STUDENT MARIJUANA DEBATE ON WEB SITE

Carondelet Posts Youths' Research And Reasoning On Legalization Issues For
The Public's Access In Cyberspace

CONCORD -- These Carondelet High School seniors -- well-dressed,
articulate, with perfect hair and nails -- have become marijuana experts.
And no, they're not doing their research in the parking lot between classes.

Tom Zientara's Current Issues students have researched most every question
related to the legalization of marijuana -- the physical, financial,
medical, legal and moral aspects. They have listened to a judge and
e-mailed the sheriff. They have taken sides and debated the issue with both
passion and politeness.

And now the world will have access to the results of their efforts.
Carondelet's technology resource consultant, Mitch Ward, is posting the
best of the students' projects on the high school's Web site,
http://www.carondelet.pvt.k12.ca.us/

"We want our students to be engaged, creative, pro-active, lifelong
learners," Ward said. "How do they do that if they're just consumers of
information? They have to become producers of information."

Although thousands of high schools have Web sites, only a small fraction
present student work. Ward is committed to presenting the best of
Carondelet. He has posted poetry from a junior English class and a project
on the periodic table of the elements from a chemistry class.

"It has to be good," Ward said. "It's out there for the world to see."

Still, there is an abundance of information about marijuana on the Web --
research papers by experts in pharmacology, sociology and political
economy. Why does the world need to read the opinions of a bunch of
suburban Catholic high school girls?

"Because it's a debate by teen-agers," Zientara said. "The group that's
putting out the information is the group most affected by the discussion."

Luisa DeMartini of Danville argued passionately in class for the
legalization of marijuana, but confessed later that her true opinion is 180
degrees the other direction. She thinks she was able to develop a strong
argument in favor of legalization because she was able to easily anticipate
the positions of the anti-legalization debaters.

Luisa was relieved to learn that if her paper is posted on the Web, it
would not carry her full name; still, she liked the idea of her work being
available to anyone with Internet access.

"We're teen-agers, growing up in this time period, with concerns about
these issues," she said. "The teen-ager's point of view is important."

During the marijuana debate, the credibility of information obtained via
the Internet was a constant source of friction.

"There's no way of knowing whether it's valid," said Lauren Seeno of
Danville. "Should we just keep arguing back and forth?"

"We're going to refute everything you say," said Rebecca Richardson of
Danville.

The students said they were excited about a worldwide forum for their
opinions, and kept that in mind as they wrote their papers. They
acknowledged their papers were probably better than they might have been if
they knew that only Zientara would be reading them.

As Ward monitors the Carondelet Web site and posts the students' best work,
he also is working to develop another Web site -- http://www.k12index.org/
He hopes to gather excellent student work from all over the country --
perhaps the world -- and share it in a organized, coherent fashion.

"We are on the threshold of a revolution in education," Ward said, "and
digital technology is the catalyst. It has enabled a huge proliferation of
information. More information is available on the Internet than is
contained in the entire Library of Congress. Thanks to e-mail, students can
communicate with authorities from all over the world on every subject
imaginable.

"But what are students doing with these new tools and this new wealth of
information? They are writing papers, completing projects and taking tests.
Most of this work is graded and then discarded. There is no lasting value."

Ward believes that the ability to publish student work on the Internet will
revolutionize the educational process.

"It brings relevance to the classroom," Ward said. "The ability to produce
something that's useful -- that's very powerful for a teen-ager and very
cool for a kindergartner."