Aragon High School - El Tesoro Yearbook (San Mateo, CA)

Page 24 text:

j 1967 7 jg a. tif '. I7 K W V 3 W. ,N fYvwjwi'ivjf3-5? 4' M ii i I I I it M, - I all Y ll I Wim.. it miwn ll 1971 5 3 fi K . S, ,K M. A1971 ji A high school is a testing ground for ideas, along with a training ground aimed at perfecting the pres entation of these ideas. But this could describe any educational unit. But in high school there is a pres- ence of blissful security and friendship which are the natural product of the system. The faculty and students are on a closer relationship which makes the exchange of ideas a pleasure, not a chore. High school is the place where you should get involved in as much as you can, realizing that this involvement is on a limited scale. Try to better understand what A 6 Aw is present around you. Become aware of the vastness of possible educational endeavors. Aragon was my it high school. I enjoyed my four years. I hope all the things offered to me are still available to the student seeking an exciting four years at Aragon. '55 --Hugh S. Robertson III '35 Studying at: University of Stockholm Advanced Institude of Glacier Studies Cultural Geography Major He writes his family: I am now writing my thesis on rock and soil erosion. I have spent many hours in the Archives of the Royal Academy studying maps from the 18th Century and comparing them to new flight-photography maps. We have just completed a study of hydrology in connection with water power in northern Norway. 1967 I imagine this must seem strange to you to see that I am so involved with science and technology after my interest in English and Humanities at Aragon. How- ever, directions can be changed at any time if the basis for study is broad and sound enough. - -Bruce j. Mayor Although I am only two years removed from Aragon, it seems I could be no further away from my high school days than I am at the present--separated by thousands of miles and years of tradition in Wien, Austria. This distance quickly diminishes whenl think of my Aragon years. Aragon was an experience in learning, maturation and friendship from the time I entered in 1965 to the time I left in 1969. Aragon did most of its growing during this time and being a part of this maturation was what I remember most. My class was fortunate to experience high school at its dynamic best--from the typical six period per day school to the atypical and much more progressive system of modular scheduling. One only attends high school once. The more diverse his exper- iences are the more prepared he is for future endeavors. I thank Aragon for this diversity. 20 --Bob Burmeister

Page 23 text:

If I may use the vernacular of the day, Iwould say that high school for me was a very straight experience. The highlights of the year were always the evening ball games and dances like the Grid Classic or Senior Ball. We went to class most always and listened to KYA at one hundred decibels whenever we could. Our daily routine was occasionally spiced by a class prank. I must confess however that my time was used more to prepare for college than to live and enjoy each moment. I say that somewhat regret- tably since I am sure that drinking beer with my buddies in the bushes would have been more fun than studying evenings. In fact, as a senior, I began to fear that I had thrown the four most carefree years of my life into the library and had shut the door on better things. And yet I have no real regrets. I have found since then that almost no time was ever wasted studying. I am frustrated now by being unable to learn fast enough to keep pace with my inter- ests. I appreciate Aragon now as a place where Iwas able to learn, for one reason or another, at a time when Iwas not smart enough to see myself the value of my own education. I hope that students today are taking advantage of the new scheduling to explore and develop their talents and interests. I fear however that they are revelling in newly found freedom, as I once longed to do, but fortuitously never did. - - Bruce Allen . 965W I remember once trying to describe the phenom- enon of American High School, and especially Aragon High School, to a group of Turkish stu- dents while waiting for a ferry to Rhodes from the Turkish mainland. After a bit of reflexion, I remarked that High School was for us a sort of market place of ideas and center for development in a miniature model of our particular civic culture. We readily assume roles, work with others, and even come to have an appreciation of literature and scholastical material in High Schoolg but the main function of our public high schools seems to be the development of a struc- ture within which the many segments of our society can meet, interact, compete, develop, and enjoy each other. I remember High School as four years of in- volved residence at an institution which served as a center for encounter of different elements, a sometimes stage or market place where ideas were traded and roles acted out in a structural model of our society. Aragon was a place to make friends, experience a certain amount of civic oriented life, gain an introduction to the world of learning, and develop as a person be- fore being booted out into the world to find a place in society and to begin a more specialised role. --Randy Linehan

Page 25 text:

lt is as senseless to revel in the nostalgia of bygone days, as it is to predict the future of a decadent and outvvorn institution. All those who would seek to remodel our dead educational system without attempting to breathe new life into its basic concepts and idealogies are doomed to failure. The role of education in America must be reexamined. The smooth running of our educational system presupposes acquiesence to the rules, regulations, and idealogies of the system. How long can students and teachers alike continue to be manufactured products, churned out by a dead institution as trained recruits, ready to take their place in the norm of society. Students have already cried out for Free Speech. Achieving that, they have cried out against a long list of ills in our society and in the world. This was all valid and all very necessary. But now we find that everyone knows what the problems are, although nobody really knows how to instigate the necessary reforms. This has produced a two fold phenomenon with great ramifications. First, students have been left with a feeling of impotence. The ramifications of this have either been to increase the intensity of their frustration--resulting in mass indiscriminate violence, or an almost manic depression--evidenced by completely dropping out. Perhaps the more sensible students have realized that the only way to overcome this feeling of impotence is to become better equipped as individuals, to develop their higher senses, to express their creative and spiritual individuality, to sharpen their intellect, and then, once prepared, work productively for those changes and reforms which are so necessary. It is my personal opinion that the first and most important reform must be in education. This is primarily where my efforts at Aragon were devoted. Unfortunately, not much was accomplished, both because of a passive student body, and a long history of rules, regulations and idealogy which went far beyond the grasp of a few inarticulate, intellectually inept students at Aragon High School. But it was a start, and it shall continue. Students are crying now not just for Free Speech, but for freedom. Academic freedom. Creative freedom. Spiritual Freedom. The freedom of joy, of life. There is now a strong social consciousness present among students in America. Hopefully, it will be strong enough to show the people of America not only where they have gone wrong, but also, to help rebuild that which is now decadent or destroyed. But students must also realize that a strong social consciousness is totally without value unless it is accompanied by an individual or inner consciousness. It is relatively easy to change the world, it is not so easy to change yourself. The most difficult work we can do is to develop our inner selves. What would it profit a man to gain the world, but to lose his own soul? Peace in the world will only come when there is peace within ourselves. This is the role of modern education. This is our challenge. --Bruce Bendure Being out of Aragon for only three months I cannot say what my one impression of high school is. That impression may begin to come only when I've had 1970 enough time and gain enough wisdom to bring together and evaluate the many memories of high school. I sadly suspect, though, that when the time does come when I will be able to say what high school meant to me, I will View it A as a nearly tragic misuse of four years. I had as much tif not morel fun than I I anybody else and I don't mean to say that I didn't learn anything, it is just a pity that so little of that fun and learning took place in the school itself. I'm tl afraid that I'll view the lack of challenge and compassion tin the curriculum, not the facultyb as perhaps the most serious shortcoming of my four years. I'll probably see high school as having done an admirable job in preparing me for college but as having done little to prepare me for living. Despite the poor impression of my high school years I am sure that I will be thankful for the opportunity to have gone to Aragon. At Aragon there were people who recognized that education must change and who were doing something to change it. When Iwas there, Aragon was some distance ahead of a system that was miles behind. Hopefully the community will allow these people to continue the change that may bring Aragon closer to a place that will make people not only better students but, possibly, better people. --Doug Kaplan One of the more important things my experience at Aragon taught me was society's law of selection: it's not survival of the fittest but rather those who fit! Four years at Aragon Sr now one year at UCSB have attested to the validity of this idea. Peace gl whatever , --Rocky Mills