Star-Journbal Editor
The two adjoining classrooms are separated by a single cinder block wall, but they are as different as rotary phones and cellular phones, or the original Pong video game and the games played today on PlayStation III.
One of these classrooms is the most high-tech room at Hillsboro High School — the Interactive Television (ITV) Studio — where students learn anatomy, physics, or French, live, and in real-time, while in video conference with students sitting in their own ITV classrooms in Herington, Centre, Peabody, and Marion.
On the other side of the wall at Hillsboro High School, chemistry and biology classes are taught in a partitioned room — half used to be the school kitchen, the other half used to be the cafeteria.
Today, it looks like a backdrop for a scene in "That 70s Show."
"This whole thing used to be the school kitchen years ago," said tour-giving science teacher, Ruth Baldner. "A lot of the stuff is still in place from then, the cupboards and sinks."
Baldner teaches three classes of sophomore biology (think dissecting frogs, rats, and grasshoppers), and three classes of junior chemistry (imagine mixing and boiling all sorts of compounds and chemicals).
With as many as 23 students in a class, and with lab tables scattered all around the room, Baldner must stay hyper-vigilant.
"It's really problematic to get 23 students in here and you've got them all the way around," she said. "It's really hard to keep track of what they're doing, safety-wise especially."
The bond referendum being proposed by USD 410 includes remodeling the biology and chemistry classroom, creating one large room with adequate equipment, storage, and optimal placement of the lab tables, and the classroom tables and chairs.
"I would also like to have all of the safety equipment in one room," Baldner said. "We have no eye wash in [the classroom area that includes the lab tables] and no safety shower in here. That's all in the back room."
"The eye wash needs to be within a 15-second walk," she added. "I've never tested that, but the problem is that if you've got something in your eye it's not going to be easy for you to get all the way back there."
For safety's sake, the old lab tables need to be replaced, she added. The tables were built with gas jets, water faucets, and drainage sinks in the middle, forcing students to reach over glass beakers and around Bunsen burners to reach them.
"I don't think the students are at risk, but these tables could be a lot better safety-wise" she said.
Like you'd expect from a biology teacher, after six years on the job, Baldner has adapted to her less-than-ideal environment.
But as a chemistry teacher, Baldner believes all of her students could absorb more if they were closer to the source.
In a larger classroom, tables and chairs could be rearranged so instead of students sitting four or five rows back, as they do now, no student would be further than two tables from the front.
"I think especially the room organization is important," Baldner said. "I don't like that the kids have to sit back here, such a long way from the front."
Cutline: Natasha Hoffner, junior, chemistry student, simulates a laboratory experiment. Ring stand, burner, beaker.
