Academics
Science Department Looks
Forward to Breaking Gound
// By Michael Laurila ‘09
Mike Hoch started teaching Biology in
1981 — 33 years later he’s still educating
the next generation of Warriors.
During Mr. Hoch’s impressive tenure, the
school has seen many renovations, various administrative changes, and an abundance of young men seeking education in
the Catholic tradition. He’s been a staple in
the science department, and thousands of
graduates can proudly say he taught them.
But the importance of a science education has changed over the past 33 years.
Recently, the technological boom has
sounded louder and louder and there is an
increasingly high demand for people with
extensive backgrounds in S.T.E.M. — the
study and integration of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.
Despite the Science, Engineering and
Robotics departments’ impressive ability
to teach and train students in the S.T.E.M.
categories, the need to upgrade facilities
for the Science Department was apparent.
In B-Wing, where all the science classes are
held, “nothing much has changed” since
1981, according to Hoch.
In order to compete academically and
give students the best education (especially with the importance of S.T.E.M. curriculum), the science wing needed an upgrade.
Though Hoch isn’t sure when he’ll hang
up the lab coat for good, he’s sure of one
thing. “Before I leave, I would like to teach
in a nice, new classroom…A little late for
that,” he jokingly said.
Maybe it’s not too late. It was announced
at the Nov. 8, 2013 board meeting that the
school will break ground in the summer of
2014 on Phase 2 of renovations, which will
add 4,000 square feet of new construction
including two new laboratory/classrooms.
Before the announcement, Leslie DeSimone, the head of the Science Department,
had big ideas. Now they are much more
than ideas; they are a forese eable reality.
“I would like for the upper classmen to
have more of a blended curriculum,” she
said. “I see maybe five years down the line,
kids aren’t necessarily taking chemistry or
physics, but they’re taking a S.T.E.M. 1 or 2
or 3 and they’re actually building hands-on
projects and seeing a blending of engineering, math and science.”
“To do that you need large rooms, open
space, and project and inquiry-based activities. Not just one teacher with 24 kids, but
it might be three teachers with 70 kids and
they’re all working on major projects. That’s
what I see as the future because that’s what
they’re going to be doing in their careers.”
When all four phases of the project are
complete, the new Science & Engineering
wing will include the engineering and robotics classes and will be extended well
beyond the current building. This increase
in the total classroom space will enable the
blending of the curriculum that DeSimone
talked about. Despite the current spatial
and technological limitations, DeSimone
said the current
physics classes,
taught by Bob
Barnes, do the
best job of incorporating a S.T.E.M.
type approach.
“In physics the
kids actually see
some engineering
and use mathematics with appli(L-R) Mike Hoch, Leslie DeSimone and Bob Barnes teaching in B-wing
cation,” she said.
might not have been offered before.
Added Barnes: “Physics is more about
In a recent U.S. News and World Report
learning all these different concepts, and
interview, Jamai Blivin, the founder and
then when you get a problem that you
CEO of Innovate + Educate, talked about
have to solve, you have to figure out which
how important S.T.E.M. will be as our counof the concepts learned applies to this partry moves further into this age of technolticular problem.”
ogy.
The immediate effect this project will
“S.T.E.M. is of utmost importance to our
have on the school is obvious: Brother Rice
country,” she said. “We think that 90 percan offer a more S.T.E.M. based curriculum.
cent of all jobs in the country really require
But another possibility, one that both Hoch
S.T.E.M. skills, with mathematics being key
and DeSimone referenced, is the opportuto success in the workplace.”
nity to teach different science classes that
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