By Brian Yoffe
Every year, the freshman class eagerly awaits the annual trip to Canobie Lake Park. This year, however, that trip has been cancelled, much to the dismay of the class of 2016.
After much deliberation, science department head Gerard Gagnon and the freshmen physics teachers decided in March that the grade would not be going on the trip for the first time in more than ten years.
The trip was cancelled for several reasons, one of which was that teachers were concerned that with all of the cancelled school days this year, they would not be able to go over all the material for the physics MCAS in June.
“With the six days of school cancelled, the freshman class would have less time to prepare for the physics MCAS exam,” Gagnon said. “Because the state didn’t change the date of the MCAS exam, teachers were feeling under greater pressure.
Another factor that led teachers to cancel the field trip was the state’s removal of circular and rotational motion from the freshman physics curriculum. Because many rides at Canobie Lake, including the Merry-Go-Round and flying swings, were used to demonstrate principles of circular and rotational motion, teachers said they felt that the trip was unnecessary.
Physics teachers also said they noticed a lack of educational purpose for the trip in recent years. In past years, students have been given a worksheet to fill out at the park before or after going on the rides. This learning aspect of the trip has lost its importance over the past few years, however, as students have just spent the trip going on rides.
“I think that if you’re taking a trip to an amusement park, it should either be for educational or recreational purposes and it’s hard to do both,” Gagnon said.
Due to time constraints, faculty and administrators have also debated whether a few hours in the park is worth all the paperwork and organization. Typically, the freshman class has left school at 9 am on the day of the trip and subsequently left the park at 12:30 pm in order to return to school before 2 pm.
“Teachers have been debating for years on whether it’s worth it to go because we are only there for essentially two hours,” physics teacher Carlos Covarrubias said.
Several students said they have been looking forward to the Canobie Lake trip all year and are upset that the trip has been cancelled.
“I’m pretty annoyed,” freshman Emma Henderson said. “I’ve heard that last year people didn’t do any work while they were there, but I thought the point is to have fun and bond as a class.”
Others said they are indifferent to the cancellation and do not believe it will affect their freshman year.
“I was looking forward to [going] but I’m not incredibly disappointed that we are not,” freshman Jack Kenslea said.
“I wouldn’t go out of proportion to say [the decision] was ridiculous but I obviously would have enjoyed the trip,” freshman John Whalen said.
The Canobie Lake field trip is not the first event planned for freshmen this year that has been cancelled. In fact, the Spring Fling was cancelled in March due to a lack of ticket sales.
Some students said they think the cancellation of the event was due to a lack of advertising by the freshmen class officers.
“Our class officers as a unit aren’t working very well together,” Henderson said. “Next year, they need to work better as a group and get people more excited for the events.”
However, like other freshmen, Henderson said also believes that the grade’s lack of spirit contributed to the cancellation.
“I think it’s sad [that] our freshman class has no school spirit. We’re not very cohesive as an entire grade,” she said.
Some said they believe that the class officers are not to blame for the event’s failure, and rather the grade is responsible for the cancellation.
“I don’t think it’s anything that’s wrong with the class officers,” Kenslea said. “People weren’t interested to begin with.
Despite previous detachment from their class dances, freshmen said they are excited about their upcoming Freshman Cruise on May 31. This annual event is generally the most popular of the events planned by the freshmen class officers each year and has already accumulated more than 90 students in registration.
I think that [the cruise] will attract more attention because it’s an event that they do every year,” Kenslea said. “I think it will be fun.”
The freshman physics teachers said that believe that the Freshman Cruise makes up for the cancellation of the Canobie Lake trip, as it is another time when the entire grade can get together outside of school.
“[They may] feel a little left out not being able to go to Canobie but at the same time…freshmen still have the cruise,” Gagnon said.
Whalen agreed that the grade’s lack of interest in the school dances heavily contributed to the Spring Fling’s cancellation.
“[The freshmen] know they can go to a party at their friend’s house [so paying] to go to a party that’s at their school is stopping them,” he said.
The freshmen class adviser and officers declined to comment about the cancellations, as many of them are currently concentrating their efforts on their reelection campaigns.
To replace the Canobie Lake field trip, Gagnon and the freshmen physics teachers said they are considering a grade-wide project following the MCAS.
“During review week, we may do some other hands-on project-based physics that will be engaging, fun, and not necessarily as time consuming and expensive as a trip to Canobie Lake,” Gagnon said.
The freshmen physics teachers said they are still unsure of whether they will return to Canobie Lake next year or in the near future.
“The possibility of, sometime in the future, doing it post-MCAS would be a better opportunity than doing it for MCAS,” Gagnon said. “There are likely to be some changes in the state frameworks and if rotational motion comes back, [bringing back the trip] becomes an easier decision.”
Students, however, said they are skeptical that the annual field trip will return to South if the grade-wide in-school physics event is a success.
“If they don’t do the trip this year and [the in-school event] works out to be convenient for teachers, they might not do it ever again,” Whalen said.
Several students said they believe it would be unwise to discontinue the trip in the future.
“Canobie Lake is a really nice bonding end-of-the-year celebration and it relates to what we’re studying this year,” Henderson said. “It’s a really nice combination of the two.”
