Making the grade
WHS recognizes top 2 students
For Eric Lu, Woonsocket High School’s Class of 2020 Valedictorian, and Class Salutatorian Allyson Deziel, finishing high school under the constraints of the coronavirus pandemic has come with adjustments and breaks with tradition.
But the school’s two top students will also tell you that they and their fellow classmates have learned to make the best of the challenges they have encountered while completing their education as Villa Novans and are now looking ahead to the next phases of their life, higher education, service or work.
Lu, who is headed to Harvard University in the fall to study neuro-science, pre-medicine and a secondary focus on global health and health policy, said his senior year turned out to be something totally unexpected.
“It certainly was very different. Online school is not exactly what we are used to and not something that has been done, ever,” Lu said.
The student had taken an online class before, but not all of his classes and not in a manner that required complete distance learning outside the high school building, he said.
As the coronavirus crisis resulted in a complete shutdown of the state now two months ago, the high school and all other schools in the state moved to online classes at home for students to continue their studies with the alterations of curriculum needed to make the change possible.
Although he and Deziel had already put in the work needed to secure their class leading positions before the shutdown began, they still had to continue working hard given the college choices they had ahead in the fall.
“It’s worked out better than I thought,” Lu said.
“We had to get used to a new platform and we adapted pretty well and I think it has been successful for the situation that we were given,” he said.
There are differences in how they learned than what might have occurred in class at the high school, Lu noted.
“I think our teachers realized that and I think they have been trying really hard to get us prepared,” Lu said.
“I knew I wanted to work hard but I didn’t think I would end up where I am, and yet here I am.” —Eric Lu, Woonsocket High School 2020 Valedictorian
He also expects that the students’ future educators will know the challenges they faced this year and will be also be helpful in making the best of an unexpected turn of events.
“I think colleges are well aware of the situation we’ve had and will be taking that into consideration when they start placing us in classes and assigning us course work,” Lu said. “We will just have to see how that works out when we start,” he added.
As to how he achieved his personal success, Lu said it wasn’t the result of any special secret.
“I think it was just having a vision for yourself and wanting to chase that dream,” he said.
“I knew I wanted to work hard but I didn’t think I would end up where I am, and yet here I am,” Lu said.
It is a good feeling all the same. “Honestly, it’s a great feeling. I worked hard and here is where I ended up,” the valedictorian said.
Deziel, who is pursuing a degree in illustration and entrepreneurship at Maine College of the Arts in the fall, also experienced an alteration of her studies as senior year headed into distance learning.
“I’ve taken online classes before, so it was just that but more,” Deziel explained.
The biggest differences she encountered came in her performance and handson classes like chorus and art, Deziel said.
In music, it meant going back to study the basics like music theory. When you are a member of a chorus it’s hard to actually sing as a group but Deziel said her class is working on doing something in the form of a group recording session where all of the class members contribute a part.
Her ceramics class in art, in contrast, couldn’t do what might have been done in school since students could not have access to the school’s kiln for firing and finishing their projects, Deziel explained.
Seniors still have to complete their portfolios for graduation, submitting them online, and while Deziel said she would have preferred doing her oral presentation in person, she will send in a recorded version like the rest of her classmates.
“I’ll do what I have to do,” she said of meeting the requirements for graduation despite the complications of the pandemic.
The adjustments faced by the Class of 2020 members won’t end with their classes. Lu and Deziel are still facing uncertainly on what their school will be able to put together in the form of a graduation ceremony. School officials, including School Superintendent Patrick McGee and the school committee are expected to discuss options for a ceremony next week.
Lu and Deziel said they have been told to have a speech prepared regardless of what form their Class graduation will take, virtual as some districts are pursuing, or a live ceremony in some manner.
“For a while, I was kind of waiting it out but now I am going to get prepared anyway,” Lu said.
Ideally, graduation should be an event to be shared in person, “but given our situation, that is unlikely,” Lu said.
Deziel also would have preferred to have an “in-person” graduation experience and believes that would be “more personal and connected to the community.”
But like the rest of the Class of 2020, Deziel has learned to make adjustments to move forward.
“That’s probably not possible at our current place in time, so at this point, we will take as much as we can get. I know they are working on it, they just haven’t give us any decision on it yet,” she said.