In the fall of 1960, I started seventh grade. I was twelve years old, and I’d just changed from a soprano to a baritone. Memorial Junior High School had seventh, eighth, and ninth grades, and I was put in the ninth grade chorus, where there was a baritone section. I felt as if I’d skipped two grades. I was proud. But the rest of my seventh grade year did not make me proud. In sixth grade, I’d been one of the smartest kids in the class, but in seventh grade, I was near the bottom of my class.
There was an occasional friendly adult face in that school, but not many. The television program “The Wonder Years” was produced by Neil Marlens, who had been my next-door-neighbor and had also gone to Memorial Junior High School. I think I recognized the school depicted in that show. It wasn’t a school you’d want to go to.
Today I started seventh grade again. It’s forty years later, and I attend a middle school, not a junior high school. There are friendly adult faces all over the place. I’m not saying all middle schools are like that and no junior high schools are. Nor am I implying that we’ve solved all the problems we twelve year olds faced in 1960. But my first day in middle school felt much better than I remember my first day in junior high feeling.
I’m not under an illusion that I’m a pupil at the middle school, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to learn a lot there. And many of the 75 seventh graders I know there (five of my Fort River alumni are going to school elsewhere), seem to feel much better than they thought they’d feel. It’s been a good start.
I saw three boys enter the main office as I waited there when I first arrived. They looked angry as they sat down and waited to speak with whatever adult they were supposed to speak with. They slouched in their chairs. I imagined some adult telling them to sit up straight, and then warning them that they’d better approach school with a better attitude. That scenario would have reminded me of scenes I’d occasionally witnessed at Memorial Junior High.
But that’s not what happened. The assistant principal asked the three boys to follow him into his office, and they did. I don’t know what was said in there, but after about ten minutes, the four of them came out smiling. Maybe I’m about to witness an approach to seventh grade that’s very different from the approach I remember. I’ve only been there for one day; it’s too early to tell. But I have a good feeling about the Amherst Regional Middle School.