From l – r, Maizee Fryer, Afton Murray and superintendent Frank Schofield talks with Jason Williams on KVNU’s For the People.
LOGAN — The school year is over but Logan City School District Superintendent Frank Schofield was back on KVNU’s For the People program on Wednesday and he brought two recent graduates, former student body officers Maizee Fryer and Afton Murray.
Schofield said this was the graduating class that saw their freshman year interrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic,and after that a lot of social unrest and different things happening.
“And this metaphor that I thought of with these students was, let’s say you’re at a party and you’re having a great time and a song comes on, and it is your favorite song, and you love this music. But it’s a party, there’s a lot of noise, there’s food, people talking, etc and you got a choice, you can either get distracted by the noise, or you can choose to listen to the music and focus on that. And these students had a ridiculous number of opportunities over the last four years to get distracted by the noise, and they made conscious choices not to,” he explained.
As a result, he said they created very awesome experiences for themselves, for their peers, and as student body officers they created positive experiences for the school as a whole. Maizee talked a little about her high school experience.
“Most of my experience is just with, like, COVID and how it changed society as a whole. It was really weird to go, and I feel like most people can agree with this, you anticipate high school for so many years of your childhood. You watch the movies and you’re like ‘wow I’m going to be in high school one day, I’m going to be living in a high school musical’. So, at the start of freshman year it was real, we were freshmen and we were in high school,” Maizee explained.
But then COVID hit and they were all sent home for a long Spring break. Likewise, Afton said it was a strange first year in high school.
“When COVID hit, I remember, little freshman Afton, it was in AP Biology and I didn’t know how I was going to be able to take my test, because AP tests were coming up, how was I going to be able to study for that. But, yeah, all of a sudden all of your teachers, and as a freshman you’re just getting to know these people, or you’re meeting new people, meeting new friends and everyone that you know is behind a computer screen. It was a little bit alienating,” said Afton.
On another topic, recently in the Davis School District, a parent, taking advantage of a new state law, made a request to ban the King James version of the Bible, because of what they said was inappropriate content for children.
Schofield said in a democracy you listen to peoples concerns and you have legislators who are elected to write laws. He said you try to provide the best, safest and most appropriate services that you can.
“And that leads to a lot of differences of opinion because we live in a really diverse community and there are a wide variety of needs, and we hear that in these conversations. One of the great opportunities as well as challenges of public education is having families who come and reflect that diversity of thought, and helping them come together for a common purpose.”
He said it involves transparency, to let parents know what is being taught to their kids.