Andy Borgmann's Ode to Homestead

Andy Borgmann is a Fort Wayne native and Homestead High School graduate who now lives in Atlanta where he produces the Allen Hunt radio talk show.

Andy wrote a post this week about his gratefulness to his teachers at Homestead and Woodside Middle School.  Fort Wayne Observed has added Andy's weblog to the blogroll.

I was casually checking out Fort Wayne Observed today (it makes me feel connected to "home"), and amongst my perusing I came across that according to US News & World Report, my high school, Homestead High School, has been ranked as one of the top 505 public schools (top 3%) in the country.

There are many times in my life when I have had the privilege to reflect on how blessed I am to have been born in the United States of America. You don't work in AIDS villages in South Africa, or sleep in a bed 1/4 of mile from a bomb explosion in Jerusalem, or build orphanages in Honduras with out realizing that living in America is a blessing - one which wasn't earned, despite what most Americans seem to think.

... I have come to the realization that my school was a blessing I didn't earn either - and it was a blessing that prepared me for college and life more than I could have ever expected.

I often joked with my friends in college that my hardest year of college was my junior year of high school. And while it was a joke, there was some truth there. Taking 5 AP classes and being an editor on the yearbook was quite challenging. But the brilliance of Homestead was that it wasn't just about the bookwork - it was about a holistic approach to education.

I think back to Block (AP History & AP English combined) and think about the extreme amount of energy that had to have been put into that by Mr. Schmidt, Ms. Decalone, Mr. Teagarden, and Ms. Walker. They didn't just teach historical facts and grammar (which we all know I must have been asleep for the grammar part), but they taught us how to think, how to debate, how to process information, and how to interpret.

I think about Journalism and how truly grateful I am to Mr. Kuhn for not just the journalistic integrity he taught me, but the independence he gave to me to learn my own lessons. Who knew I would eventually use those lessons to produce a talk radio show on the largest news radio source in the South (and no I took no journalism classes in college).

I even think about Woodside Middle School (feeder for Homestead) where I did my first and only web programming class and my first and only video editing class with Mr. Gorman. These are two elements of my life where I have succeeded at GREATLY and they have pretty much enabled me to do that which I do now. Yet I had no collegiate education to show for these areas either.

Middle school was also important because it had Mr. Panning – a man that taught me more about life and provided a great example of what it was to be a man during a time when I desperately needed that (he was a great Math teacher and Cross Country coach too).

[ ... ]

I currently live in an suburb of Atlanta much like Southwest Allen…only about 10 times more wealthy and “yuppie”. Instead of Dick Freeland and Tom Kelly - you’d know who I am talking about if you lived in Southwest Allen - Usher, Jeff Foxworthy, John Smoltz, and the CEOs of Fortune-500 companies are my neighbors. What cracks me up about this area is how many private academies there are (I can count 6 within the same space as my old school district). Yet I still don’t think any of them do as good of a job of educating and preparing a holistic person better than Homestead did. I spoke at a local private academy's career day earlier this year and I reminded them of Mark Twain's quote, "I never let my schooling get in the way of my education." School is more than just books. Homestead got this; I am not sure most private schools do.

Comments

[Cathy Dee]

Andy's post is particularly notable in its positivity; among Homestead grads who live around Ft. Wayne, they still catch grief on being from "the rich school" and find themselves almost apologizing for it!

[Brian Stouder]

"they still catch grief on being from "the rich school" and find themselves almost apologizing for it!"

Really? I'm an old guy (South Side High School, class of '79) - and I've never had that impression of Homestead.

I will say that I had friends who moved to southwest Fort Wayne back in the '70's (back when all that was near Liberty Mills Road was a Conoco station, and if you needed groceries, you had to go all the way back to Times Corners where Maloley's was) and it seemed to me that Homestead was the worst thing that ever happened to them....but looking back at it from the here-and-now, it seems to me that every school has its share of knuckleheads.

But I wouldn't trade the marvelous bunch of teachers and staff and fellow students that I interacted with at South Side (or from Ben Geyer - now Towles Intermediate Montessori School, currently where my children attend), exceptional people that included (amongst other things) a gym teacher who was a combat veteran from Omaha Beach, a math teacher who is now an owner of a major Fort Wayne firm, and a fellow student who served as a Prosecuting Attorney of the 38th Judicial Circuit of Indiana.

By way of saying - people who think they need to feel defensive or apologetic for attending Homestead are as misguided as people who might feel that way for having attended Southside....or people who would judge others because they attended Homestead or South Side.

[Andy Borgmann]

they still catch grief on being from "the rich school" and find themselves almost apologizing for it!

I can understand that a little. But it is the same sort of thing when I travel abroad and do humanitarian/missionary work in third world countries and feeling like I have to "excuse" myself for being an American. I can't control how people think, but I do believe to much have been given, much is expected. I didn't "earn" the privilege to live in America. Nor did I "earn" the privilege to go to a great high school. But I do have a responsibility because of both blessings to help make this world a better place for all.

Really? I'm an old guy (South Side High School, class of '79) - and I've never had that impression of Homestead.

My dad graduated from South Side in the 60s. My grandfather graduated from North Side in the 30s (or it might have been 1929). Who knows, maybe I'll move back and send my kids to Carroll just to round it out.

[Michelle Hochstetler]

I can relate to the comment "they still catch grief on being from "the rich school" and find themselves almost apologizing for it!" For the first few year after I graduated from Homestead, I found myself doing this, too. But I wasn't apologizing about the teachers, I was apologizing about the students.

I feel the same way about Homestead as Mr. Borgmann. Although the students (10+ years ago) very much lived up to the "snob" reputation, the teachers were top notch. When I graduated, I wrote thank you notes to at least 10 teachers and staff because I wanted them to know how much their work meant to me.

Living in Oregon now, I appreciate my education at SACS that much more. As I consider the schools for my son, I hope that I can give him the opportunities I had in Fort Wayne.

If I were living in town today, I would no longer be apologizing. I'd wear my Spartan pride so all could see.