Julius West Middle School

Awkward middle school dances
Playing the Wallflowers «One Headlight»
While most of us remained wallflowers ourselves — classic
I attended Julius West about 2 – 3 years after it was renovated which was nice. The facilities were good and I remember having great teachers!
Shout out to Ms. Jasper, Ms… Pureto Rico?, Mr Davidson.
Mr. Davidson was a very special teacher. He stepped into an Assistant Principal position after I left (or at least that’s what I heard). Then, if the grapevine was accurate… he wasn’t too happy as an assistant principal.
I’ll tell you what he was one hell of — A science teacher.
Man, he could of had a PBS show. He was like the Robin Williams of science class. He was exuberant, filled with energy, made learning fun.
So he had this rule that if you chewed gum in his class, he had a tennis ball container (the ones that fit three balls). And everyone would spit there gum out in it. So mid year, just opening up that awfully stank jar in front of you was the punishment for chewing gum. One day, I brought in gum for the entire class room. I had a student call him out of the class to talk to him and when he was out — I gave every single person a stick of gum. As soon as he walked back in and said one word– every single person started chewing on the gum. It was great. We all spit out the game in the tennis ball container. Fill that B UP!
Worse part of middle school — the mile run. Man… I’ve been out of shape for a long time.
Best part of middle school — trampoline class!
Most productive part of middle school (ok, now I“m gonna age myself). I was in the pilot class for «typing». If I hadn’t taken that class, I would be so behind in life right now. Man, thank g-​d for that class.
In middle school — they gave me a test in like 7^th grade to determine whether I was going into the higher or lower math class. In my head, (cause I was a middle schooler), I was like — I’m not gonna try hard on this test. Why would I want to be in the harder math class? That sounds horrible!
Purposefully doing bad on that test was a very poor choice. It landed me in a lower math class for my entire middle school, into high school, into college career.
They really did not explain that well. Just give me the test– tell me who ever does best gets a tamagachi — and let us have at it. Don’t let me know that if I do well I’m gonna be in the harder math class. Fools!
My first part in a play was in middle school. I was commissioned by the student diversity club to play a part in their short production in front of the school during African American History month. They commissioned me to play the role of the bus driver… in a show about Rosa Parks.
#…
Thanks a lot Student Diversity Club…
Julius West! Being an awkward teenager never felt so good!