Mr. Paur
Edwardsville High School
Classes and Clubs
Sociology
American History
Global Perspectives
Key Club
My trip to Japan
How to reach me
Sociology
What is sociology? Sociology is the study of human society. In this class, we will concentrate on human behavior and how it is influenced by one's environment. Some of the units include culture, deviance, social movements and change, social inequality, and social institutions. Some projects of this class include breaking a social norm, creating social movements, "doing sociology" investigative research, and two nature v. nurture debates (one v. psychology classes, one v. O'Fallon HS sociology classes). Much of this class is based on classroom discussions and student participation.
Back to top
American History
American history class covers the areas from colonial America to the present, though I like to begin with a unit on pre-Colombian American Indians. This year long course includes some projects like students creating their own powerpoint presentations, students competing vs. each other in a Civil War project, and a mock trial.
Back to top
Global Perspectives
Global perspectives covers the following areas of the world - North America, Russia and the former Soviet republics, Africa, East Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Pacific islands. Some projects of this class include email correspondence with students in Oyama, Japan, writing your own National Geographic article, and going out for lunch.
Back to top
Key Club
The EHS Key Club is a group of caring, dedicated students who volunteer their time to help those who are needy in our community. The word "volunteer" actually comes from two Swahili words: "vol" which means to kill oneself, and "unteer" which means without pay. We will be working without pay, but not doing the other root of the word.
As a matter of fact, I think you will find this work to be very gratifying and feel like you are helping yourself as well as others. ("For it is in giving that we receive.")
The EHS Key Club has already given thousands of dollars to 9/11 victims, war refugees, malnourished children, and many more. In the 2OO1-2OO2 school year, students also worked over 3OOO hours at schools, nursing homes, environmental projects, and others. Our goal for 2OO2-2OO3 is to even top these marks.
The Key Club is in partnership with the Edwardsville and Glen Carbon Kiwanis. Another goal for the upcoming school year is to increase our work with them.
Our club is broken into many different groups. Each of these groups does their own weekly volunteer work, and we come together as a group for large projects. Some of the groups include:
- assisting residents at Sunbridge Nursing Home and Madison County Sheltered Care
- an afterschool tutoring program at Woodland Elementary School
- a fundraising group
- working with 3-4 year olds at Head Start
- the "Best Buddies" program
- helping with the Special Olympics
- volunteering at the Humane Society
- a "frontline" group which works special projects
- a "Welcoming Committee" to welcome new students
- a Random Acts of Kindness team
- and any other groups which may be added along the way
We will break the 2OO2-2OO3 school year into three trimesters. When a students volunteers for a service project, they will be expected to complete that trimester. At the end of the trimester, a student can decide to sign on for another 12 weeks, or to volunteer with another group. Of course, if you are involved with an athletic team or another club for part of the year, you would not want to work with the Key Club during that trimester. Each Key Club member will keep a time log of hours worked so we can keep account of our total amount of hours worked as a group and recognize those outstanding members. There will also be a minimum amount of hours worked needed to stay in Key Club.
The Key Club will meet once every two weeks to share experiences and discuss ideas. Members are expected to be present at the meetings. We will also occasionally have "social" parties.
We would like all members of the EHS Key Club to have a custom made t-shirt. The cost is $10 and part of the money will go towards expenses of the club.
If you are interested in helping the Key Club and your community, contact Mr. Paur (Room 235).