Berkeley High School - Olla Podrida Yearbook (Berkeley, CA)

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Mrs. Sheila Kilgore, Attendance Clerk. Mr. Gordon Nagai, Dean of Attendance. Mr. Nagai Observes that Not All Youth Belong in the Public School Last year ' s new Attendance Counselor Mr. Gordon Nagai received his Bachelors Arts degree at the Uni- versity of California in Berkeley. After graduating, he started his graduate work also at Cal and received his Master ' s in Social Work. For two years after completing graduate studies, Mr. Nagai worked as a Psychiatric Social Worker at the State Department of Mental Hygiene. For two years after that he worked at the Antioch Unified School District as the Supervisor of Child Welfare and Attendance. Following those two years of being a supervisor Mr. Nagai was offered the job of Attendance Counselor at BHS. The attendance problems at BHS fell into different catagories said Mr. Nagai, on one end of which you found cutting for kicks, to more serious resistance to conformity and authority, to the other end where you found truancy and attendance problems that reflect deeper disturbances of the students and their families. The difference in the nature of the problems, the individual personal differences and needs, require an awareness of what is needed by the individual, and by his fellow students who watched what occurred in the glass fishbowl of the dean ' s office. He said one factor that provided perspective for me in this job, is the realization that not all youth belong in the public school system. The challenge in working with attendance matters is to distinguish between the needs of the students, utilize my own training and skills, make use of guidance personnel and counseling staff, and involve the parents in seeking positive resolution to dynamics that resulted in attendance problems. The Duties of Head Nurse and Assistant Nurse Are Varied The duties of Public Health Nurse are to handle problems referred by the assistant nurse, refer certain students to doctors, speak to parents about specific medical problems, and refer families to a health nurse to go into the home when assistance with health prob- lems is needed, says Miss Mary Huff, head nurse. Also, stated Miss Huff, the head nurse handles coun- selor referals, investigates frequent absences of students when there may be a serious medical problem, and handles certain medical problems of students referred by guidance workers. The duties of the assistant nurse are to take care of first aid cases, attend to students who are ill during school hours, and to call home to parents when it is necessary to send students home, stated Miss Huff. Mrs. Helen Raye, assistant nurse, works full-time at BHS, and Miss Mary Huff is at BHS part-time. Miss Huff works at McKinley High when she is not at BHS. Mrs. Hazel MacFarland, Attendance Clerk. Miss Mary Huff, Nurse. 12 Miss Eunice Carlson, Attendance Clerk.

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Miss Frances Shaw, who registers all incoming students, and Regina Pridgeon. Mrs. Eva Hayes, Principal Curtis’ private secretary, con- sults with Martha Newman. Mrs. Mary E. Walter, in charge of all school correspondence. Many Responsibilities Handled in the Main Office Mrs. Eva Hayes, Mr. Curtis ' private secretary who was also head secretary of the main office, oversaw all work that went on in the main office. She called the main office the hub of the school and said that everything that had to do with BHS began and ended in the main office. Those working with Mrs. Hayes were Miss Frances Shaw, Mrs. Mary E. Walter, Mrs. Carolyn Hen- nington, Mrs. Emy Peterson and Mrs. Margie Thorp. Miss Shaw who has been with the BHS main office for 30 years registered all the incoming students. She sent for the past records and transcripts from former schools of the students. Miss Shaw also handled all college representative interviews. Mrs. Walters handled all school correspondence in the front office and wrote and produced the daily teach- ers bulletin. Every year Mrs. Walters is in charge of seeing that the students correct name is on their gradua- tion diploma. Mrs. Hennington was in charge of all the I.B.M. work which included all report cards. Mrs. Peterson, curriculum secretary, did all the work for the 13 curriculum associates. Mrs. Thorp did the secretarial and clerical work in part for the Industrial Arts, Home Nursing, Child Care, Food Service and Business Education departments. Mrs. Emy Peterson does all the work for the curriculum associates. Mrs. Carolyn Hennington, in charge of ail I.B.M. work, with Judy Reimann.

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Mrs. Larissa Rulofson and Mrs. Carol Kalamaras discuss history with Walter Pope. Minority Students Helped by New Counselor Assistants The College Commitment Program was an ef- fort by colleges and universities in the area to counsel minority youth in regard to enrolling in four year institutions, said Head Counselor Mr. Vernon Wenrich. Under the direction of Mr. William Sherrill, former counselor at Berkeley High School, minority college students from the University of California, San Francisco State College, and San Jose State College were placed in high schools in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, Hayward, San Francisco, and San Jose as counseling assistants to offer support, tutoring, college admissions and financial aides information. At Berkeley High School there were two stu- dents working in connection with the program. They were Pedro Ruiz and Pat Wilson. Pedro is a Spanish American from Panama. He speaks both Spanish and English fluently. Pedro studied for two years in the mid-west, at Aurora College, then transfered to Cal Riverside for one year and was at Berkeley where he was a senior in Sociology. Pat is a Negro. She grew up in Berkeley and graduated from Berkeley High School in 1965. She is attending the University of California and is Majoring in Business Administration. She was Broad Range of World Literature Encompassed at Seminar BHS students in the new Honors Seminar Study were involved in a panel discussion on the many eras of World Literature. From left to right: English teacher and sponsor of the semi- nar, Miss Elizabeth Bennett; Laurie DeVos, Patricia Smith, Moira Gibbens, Jeff Muscatine and Librarian Mrs. Carol Kalamaras. Honors Seminar, a new course offered at Berkeley High, was a guide in helping inter- ested students to work toward independent study. It was a period long course which met in the library every other day and was instructed by Miss Elizabeth Bennett, English teacher. Library Is Laboratory, Searching Center and Motivating Force Our concern this year, said Mrs. Larissa Rulofson, head librarian at Berkeley High School, has been to define for students, teachers and administrators the functions of a school library — its differences and simi- larities to all other types of libraries. Primarily a school library is a flexible teaching area which is used as a laboratory to discover a variety of materials, a searching center for using keys to information, and a motivating force to use this discovery process as a lifelong learn- ing tool. The teaching aspect of the library within the school is emphasized since the pursuit of independent study is impossible without the knowledge and skills to do research work. As an enrichment area the library welcomes stu- dents to pursue independent reading within reasonable rules set for the benefit of all students, she continued. We have made a beginning toward the concept of the library as a media instructional center with the addi- tion of records in the fields of music and literature, art prints, and microfilms of magazines such as American Heritage, Ebony, Scientific American and Time. Mrs. Rulofson defined a librarian as a media special- ist concerning the selection of media and the thorough knowledge of the media available. A librarian she con- tinued, is also a teacher who plans instructional pro- grams and classes for using the media and teaches about various media to individuals when necessary but primarily to groups. A librarian motivates growth in ap- preciation of a wide variety of materials. She is an organizer who creates efficient procedures for finding stored media and promotes efficient processes for the use of media. Pedro Ruiz and Pat Wilson discuss counseling problems of minority students. Honor Seminar Group in Library.