High school II [NTSC]

This is a film about Central Park East Secondary School (CPESS), a successful alternative high school in New York’s Spanish Harlem, 95% of whose graduates go on to four-year colleges. The film illustrates the School’s emphasis on “Habits of Mind” (weighing evidence; awareness of multiple points of view; seeing connections and relationships; speculating on possibilities; and assessing values). Sequences illustrating the School’s approach to learning include: classroom activities in the humanities and sciences; family conferences; discussions of race, class, and gender; faculty meetings; disciplinary problems; sex education; conflict resolution by students; and student council meetings. The film shows the students learning how to learn, how to reason and how to critique complex issues requiring collaboration, personal responsibility and a tolerance for uncertainty.