Zoe Jackson
The Tower
Grosse Point South HS
1st Place
Division 1, News Writing
Diversity Coverage
Principal Moussa Hamka’s high school teachers did not encourage him to succeed in school, partially, he said, because of his status as an ethnic minority. Now, as a high school administrator, he is determined to advocate for students whose test scores fall in South’s bottom 30 percent.
“Teachers didn’t have expectations for us,” Hamka, whose father immigrated to the US from Lebanon, said. “We were either going to go work in our parents’ gas station or go to community college.”
The October release of PA-25, a state-mandated report which includes, among other things, a school’s standardized test scores, also includes data about which students fall in the bottom 30 percent. It’s these students that Hamka wants South staff to be sure they include when discussing ways to bring up those standardized test scores.
Composite test scores from standardized tests are sorted from high to low, Hamka said. Once the bottom and top 30 percent are identified, the score discrepancy between the two groups is compared and included in the PA-25 report.
In every scored section, South outscored 95 percent of Michigan schools, but there are always bottom students, Hamka said.
“No matter how good your school is, you will always have a bottom 30,” Hamka said. “Our bottom 30 is higher than some school’s top 30.”
However, Hamka said that school officials realize that part of the school population is not achieving and hopes to focus on those students this year.
“There is a variety of reasons why some of our students aren’t achieving. In America right now, you (often) hear about an achievement gap. I also believe in what we call the attitude gap,” Hamka said.“They aren’t succeeding academically, and they don’t want to.”
Hamka knows because he used to be one of those students.
“We didn’t care,” Hamka said. “We weren’t as motivated to succeed academically. I grew up in Dearborn, the son of an immigrant. I went to a school with a lot of immigrant kids, and we didn’t achieve.”
Part of it was the attitude gap, Hamka said.
“Many of us didn’t have parents who could sit next to us and do calculus,” he said. “Many of us didn’t have parents that could read or write English.”
Hamka said he is trying to make sure that all students, but especially those in the bottom 30 percent, feel that they have support from teachers and administration, even if he didn’t.
“When I was in high school, I didn’t have that social support structure around me,” he said. “Some of my peers who weren’t Arabic, they were pushed and motivated to go to University of Michigan, to go to Michigan State. There were expectations for them, and there weren’t expectations for me.”
Hamka compared his high school struggles to the struggles of some of South’s minority students, but said it would be wrong to assume all minority students fall in the bottom 30 percent.
“Statistically, our bottom 30 is not all black students,” Hamka said.
South’s student body is comprised of approximately 1800 students. Fewer than 180 black students make up the 600 kids in the bottom 30 percent. However, Hamka said most of the minority students at South do fall in the bottom 30 percent and he and the staff need to figure out why this is and work to change it.
“I know we have a wonderful staff, and we have wonderful kids,” Hamka said. “The most important step (toward change) is asking my students ‘why?’”
Knowing your students and identifying the ones that need extra help is a major part of helping any student who is struggling, Freshman English teacher Melanie Lauer said.
“In a school this big, and with the way our class sizes are this year, it’s so easy to lose kids,” Lauer said. “I am doing everything I can to encourage them to come to me if there is anything they need. I think that’s one of the most important things a teacher can do.”
Teachers in other departments such as math teacher Alexa McConaghy understands how difficult the routine of school can be for some students.
“I try to remind people that (school is) a marathon, not a sprint,” McConaghy said. “It’s an accumulative effort that pays off. When we’re doing notes and we come to ‘try’ kind of questions, I tend to help people who I know have been struggling, so I can correct a misconception at the start.”
Students are encouraged to come in and see her, even if it’s just a few minutes a couple times a week, McConaghy said.
“It is hard to decide that you’re going to do everything your supposed to do,” McConaghy said. “You have to get up in the morning and say, today I’m going to take notes, today I’m going to do my homework. People know what they’re supposed to do. Its just making that choice every day.”
As a minority student, Briana Thompson ’16 said she experienced prejudice while at Pierce Middle School which affected her accomplishments at school.
“I could tell a teacher was racist,” she said. “She didn’t offer me much help in her class, and she really tried hard to get me to fail,” Thompson said.
Fortunately, Thompson said her experience at South has been more positive.
“If they have questions, (students should) ask their teachers. Teachers just have to do their job–teach students what they need to know,” she said.
It is Hamka’s hope that all students will adopt a positive attitude toward their schoolwork and the South staff will help them do so.
“Our job is to educate all kids, no matter when they come to us,” Hamka said. ‘It’s our job to get those kids caught up, and successful,” he said.