A History of High School Sociology and CAST

 

High School Sociology and Chicago Area Sociology Teachers (CAST) 

 

Most high school social studies teachers have to teach multiple different social studies classes.  The most common and consistent classes are US history and government.  Then teachers might be assigned some combo of other elective courses such as geography, economics, psychology or sociology.  So, for social studies most teacher education programs are focused on history and so is the professional development (pd) that comes as part of continuing teacher education (CTE).  One exception is Advanced Placement (AP) courses which are supplemented by the College Board. This means that professional development is difficult to find for tertiary courses that are not required and not AP level.  Additionally, because sociology is on the periphery, most high schools that offer sociology only have one teacher in the building who teaches it - there is no one for them to collaborate with.

 

The Beginning

Fortunately, in 2003, DePaul U hosted a regional meeting of sociology (MSS or NCSA) and there was a session on teaching sociology.  A handful of high school teachers showed up to that session.  After the session, we exchanged emails and agreed that it was helpful to share ideas with other sociology teachers.

 

The following year, Hayley Lotspeich from Wheaton North High School organized a meeting for our small network in a free conference room in the basement of a bank.  Less than a dozen of us met at that first meeting, but it felt so great to be with our sociological compatriots and the practical ideas we shared were so helpful.  We were absolutely committed to meet like that again.  Hayley gathered email addresses, and contacted department chairs in the nearest two counties to spread the information to their sociology teachers who had not attended the conference.  A major obstacle for the group was selecting a time after school that everyone was available.  Many teachers coach, sponsor activities in the building, participate in building committees, and have day care issues.  It became clear that there were more teachers who wished to participate, so to include everyone, the group would need to meet during the school day and for a very low or free cost. 

 

CAST

With the success of the first couple meetings, it was clear that this was a valuable opportunity that teachers were energized about.  We brainstormed ideas for a name and the Chicago Area Sociology Teachers (CAST), was created!  Hayley was able to get space at her high school so that the group could meet in a larger space during a school day.  Christopher Salituro from Stevenson High School created a Google Group listserv so that we could follow up and continue to share with each other in between our meetings. Year to year the group grew and so did the Google Group listserv. Hayley even collaborated with students to create the logo for the group.

 

The annual meeting continued to thrive with Hayley's dedication and organization.  Generally, each meeting was a continental breakfast from 8-8:30 followed by some brief remarks about the group and other relevant happenings in sociology.  Then, there was a keynote speaker (usually found by Hayley) who would engage and enrich our understanding of sociology by simply explaining their work.  Some of the speakers over the years included: domestic violence case worker, Homeless Veterans Outreach, WE Schools community service, Chicago Police officer and investigator, director of shelter for victims of sex trafficking, homeless outreach, World Relief refugee resettlement coordinator, chaplain from Dupage Jail,  UIC Institute for Research on Race and Public Policy and Tonika Johnson's Folded Map Project, Judson Everitt Undergraduate Director from Loyola University Sociology Department, and Dana Garbarski from the Cook County Community Survey. Finally, the third session of the day was a roundtable lesson sharing where every participant brought one lesson/reading/activity.  The teachers give a brief explanation of what they brought - what unit they teach it in, why they like it, what pitfalls to avoid, etc...  This is usually the bulk of the conference lasting about 2 hours.  Usually a lunch is included and it can be a working lunch to continue the session if need be.  The conference has continued to be minimal cost, just enough to cover lunch, snacks and any printing/paper.

 

ASA

In 2007, Hayley and Chris reached out to the American Sociological Association (ASA) to let them know about the work we were doing and see if they could provide more support for high school sociology.  Specifically, we wanted to see if there was institutional support for an AP course, but generally we wanted to promote high school sociology and garner resources for our growing group.  ASA put Margaret Weigers Vitullo (Director of Academic and Professional Affairs) and Jean Shin (Director of Minority Affairs) in touch with us.  They flew out to see the annual meeting and were really impressed with the large and vibrant group of sociology teachers.

 

Maragaret and Jean started to collaborate with Hayley and Chris informally and in 2007 CAST was featured in an issue of the ASA's newsletter Teaching and Learning Matters.  By 2009, the ASA sponsored members of our group to present at the National Council for Social Studies (NCSS). Soon after, the ASA formalized their partnership by creating the High School Advisory Board.  Hayley Lotspeich was the Director of the High School Advisory Board and Chris was the Assistant Director and Margaret and Jean collaborated on the board with them. The group was small, but it had a seat at the table and had both institutional support and a small budget from the ASA.  

 

The first couple of years, the ASA had a special session at the ASA annual meetings. In 2011 we presented at ASA in Las Vegas and in 2012 we presented at ASA in Denver. We spent a lot of time reaching out to local schools to promote the conference to high school sociology teachers.  But the ASA annual meeting's date was a difficult time for many high school teachers because it fell during the first week or so of school.  Hayley and Chris worked with the ASA to create a session at NCSS, the predominant professional development conference for K-12 social studies teachers.  NCSS agreed to create a symposium which featured a contiguous 3 session series organized by the ASA High School Advisory group.  We usually structured the series with a couple sessions about teaching sociology concepts followed by a session from a scholar who highlighted their work in the field including: Harel Shapira, Dennis McSeveney, Angel Harris, Ness Sandoval, Lynette Hoelter, Laura Beth Nielsen, and Arlie Russell Hochschild.  We also presented at NCSA in Chicago (2010), and Indianapolis (2013).  

 

Standards and AP

In 2013, the push for common core standards was already in full swing. The NCSS was already working on the social studies version of common core standards called College, Career and Civic Life Standards (C3).  NCSS asked us to create a sociology appendix with C3 standards for high school sociology.

 

While presenting at various conferences with the ASA, we also set a goal to make a push for AP sociology once again.  The conferences were creating a network of high school sociology teachers from around the country, which showed the interest for AP sociology was there, so we turned our attention to the course.  We felt that in order to create a course that was advanced, we had to establish what the standard for the course should be.  The ASA High School Advisory Board convened a working group to create national standards for sociology.  The group consisted of representatives from the ASA, high school and higher education and published the  National Standards for High School Sociology in 2015.

 

With a listserve of over 300 teachers and National Standards for High School Sociology the ASA High School advisory board appealed to the ASA board to approach the College Board about an AP sociology course.  In 2017, Michele Lamont (Harvard) reached out to the college board but was continually rebuffed by Trevor Packer.

 

In 2018, Hayley and Chris collaborated with MSS and NCSA to host a teaching workshop at the the joint meeting of MSS/NCSA in partnership with AKD represented by Jeffery Chin.  This was in downtown Chicago but due to space and cost, Loyola University's sociology department led by Anne Figert agreed to host our portion of the meeting at their downtown (Watertower) campus.  

 

In 2020, as Covid was shutting down all in person gatherings, the ASA restructured their organization.  Among quite a few personnel changes, ASA also decided that the High School Advisory Board should become like the other communities at ASA with an elected board. 

 

In 2022, Hayley and Chris both applied and were accepted to be a part of an ASA high school resource workshop group to create lessons that support the National Standards.  These resources are posted on the ASA website.

 

Dual Credit

In 2017 Chris partnered with Loyola University Chicago to create a dual-credit sociology course through Loyola University for Stevenson High School Students.  Hayley partnered with Indiana University's Advanced College Project to offer dual credit to Wheaton North High School Students.