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Herman Walter, Vice President of the Orr Alumni Association:
I graduated from Orr in 1980, and it was a nice school. But over the years they’ve done a lot of experimenting. It changed from one school, to four schools, to three schools, back to one school. When I heard about the turnaround I thought, “Uh oh, another experiment.” But 10 months into the turnaround, I saw things really had changed. I saw the students and the staff and the leadership. There was guidance, they were really working with the kids. Making it one school took away 50 percent of the problem. Before there was a lot of competition with all of the schools wearing different colors. But the kids are getting along a lot better now, and the rival thing isn’t there. They wear uniforms now, and instead of competition with fancy clothes and designer shoes, everybody’s on ground zero.
The kids’ attitudes in terms of learning and environment have changed. Now it’s cool to learn.
It’s an energetic staff, and it seems like they’re all on the same page. They’re highly motivated to help the students. The principal is always walking around, and he’s engaged with the kids. There’s a lot of youth guidance, and they hold health fairs and youth training. All staff members have to pick kids to mentor. They do something called credit recovery, where students can make up credits. There are a lot more after-school activities. They keep school open from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. The longer we keep them there, the better the chance to have them grow and learn and not get in trouble.
I’m up there at 7:30 on the corner, encouraging kids to get to school on time, keeping drug dealers away, getting the kids out of the stores to get to school. We get the chance to develop relationships, just to even say good morning to them, and they know you care.
The principal really welcomes us (the alumni). He gave us an alumni room, where we can have meetings. We have scholarships for kids, we do mentor programs. We give kids bus passes. We help run the GED programs on Saturday. We show up at events. We let the students know we’re supporting them.
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