entire class of 28 who wanted to do it. There was no convincing needed.”

There were times when both girls were absent through the year, and sitting to do homework was the last thing they felt like doing while they were home.

“We’d do it,” Thomas said. “If it wasn’t on ASPEN, we’d text our friends to find out the pages that were due.”

Although both students feel their personal work ethic is and always has been strong, neither had ever been in a class before where everyone had completed every assignment. Both agreed that it was touch and go on several occasions, when they worried that someone might not have done the work and the goal would be lost.

Cameron Johnson and Jake Simbron were students in Santangelo’s other class that achieved the goal, and their experiences were similar.

“There were definitely some close calls through the year,” Simbron said. “Sometimes we weren’t sure that everyone would do it, we thought that someone might not care or might not be upset if it ended. There’s always those people. In the past, I might’ve been that person.”

Checking in with each other and working together were the things that made achieving the goal possible, according to Johnson, a student new to Western Hills but not to middle school, having come from a school where sixth grade was a middle school grade.

“We had to check in with each other, we had to work together,” Johnson said. “Everyone was willing to do it, but some of us definitely wanted it more than others.”

The goal helped the students with some middle school life lessons, according to Santangelo.

“For most of the kids, this is the first year they’re switching classes, using lockers. It’s different than elementary school,” he said. “They needed to be organized and this will help them get ready for high school. They not only had to have the desire, but they had to have the self-discipline.”

As an added benefit, Johnson believes the shared goal built a new level of communication within the classes and even between the two classes with each other.

“It built communication and responsibility between all of us, especially after the halfway mark,” Johnson said. “More people started talking with each other. We started checking in with each other in the hallways between our two classes.”

In order to reward the two classes, Santangelo arranged for the KONA Ice truck to come to the school, and each student was able to partake in the sweet treat during the day on June 14. Additionally, Assistant Superintendent Norma Cole stopped by the school to congratulate the students on June 15. She was especially proud, spotting some familiar faces in the two classes from her days as the elementary principal at Stone Hill School.

“Congratulations on your accomplishments,” Cole said. “It’s an amazing thing that you did. You set a goal, you were inspired by Mr. Santangelo, and you met that goal. That’s a huge thing. Moving forward in your education, you’re going to be setting goals all the time and it becomes even more important. This is getting you ready for high school.”

All of the students agreed that they’d love to be a part of a similar accomplishment in the future, but they aren’t sure they’ll ever be part of such a special, motivated group of students such as this, again.

“We couldn’t have done it without each other,” Glatman said. “If he hadn’t set the goal, the whole thing might not have happened.”

Santangelo’s suggestion definitely lit the spark in his students, according to Thomas, but the students achieved it together: “Once he set it, he didn’t have to do anything else, because we all set it for each other.”

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