Hyde's "new" rhetoric

[Anonymous]

If you haven't seen it, you may want to take a look at Hyde's new public relations rhetoric: http://www.hyde.edu/page.ww?name=Teachi ... ember+2005

If you read between the lines here, one might conclude that Hyde is very worried about enrollments and is trying to figure out a way to reshape its image from a school for "problem" students to a school for all students interested in "excellence."

This has the aroma of a marketing ploy to boost a school that knows it's in some trouble, given all the competition in the "troubled student" market.  As I travel around Hyde I continue to hear anxiety-driven comments about enrollment trends (much of it in the form of a whisper).  Postings on this website and other bad publicity may be having an impact.  

The basic problem, of course, is that Hyde is still Hyde, with all the attendant failings, shortcomings, and hypocrisy.  Let's hope parents aren't seduced by this rhetoric.

[Anonymous]

On 2005-11-09 17:58:00, Anonymous wrote:

"If you haven't seen it, you may want to take a look at Hyde's new public relations rhetoric: http://www.hyde.edu/page.ww?name=Teachi ... ember+2005



If you read between the lines here, one might conclude that Hyde is very worried about enrollments and is trying to figure out a way to reshape its image from a school for "problem" students to a school for all students interested in "excellence."



This has the aroma of a marketing ploy to boost a school that knows it's in some trouble, given all the competition in the "troubled student" market.  As I travel around Hyde I continue to hear anxiety-driven comments about enrollment trends (much of it in the form of a whisper).  Postings on this website and other bad publicity may be having an impact.  



The basic problem, of course, is that Hyde is still Hyde, with all the attendant failings, shortcomings, and hypocrisy.  Let's hope parents aren't seduced by this rhetoric."

If Hyde's enrollments are in trouble, it's probably because so many people have discovered how weak the school is academically (a critical mass of teachers with relatively unimpressive academic records, training and teaching ability), that the school is preoccupied with non-academic issues that it often mishandles, and that the school accepts an incredibly large number of kids who pose serious behavioral, substance abuse, and mental health problems without offering professional services for this population.  How many rational people would send their kid to this kind of school?  No wonder the attrition rate is so high.  I shudder to think what will happen if Hyde's new PR material and cliches seduce people who have no idea what Hyde is really all about. This kind of Gauld-driven grandiosity is truly scary.

[tommyfromhyde1]

This isn't exactly new. I remember such talk from the '70s

Speculations on the Origin of Human Intelligence: "In defense of the Pygmies, perhaps I should note that a friend of mine who has spent time with them says that for such activities as the patient stalking and hunting of mammals and fish they prepare themselves through marijuana intoxication, which helps to make the long waits, boring to anyone further evolved than a Komodo dragon, at least moderately tolerable. Ganja is, he says, their only cultivated crop. It would be wryly interesting if in human history the cultivation  of marijuana led generally to the invention of agriculture, and thereby to civilization.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0345346297/103-2574067-9409467/circlofmiamithem' target='_new'>Carl Sagan - The Dragons of Eden - 1977