#213, Cutout
EDIT: Each year around April 1, it is an annual tradition to fool my students with a fake news article disguised as a typical Journal post. Once a year, I peruse the most viewed articles from the Onion (America’s Finest News Source) and find one bizarre, yet believable story to pass off as real. Rest assured everyone, your classmates will not soon be replaced by cardboard cutouts 😂
Clues it was fake:
The link to the article redirects you to the New York Times home page, not the article. Real link → https://local.theonion.com/high-school-adds-cardboard-students-between-distanced-d-1844653467
Searching for the article on Google will bring up its real source, the Onion, a well-known parody website.
Article was dated April 2021 which was from the future (it was posted on March 25)
This quote: “Lester told reporters that the early success of the program had inspired him to replace several teachers with cardboard cutouts.”
Psychologists have been warning that teens’ mental health is a real cause for concern during the COVID-19 pandemic. The lack of contact with friends, missing milestones like graduations and birthday parties, and an irregular school schedule have taken a serious emotional toll on the youth.
“We see [increased] depression and anxiety in all age groups, but in adolescence it’s on steroids,” says Robin Gurwitch, psychologist and professor at Duke University Medical Center. “When kids look into the future now, they’re looking at one that wasn’t what they envisioned before. ‘I used to be able to hang with my friends, and now that’s gone. I was looking forward to going to college, but my dad just got laid off and can’t afford it.’”
So what can be done?
Schools all across the U.S. are experimenting with an innovative new approach to remedy the issue—cutouts. Students’ pictures are taken and then printed, laminated, and set up in the classroom to mimic a real classroom environment. Read this news article on this unusual new approach.
High School Adds Cardboard Students Between Distanced Desks To Maintain Normal Feeling Of Oversized Classes
By NICK CUMMINGS-BRUCE | April 2021
SAVANNAH, GA—Emphasizing that the cutouts would create the illusion that learning facilities were just as cramped as the year before, representatives from Savannah High School confirmed Friday that cardboard students had been added between distanced desks to maintain a normal feeling of oversized classes. “Although Covid-19 has brought many challenges to reopening our schools, these cardboard figures will help not just students but also teachers feel just as flustered and overextended as usual,” said school principal Dr. Jeremy Lester, adding that numerous pupil printouts would be placed throughout the school’s classrooms, halls, and bathrooms, which students would then compete with for textbooks, school supplies, and locker space. “While this year will certainly be an adjustment for everyone, these 1,500 custom-designed stand-ins will make it just as difficult for students to fight for attention from their principal, coaches, and support staff. As such, each classroom’s budget has been severely limited to account for the printing and lamination for each new paper student.” At press time, the Lester told reporters that the early success of the program had inspired him to replace several teachers with cardboard cutouts.
SOURCE: http://www.nytimes.com/articles/high-school-adds-cardboard-students-between-distanced-d-1844653467
The South Korean government is evaluating the efficacy of this new approach and strongly considering it for elementary and middle schools in the second half of 2021. Desperate times require desperate measures.
To complete this Journal response, address the following:
What is your reaction to this radical new approach to education? Should South Korea experiment with cardboard cutouts in the classroom?
Comment on a peer’s response.
-Brenden Lee Teacher