InterStudent:

Learning About Political Economy

Harry Pollard

[Estimated 1970s]

What teachers tell us about InterStudent:

"As I read the student manual . . . I'm afraid I laughed like a loon. The cleverness, the practicality, the infectious fun, the sheer deviousness which shone through every page hooked my interest. I asked myself - Can this program deliver what it promises? I must find out for myself."

"After a three semester trial at my middle school, I can report that it does deliver what it promises, to such a degree that there are now three of us running the program at my school and Economic InterStudent is up for district adoption . . . "

"To relate all the ways Economic InterStudent meets the requirements of the California State History-Social Science Framework would require another letter. . . . many, many of the strands are utilized in the various tasks InterStudent requires the students to perform. . . . InterStudent has a diverse set of job roles which students assign themselves . . . Current pedagogy calls for active, student directed (rather than teacher centered/teacher delivered) learning. InterStudent is the epitome of such an approach." . . ."

"I am most impressed."

Jon Newland (La Quinta MS)


"In my old lecture discussion classes I would have anywhere from a quarter to a half of the students getting D's and F's. . . . It seems the program is doing what I wanted it to do, help bring up the grades of the lower end students. Going into Cycle Nine . . . the number of students with D's and F's is 9.3%."

" . . . my contact with students has increased every Cycle. In a typical period I will test and question groups and students for 50 of the 56 minutes we are in the room. On many days students will arrive early, during lunch, and stay late, during the passing period for the next class, in order to get more done."

" . . . it is teaching students life and business skills, such as working with others, starting and completing tasks of varying difficulty, speaking in public, and taking individual as well as group responsibility for learning and achievement."

Ron Johnson (Newark HS)


". . . I found that I had students wanting to transfer out of my classes right and left. It appeared that this was too radical of a process for some of their young minds to deal with. They were so used to being told what to do, when to do it, and how to do it, that when asked to take the responsibility for their own learning, they freaked. . . . the assistant principal called me into her office . . . she realized that this way of learning is outcome based, multi-tiered, demanding of critical thinking at a very high level, is able to meet the needs of students of varying abilities and at the same time utilizes students strengths instead of magnifying their weaknesses."

". . . So, instead of students wanting to transfer out of my classes, I began to have students wanting to transfer in. I never imagined that I would have whole classes starting to work before the bell and staying to work after the class was over."

Robert D. Marvulli (Merced HS)