Maya McFadden Photo
Seniors Benjamin DeBlasio, Gianie Figueroa, and Johanyx Rodriguez.
A trio of High School in the Community (HSC) seniors finished their high school careers with ideas for life-changing improvements to local education curricula in mind.
The three students, Johanyx Rodriguez, Gianie Figueroa, and Benjamin DeBlasio, pitched ideas for schools to have climate literacy curriculums, mental health education, and healthy technology usage with their end-of-year senior capstone projects.
HSC’s capstone project has students do in-depth research on a real-life interest. HSC requires the students to include an action component to the projects.
Many but not all students use their capstone to continue working on an extension of the issue they examined for a Social Justice Symposium project required in their sophomore year.
This year the seniors completed their capstones remotely. The projects were all uploaded to a virtual exhibit online for their classmates to view. The trio’s projects were among the top favored projects for this years senior class.
Normalizing Anxiety, Talking Mental Health
Fair Havener Figueroa, 17, concluded that a better New Haven will include education in schools on how to cope with anxiety and mental health awareness.
It wasn’t until Figueroa was 14 when she opened up about suffering from anxiety during her childhood, she said. To cope she taught herself how to write music and sing.
For her capstone she researched several causes of anxiety and some common ways of coping. She then interviewed friends about their experiences with anxiety and its effects on them.
Figueroa wrote two songs, called “Fighter” and “Breathe.” She performed them for her capstone.
Figueroa described anxiety as a “plague” that affects many but is often hidden because of stigma.
“Schools want you to learn. but for that to happen they have to normalize conversations about mental health,” she said. “So many people deal with it in different ways so you can talk about it in any class.”
Figueroa plans to attend the University of New Haven in the fall to major in music and sound recording with a possible minor in theater. One of her future goals is to write music and a musical about mental-health problems.
Lessons From Remote Learning
Concluding slide from Benjamin DeBlasio’s capstone presentation.
DeBlasio, 18, focused his research on the impacts remote learning had on students during the pandemic.
He found that many students formed unhealthful habits with technology that impacted not only their academics but their mental health.
DeBlasio’s interest in the topic came about halfway through the year. He watched his friends fall behind and/or drop out during remote-only learning.
“So many of us struggled,” he said. “I wondered: If there’s bad, there has to be good that came from it too.”
Friends of DeBlasio had to take on remote learning alone. They were unaware of the need for establishing healthful computer habits.
“Technology wasn’t used much in our classrooms before,” he said.
He learned that students’ daily exposure to blue light often negatively impacted students’ eye health and sleep pattern. Remote learning also caused students to lose the breaks they used to have in between classes when they would walk to different classrooms in person.
DeBlasio and friends most often used technology only recreationally before the pandemic. When technology is overused, he said, it makes users “feel bad, like they’re the issue.”
These experiences were shared with DeBlasio when he became a member of the State Student Advisory Council on Education for two months. During his work with the council DeBlasio interviewed students and administrators about the effects of the switch to remote learning.
In his presentation DeBlasio suggested that students and schools incorporate screen breaks in future remote learning, avoid blue light sources before bed, institute social media breaks, and monitor screen time.
While on the council DeBlasio, who lives in Seymour, worked with fellow members on a presentation about the “Challenges & Solutions to Remote Learning” that was later presented to the state Board of Education.
In the future, DeBlasio said, he hopes the Board of Education will push for schools to develop responsible computer usage with students. In the fall DeBlasio plans to attend the University of Colorado Boulder for Aerospace Engineering.
Climate Change Education
Back in 2018, Rodriguez heard about Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg on Twitter.
“I saw how young she was and was like, ‘I want to do that. I want to be like her,’” she recalled.
Since then Rodriguez, who lives in Morris Cove, has attended climate change awareness marches and become an advocate for climate change education in New Haven public schools.
For her capstone Rodriguez examined how to implement climate change education in local middle school, high school, and college curriculums. She researched where curricula have been established.
As a sophomore Rodriguez did her social justice symposium about the effects of climate change. Two years later, her capstone continued the conversation.
Rodriguez cited a San Jose University survey that correlated students’ learning from a year-long course about climate change with a decrease in 2.86 tons in carbon emissions for them individually each year.
At the start of this year Rodriguez joined the Climate Health Education Project (CHEP) as a intern. As an intern she worked on a social media campaign spreading awareness about climate education and its importance. Rodriguez got familiar with using a green screen and tripod to make videos for educators on Instagram and Youtube.
Rodriguez utilized CHEP’s audience of educators to encourage local schools to push for adding a climate literacy curriculum. She also partnered with another CHEP intern to create a Climate Literacy 101 document that includes eight weeks worth of video links, articles, and lesson plans for teachers.
Rodriguez was urged by CHEP to bring an event called Climate Week to HSC. In collaboration with HSC’s Environmental Stewardship Program, Rodriguez launched a Climate/Earth week at HSC. For the week Rodriguez and her partners put together a presentation that consisted of videos and Kahoots for students to learn about ocean acidification and how to recycle.
“This is necessary work and we can reach the largest audience through education,” she said.
Rodriguez’s proposed curricula cover topics like the greenhouse effect and environmental migration. In addition she suggested a schoolwide Model United Nations conference about climate change-related topics for students to help lead the movement, followed by curriculum work in schools to help students create personalized energy saving plans to lessen their carbon footprint.
HSC Magnet Resource teacher Dianna Carter described a trend in this year’s capstone projects by seniors as “empathetic.” Many other projects focused on helping peers and future generations that will be educated in New Haven.
“It’s about time we really learn how to better our future in school. because soon we will be in charge,” said Rodriguez.
It's so interesting to read about the senior projects that these students did. I have high hopes for the future with such intelligent, empathetic and curious students focusing on making our world a better place. Congratulations and keep up the lifelong opportunities for learning.