Walter J. Clark, principal at Blatchley Middle School in Sitka, takes an approach to interdisciplinary learning and innovation that involves the community, parents, students and teachers. At his previous school, Mr. Clark led a unified staff effort to raise student-parent pride in the school through community-involvement projects and a new language arts program. As a result of his efforts, students' scores on achievement tests doubled over five years. An example of Mr. Clark's innovative thinking is the Renaissance Program he introduced at Blatchley Middle School, in which students learn about the history, culture, language, science, armaments, and food of medieval times by visiting "guilds" created by their teachers.
