By Preston Thue
Staff Writer
Providing an environment for students to develop important character traits should be a school’s top priorities. Optimism, perseverance, courage, integrity and many other traits should be taught and promoted in schools, which is why Costa’s new Core Value Character Program is important, as it instills these positive character traits in students.
The Costa Parent Teacher Student Association will be partnering with the Costa Associated Student Body to put eight character flags on the light poles in the new quad, each of which will have various character traits written in bold. These flags will be purchased with an illustration, likely something related to Costa, like a Mustang or the interlocking “Mira Costa” insignia.
According to the PTSA Legislator Franca Stadvec, the PTSA and ASB will present approximately fifteen different flags, and students will vote on the best eight to put up in the quad. They will be a simple reminder of what students should be working toward, academic excellence, along with the ability to learn from failure and work towards being a successful adult. These skills are critical parts of a student’s education because they are what enables a student to put forth what they have learned and become successful.
As stated by Stadvec, The Core Value Character Program was recently implemented at Manhattan Beach Middle School. It is based on the ideas presented in a book called, Building the World’s Greatest High School, as well as on a website called Character Lab. Their goal to incorporate life skills into education is essential to any school’s teachings because having life skills is how a student is able to implement what they learn into their career.
Expressed by Andrew Sokatch, the Director of Research for Character Lab, end of year test scores are like the floor of what we expect from schools, but people mistake that floor for the whole house. In other words, although test scores matter, they are just half of what students should be taught, and the other half is character. Character is extremely important because it is the way a person acts, which affects people throughout their entire life.
Many studies, such as the Perry Preschool Program study, have concluded that the way students are educated in school affects many aspects later in life such as successfulness, crime, marital stability and other essential lifestyle aspects. Any experienced person knows that students who have been taught how to build off of failure are often much more successful than those who were simply affluent in their studies. Schools need to realize this and make simple changes, like implementing the Core Value Character Program, in order to reinforce good character traits.
Fortunately, Costa has a brilliant, well-funded PTSA organization that is clued in to the importance of character traits. The character flags are a helpful step they are taking to increase the effectiveness of education.
Some may say this is a waste of the school’s funding, but the reality is that many people fail to realize the true purpose of school, which is to excel as an adult when school is no longer part of life. Also, these flags are not expensive, and their function is priceless anyways.
Academic excellence matters in a student’s life, but people should be concerned with what students are able to do once they go to college or start their first job. Schools should remember the irrefutable fact that if students are not equipped to welcome failure and strengthen their weaknesses, then they will not know what to do when they inevitably fail at something.
According to Stadvec, students have been shown to improve their grades as a result of projects like this. Costa students are, on the whole, highly driven and competitive, so this program proves to be a perfect fit.
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