Reading Passage 2 High School Society: Who Belongs Where?

Reading Passage 2
High School Society: Who Belongs Where?
Look around the sprawling Chaparral High School campus at lunch time, and the social
geography of the 1,850 students is clearly mapped out. The football players and their
friends have the center table outdoors. In back of them, other popular students chat
cheerfully – an attractive array of cheerleaders, lesser jocks, and members of the
student government. If you qualify for membership under some written clause in the
group’s unwritten rulebook – even if no one has ever met you before – you’ve got it
made. Lauren, a sophomore cheerleader, notes that “unqualified” students would never
dare sit where she’s sitting. ''But once you're in with the girls, everyone is really friendly
to you. When I made cheerleader, it was like I was just set.''
Inside, in the cafeteria, a converse society exists. There are more braces and glasses
and hair that doesn't quite have a shape. These are the skateboarders, the so-called
nerds, those who say they are just regular, the freshmen who have not yet found their
place. They may have lower status than the sunny groups outside, but they generally
feel they have, or eventually will have, a social place they can live with. There are many
other lunchtime domains as well. A bunch of art students eat in the studios, some band
members gather by the music building. Dozens of drama students eat in the theater
building, where they are joined by some students whose looks or manners deviate from
the norm but who find the theater group more tolerant than most.
Despite all the choices, a few students still have no clique. They eat upstairs or alone
outside the library, or they just passively wander, their heads low as they pass clumps
of noisy schoolmates. They are blank-faced reminders that a public high school has to
admit all kinds of students, but it cannot guarantee them all a place.
Chaparral is a large, well-regarded high school in an affluent suburb. It is a pleasant

place, where parents, teachers and students take justifiable pride in their facilities, their
community, and their achievements. Compared with big-city schools, these schools do
not look very diverse. The majority of the students are white, middle class, dressed in
the same handful of brand names. But the reality is far more complex. Those who run
such good suburban schools are well aware that horrifying school violence has
happened at their kind of places, not at tough inner-city high schools.
They speculate the reasons for this. The nation's dropout rate has declined sharply
since the 1960's, especially in suburban schools. Poor urban schools still lose many of
their problem students to the streets. Suburban schools still have them. ''It used to be
that the kids who were really having trouble, the misfits, would leave,'' said Dr. John
Kriekard, the principal at Chaparral. But now, ''we serve all kinds of kids and we have to
try to be all things to all people.''
He and others also emphasize the central role schools play in suburban life: ''In big
cities, there are lots of places where kids make connections, where they have pieces of
their lives,'' he said. ''But in a place like this, we're pretty much it.'' This maximizes the
influence that school society has on a student’s overall life. Adolescence has always
been a time of identity formation, with inclusion and exclusion, trying out new ideas,
styles and friends. And these are not primarily girl issues. No matter what your gender,
good looks, cool friends, academic achievement and money have always helped to
define the social terrain.
A few troubled students would continually disrupt the whole school unless someone – if
not the principal, then the law – intervened. They are likely to be rootless and poorly
directed, and their chances of finding effective control at home are slim. Economic
factors are less important than family factors and previous social experience. Such
behavior is a call for help, not for material goods. To a teenager who has little
experience with acceptance and security, these advantages seem to go arbitrarily to
some people and not to others, certainly not to them.
Carol Miller Lieber, a former principal, says many students entering high school already
see themselves as losers. Not surprisingly, this alters their perception of the entire
school. Studies show that students who see themselves as outside the winners' circle
have far more negative views of a school than either the teachers or the most
successful students. ''In these big high-powered suburban high schools, there's a very
dominant winner culture, including the jocks, the advanced-placement kids, the student
government and, depending on the school, the drama kids or the service clubs,'' she
said. ''But the winners are a smaller group than we'd like to think, and high school life is
very different for those who experience it as the losers. They become part of the
invisible middle and suffer in silence, alienated and without any real connection to any
adult.'' Interviews with Chaparral students confirm the research: the popular students
who lunch outside were far more likely than the ones sitting inside to say that they love
the school, and feel connected to at least one teacher.
14.
0,3 points
Question 14: Mark each sentence as T (True) or F (False) according to the information
in the passage.
14. At Chaparral High School, athletes have the highest social position.
True
False
15.
0,3 points
in the passage.
15. Passive students must ask special permission from the school to eat lunch outdoor.
True
False
16.
0,3 points
in the passage.
16. Most students who don’t fit in with any clique disrupt the whole school.
True
False
17.
0,3 points
in the passage.
17. Someone who becomes a cheerleader is guaranteed acceptance at that group’s

lunch table
True
False
18.
0,3 points
in the passage.
18. Public schools are required to accept even troubled students.
True
False
19.
0,3 points
in the passage.
19. In a suburb, the school is likely to provide most of a student’s social experience.
True
False
20.
0,3 points
in the passage.
20. The majority of students in a typical high school see themselves as winners.
True
False

Reading Passage 2 High School Society: Who Belongs Where?

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Reading Passage 2

High School Society: Who Belongs Where?

Chaparral is a large, well-regarded high school in an affluent suburb. It is a pleasant

17. Someone who becomes a cheerleader is guaranteed acceptance at that group’s

18. Public schools are required to accept even troubled students.

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