教甄◆英文科題庫下載題庫

  Connor Balthazor, 17, was in the middle of study hall when he was called into a meeting with his high school newspaper adviser. A group of reporters and editors from the student newspaper, the Booster Redux at Pittsburg High School in southeastern Kansas, had gathered to talk about Amy Robertson, who was recently hired as the high school’s head principal. 

  The student journalists had begun researching Robertson, and quickly found some discrepancies in her education credentials. For one, when they researched Corllins University, the private university where Robertson said she got her master’s and doctorate degrees years ago, the website didn’t work. They found no evidence that it was an accredited university. “There were some things that just didn’t quite add up,” Balthazor told The Washington Post. The students began digging into a weeks-long investigation that would result in an article published questioning the legitimacy of the principal’s degrees and of her work as an education consultant. A few days after the release of the report, Robertson resigned. 

  “In light of the issues that arose, Dr. Robertson felt it was in the best interest of the district to resign her position,” Pittsburg Community Schools announced in a statement. The resignation thrust the student newspaper staff into local, state, and national news, with professional journalists nationwide applauding the students for asking tough questions and prompting change in their administration. “Everybody kept telling them, ‘stop poking your nose where it doesn’t belong,'” newspaper adviser Emily Smith told The Post. But with the encouragement of the superintendent, the students persisted. “They were at a loss that something that was so easy for them to see was waiting to be noticed by adults,” Smith said. “We’d broken out of our comfort zones so much,” Balthazor said. “To know that the administration saw that and respected that, it was a really great moment for us.”           After graduation, Balthazor said, he hopes to pursue a degree in creative writing or filmmaking. Even though he doesn’t necessarily plan to stick with journalism, Balthazor said the past few weeks had been “surreal.” “Most high schoolers would never get even close to an opportunity to get to experience something like this,” he said.