It’s more than just home room. Yes, I’m talking about advisory – that place that is probably one of your smallest classes, where you can have candid conversations with your teachers, where you don’t have to worry about getting a bad grade.  Advisory occurs for about 10 minutes first thing each morning, kind of like home room, except for Mondays when the Middle School has assembly. There’s also an extended 25-minute advisory period on Wednesdays prior to lunch.

Advisory brings students closer together and creates a family-like environment. However,  this year it’s different from years past. Each month, advisories now discuss in depth a different character trait. The theme for August was “respect.” Advisories were charged with discussing what respect in the Middle School looks like, and then detailing on a poster board their advisory plan to show respect, and examples of respect they have seen demonstrated around campus.

“We talk about the [traits] a lot, but it’s another thing to live them and witness them,” said Student Services Counselor Ms. Danielle Benvenuto, who spearheads the Middle School’s advisory activities. “This [project] gives students and teachers a chance to practice the traits in and out of school. It’s not just about hearing them, but living them and witnessing them.”

By doing this project, students learn how to incorporate these traits into their daily lives. “If people are respectful in class, then students can be more focused and everyone can get more done in class,” said seventh grader Lexi Lower. 

Advisories in the middle school had to pledge to show respect in their own ways. “To show respect, my advisory promised to say please and thank you to everyone, respect and greet people, and to listen to other people’s opinions,” said eighth grader Liv Simon.

In addition, during the month of September, the students have been participating in the Kindness Challenge via the advisory program. The challenge works to incorporate kindness into the school day, and make kindness a practical, commonplace skill. As a result, students have been tracking their acts of kindness in advisory. Each day, they write down  how they have demonstrated kindness that day on a calendar given to them by their advisors.

Asked to describe ways in students can be kind, sixth grader Joey Tomassetti said, “You can be kind to other kids, you can be respectful to the school, you can not destroy property, and just be kind to one another.”

Each advisory also participates in  community service projects throughout the year. This brings the advisories closer together while simultaneously helping the community. Mrs. Anne Franzen’s advisory already has plans for its community service project.  “Our advisory community service project is to [spearhead the] Hurricane Harvey supply drive,” said eighth grader Caroline Yancey. “We collected supplies like toiletries, canned food, baby supplies, and a lot more for the people that were affected by the hurricane.”

All of the supplies were driven to Texas with supplies collected from other schools. This project may not be helping the South Florida area, but will help others who lost their homes, possessions, and loved ones in another state. Other advisories will conduct projects such as helping with local food and toy drives, volunteering for the Special Olympics, making meals for families seeking medical assistance, and much more.

All middle school students are required to accrue a certain amount of community service: six hours for the sixth grade, eight hours for the seventh grade, and 10 hours for eighth grade.  

“We hope that all we do at this school supports the mission statement –  ‘a concern for others and a commitment to serve society’ – so that’s really the overriding reason that we do [community service],” said Susan Poncy, the Lower/Middle School Director of Student Services. “We want to develop that in not just the students, but our whole school community.”

Many students have already started, completed, or done more than the required amount of community service. “This summer I was a CIT (Counselor In Training) for a camp, and I got 32 hours for that,” said eighth grader Caden Quinn.

It seems that as the older students get, the more accustomed they become to helping out in their communities. “Every year I go through the amounts of community service every grade does,” said Benvenuto, “and on average, eighth-grade students do more hours than required far more than the other grades. By eighth grade, students naturally do more community service which is what we really want from everyone.”

And while advisory may be all about creating positive habits that will stay with students far after their middle school days are behind them, it’s also a lot of fun. “We get to sit in comfy chairs, and we talk about cool things, and we get to eat cupcakes and donuts,” said sixth grade Maggie Smith, a member of sixth-grade English teacher Mrs. Susan Kirkman’s advisory. Also, in Ms. Sara Featherston’s eighth-grade advisory, a breakfast party takes place each Friday. “We had waffles and pancakes with Nutella, syrup, and whipped cream,” said eighth grader Danielle Lancaster. “We also had orange juice, fruit, and parfait. It was a really great time and tons of fun.”

School, of course, will always conjure images of textbooks, classrooms, math, and English, but at TBS, advisory provides the opportunity for personal growth, service to others, and a safe place where students can be kids, relax, and have a donut every now and then.