If you ask 10 people what character means you’d get 10 different answers. Some would relate character to attributes such as honesty and treating others well. Others might say personal accomplishment and being good rather than being bad defines character.
But, what is meant by honesty; what is good and what is bad?
For this reason, I've always thought that teaching character in a school system can be fraught with unusual challenges. In Cobb County schools, and across the state, we have various character education curricula in grades K-12.
Sprayberry High School in northeast Cobb has found a practical way to implement its character education program. Three years ago, Sprayberry teamed up with the Northeast Cobb Business Association to help students understand what character means in a real world sense.
Paul McMahon, associate principal at Sprayberry, runs the program for its students and works closely with the business association to instill what McMahon says are, “lessons about community service, leaving your mark, and sustaining the community.”
Something must be working because Sprayberry was recently recognized by the state Board of Education as a School of Excellence for showing continuous gains in student achievement the last three years.
McMahon recognizes that academic achievement cannot be detached from “service to others and giving back,” he told me when trying to define character education at Sprayberry.
Steve Crowley coordinates the program for the Northeast Cobb Business Association, headed by Frank Wigington, owner of a landscape company and Sprayberry alum. Crowley, community pastor at Piedmont Church, believes that the “community should be in the school and the school in the community."
Sprayberry has 100 student groups who meet regularly to devise tailored character education programs with the goal of completing service projects during the year.
Under Wigington’s guidance, students invited veterans returning from Afghanistan to a reception party during the winter holidays. Local businesses provided food for the returning veterans.
This effort is part of a larger outreach students and business leaders conduct to offer assistance to veterans by raising money and awareness in the community and to send care packages and letters.
Students also work with a local animal shelter to repair pens and spruce up walking trails with the help of business association members. There are many other projects.
All these projects will culminate on April 7 with an Easter egg event at Sprayberry’s Jim Frazier Stadium that, last year, involved 14,000 participants. It takes 200 student volunteers to plan and assist with this project, which is initiated with an egg drop from a helicopter provided by Marietta-based Alpha Helicopter.
Along with service projects that help the community, students are recognized for individual achievement at an annual school assembly. The business association also selects two students as interns.
Character Counts may be a platitude to some, but to Sprayberry’s students, it’s part of their everyday school experience thanks to their partnership with the business association.
Craig Allen has lived in Cobb County for 10 years. Reach him at alle3257@bellsouth.net.
