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Hello.

Welcome to Soul issue.

I'm Nick Williams.

Today I'm speaking with Eric Gordon, principal of Saginaw United High School.

Currently in its second year, Saginaw United is a merging of Saginaw and Arthur Hill high schools.

I talked to Eric about the progress and the challenges being made.

In his second year leading this brand new school and its growing legacy.

I'm here with Eric Gordon, principal of Saginaw United High School.

How are you today, Eric?

I am, I'm excellent.

Wonderful.

All right, let's get started.

Saginaw United has been around for only a year now.

How was that first year been?

As principal.

First year was great.

Busy.

And I tell you, busy.

Very, very busy.

Community came out.

Got us a brand new, beautiful building.

Five stories, call it.

Rise the tower.

First year was this.

We went to construction, so we had a, you know, a couple of bumps ups and downs.

But mostly, students have really came together.

We combine Saginaw High and Arthur Hill together last year.

Just had a wonderful experience.

Students got along excellent.

No complaints at all.

You know, I mean, just getting the community ready for the change that took place.

And it was it was actually a phenomenal year just to see how resilient the students were, how we came together, even though we opened up their building, we were going through construction.

The kids did everything that we asked them to, so it was really an excellent year.

I cannot say anything negative about it.

I really enjoyed the kids bringing them together and you know, everybody was always, oh, are you going to bring these two schools together?

The kids, the kids were kids.

So when I tell everyone, here's our kids.

And, you know, as long as you're doing things that engage kids, they'll be there and they'll do things they should do.

That's great.

Talking a little bit more on that change.

Obviously, I mean, I graduated from Arthur Hill.

Okay.

There was the, you know, Arthur Hill Saginaw High rivalry.

It's all under one banner now.

Can we talk about that change a little bit?

Maybe a little bit about the the population makeup of the city, how things have changed, how, you know, we just don't have as many schools as as as we once did in this town.

You're absolutely correct.

When you talk about the, the dynamics of the population, enrollment in Saginaw, well, I will say that the population of Saginaw has been dwindling.

You know, I think Saginaw was, in my opinion, was built on General Motors.

As the jobs have moved out, we've our population has went down.

And so, back when the schools were built, 1950s Saginaw was just full of General Motors.

It has so many families.

But again, as those as General Motors pulled out and went south, we just don't have the enrollment that we used to have.

We just because of the families and the population.

And so with the dwindling enrollment, Doctor Roberts, came and was put, put a couple plans out and we want to build one unit at school right in the middle of Saginaw, right in the Middle East side, west side, and put it right there on the riverfront, which I think was an excellent idea because, again, we met in the middle that we can't because, you know, honestly, back in the day, you know, you got Saginaw High traditions, you got Arthur Hill traditions.

And so we just want to start off with a brand new tradition.

So we thought the best thing we could do is unite the two schools and put them in what we call Saginaw United.

And I think it was just an excellent idea because, you know, we can better use our resources.

You know, when you look at trying to have all these buildings and all these students over here, and then you got 500 over here, you got 700 over here.

Let's put them together, you know, and have one competitive high school.

And I think it worked out really well for the students and for for the city of Saginaw.

And can we talk about that, a little bit, the location of the school, it's almost symbolic, as a lot of us know, Saginaw has this sort of, unspoken segregation from the East Side and the West Side, with, you know, black folks on one side, white folks on another.

You know, we have, we have a large, Hispanic population.

We have a growing Asian population.

How is that, what is is that make up, accurately?

Well, I guess what is the, the the ethnic makeup of the school?

Is it is it diverse?

It's.

Yes.

It's diverse.

We have black students.

We have white students, we have Latino, have, you know, Indian.

We have, you know, we even have some, kids who came from, last year because it doesn't speak English.

Cuban have some Cuban kids as well, you know, it's a very it's a diverse building.

You know, I like to see more diverse, but it's right now is we're growing.

We're going more diverse each and every day.

Each and every year I see more.

I see more diversity this year than I did last year.

So I think it's a school where everybody can call home.

And that's what we want to do is make it for everyone.

So everyone, every student will feel comfortable and you know, and call it, call it their high school home.

What's unique do you think about Saginaw United?

That sets it apart from, as a, as a new school.

What's, what's kind of its mission statement setting out, you know, we're we're very unique.

When you look at the program that we have, we have Mandarin, you have French, we have Spanish.

We have mechatronics, Stem robotics, we have, you know, so many programs in that building where this year we have one of the only schools around here where, you know, we already have SCC, which is our Saginaw Career complex.

But this year we were able to add mechatronics.

Right.

And we have it right there in the building, which is a Stem program that's only available at SCC.

But we are available.

We have it now at Saginaw United.

We're just trying to give every kid, every every kid, every opportunity to be whatever they want to be.

And that's what makes Saginaw United unique because we just opening up doors where again, back in the day where we have Saginaw High, we had Arbor Hill, we can offer all of these programs because again, we're trying to use our resources over here, you know, trying to use our resources over there.

But when we put that pool together, we can better use our resources and give the kids what they, what they honestly deserve.

I mean, so we're just trying to put every kid on an even playing field so they can go out to that in this world in the 21st century and be productive.

You know, one of the unaddressed concerns, it would seem, in, the modern education landscape is, you know, violence.

It's an uncomfortable subject, but, you know, there are, I think, for my opinion, two types of violence that are specifically gun violence that are, plaguing schools.

You know, there's one involved with organized crime, and then there's one that's random acts of lashing out.

Correct.

Are there precautions being taken at Saginaw United?

Do you have, drills, you know, things of that nature.

And then I have a follow up question after that.

Yes.

We've been taking precautions that all Saginaw Public Schools take precautions, which is not just is something we do a Saginaw United Saginaw.

Well, Saginaw middle, Thompson.

Every high school Sasser we are all equipped with now we even have these brand new metal detectors called Open gate.

Which which students now go through.

But again, we've been doing this thing for, for I can go back about 20 years.

We're one of the only high schools where every day when kids come in, we do search.

They put bags.

We have a clear backpack policy.

So schools are only allowed with clear backpacks.

And we also go they go through metal detectors every day because, well, what our mission is to make sure when a student comes to that door, they're going to come back home to their parent.

That's our number one mission.

Before we can teach them anything, we want a kid to feel safe.

And so I think we do a dang good job at doing that, because, you know, that was one of the things when we first opened, we had so many kids coming that the line was out the door, because at that time we were going to construction and our student entrance wasn't ready, so we were entering everyone through the front door, through the front door, which is not our general entrance for our students.

We have a student entrance in the back of the building where the parking lot is, and but that was because we're trying to take every safety precaution that's necessary because, again, you know, we, we hear about all these things that happen in other schools.

I'm not saying that they can't happen.

You know me, but but we do take precautions each and every day.

And I don't think any other high school around here is even doing what we we're doing.

When you talk about the safety and security of what our students go through, we have seven security officers, Saginaw United, even though it's a five story building, you know, we we're making sure we do everything we can to keep he is safe.

You know, that's our number one concern.

And then my follow up question about this is and you know, some of that is obviously out of your hands.

I just want to get your thoughts on this because it's something, that I've had on my mind.

As you know, these stories have been coming out recently.

These precautions that we take, the drills, the metal detectors, the clear book bags, there's even, almost seemingly an end to industry, you know, with the with the book bags, the, bulletproof book.

But things of this nature, do you think that that is a trauma unto itself?

Do you think that might be hurting the kids to just, you know, we're not, are we?

Are we addressing the symptom and not the cause?

You know, we have to deal with things that they come to us.

That's what I would say.

You know, we do is sad to say, but we do live in a society where we do have violence that goes around in the city of Saginaw.

And so, again, students, I deal with trauma each and every day.

You know, I mean, I've had honestly, I had, two, two of my students, two young ladies that they lost their mom, you know, I mean, to gun violence, you know, I mean, so again, we're dealing with these things on a daily basis, you know, trauma, just trying to deal with, you know, what goes on in the city.

But, you know, we just we have to take students where they are, you know, we have to meet them where they're at.

Will we like it to be better?

Of course we would.

But at the same time, we're doing the best we can with with the cars that we do each and every day.

But you know, where it starts is at the school where we can keep on trying to educate students on making a bigger and a brighter future for them by not trying to do the gun violence, not trying to do the things that are out there plaguing the city of Saginaw.

And so that's what we try to do in Saginaw public schools.

Let's try to educate our students, educate our parents as well.

You know, I mean, we're trying to educate everyone that we so we can have a better society and a better school system each and every day.

I like your point about meeting students where they're at, just to jump off of that, because the educational landscape is very different from when I was younger, when you were younger, there are so many more distractions.

There are so many.

I mean, if you think about I, you know, that's, that's a whole other impediment of education because now kids can, you know, have, a machine that just gives them the answer to essentially everything.

I mean, I'm I'm very curious.

What are the, push backs against that?

What are the things that are being implemented to make sure kids are still learning?

You know, the AI is huge now where kids can just input something and give an answer.

And so again, we have many students who now actually who are dual enrolled, will take classes at Delta College here.

And we also have to take classes at Saginaw Valley State University as well.

We have many kids who are graduating out of high school when they have already have 30 credits hours to complete college.

So they get the first hand experience about AI.

And because when they're writing their papers, we're telling them, hey, you know, your professors because they're checking this stuff for AI.

And so these are things that we have went through.

We're dealing with them as situations come to us, just trying to educate students on, you know, you can't just put in this and can't put in that.

You have to basically back in the day how you got to earn it, you got to earn it.

AI is great if you use it as a tool, but it can't do it, can't do the whole job for you, you know what I mean?

So we're just trying to, you know, because again, you have to embrace technology.

We have evolving world and technology is a huge part of it.

And so you can say, hey, put those phones down.

Don't do this.

Don't do it.

The more you say the try to take away something, the more someone wants to do it.

So again what you have to we what we are doing, we're embracing technology and trying to use it as a tool and not where it just takes the whole place of you doing the work.

Just for fun.

Are there any particular extracurriculars going on at the school right now that you see?

Like a lot of, growth in whether that be a, a sports team, a dance team, you said you mentioned the robotics team.

Is there is there something that's going on in that school right now that you're like, oh, those kids are on to something?

You know, honestly, yes it is.

It's an abundance of things.

We have a law club last year that went down and competed and they actually won, we have a robotic team that won best rookie team last year.

Some competitions.

We have stemmed we have Stem, we have dance, we have, we have teachers, girls, it's a fitness thing.

Well, teachers are working with kids, just which we have so many.

We have we asked we have about 70 teachers.

And what we do, we try to ask at least we have 135 to 50 clubs where student interest is student driven and teach all of all we all we doing is asking teachers to say, hey, we want you to sponsor this club night club because we're trying to give kids some engagement, give them something to do when school lets out at lunch time.

So give them something to have fun with.

So incorporate that into their daily lives where kids are not just don't have anything to do with it.

Not going home, just doing nothing.

So we have a bunch of clubs each and every day.

We have, we have I got my French teacher, my, Mandarin teacher.

They have a language around the world Club.

What are you going to do?

Even though we teach in the class C, everybody can get those classes.

But guess what?

We have a club with kids can get incorporated in martial languages around the world.

So again, we're doing everything we can to encompass that whole child.

Not I mean, so if you want to do it, if it's fun, it's engaging.

Guess what?

We're trying to do that for kids.

We want things to be led by students and that's what we're doing each and every day.

Is Saginaw United.

What are your hopes for the school?

You know, five, ten years from now?

What do you what would you like to see?

As as, Saginaw United becomes more ingrained in the community as time goes on.

I just want us to evolve and be a place where the city of Saginaw sees Saginaw United as a number one high school.

Because I think we're we're well on our way.

When I we try to we try to do everything we can to encompass the whole child.

You know, the whole of we want boys, girls, everyone, you know, come here, come to Saginaw, feel safe, feel secure.

And guess what?

Get out to the real world and be productive.

That's the main thing we're trying to do.

We're just trying to give kids opportunities.

We want them to grow.

Because again, as we educate these kids, the city of Saginaw will become a much better place as well, you know?

And that's what I think that one of the biggest problems that we have, we're not we're not getting enough kids to be educated the proper way.

And so guess what?

They're falling off in the streets or doing other things.

But if we can get those kids, get them at a young age, bring them up, do the right things, we'll get more people doing the right things, and we will have a better place right here in the city of Saginaw.

So my vision is just to keep on educating and make it bigger and brighter and keep this keep on hope and reaching for the sky because I think we will reach it.

What would you say is the biggest, impediment for for getting those kids on that level?

If only, be honest with you, the one of the biggest impediments we have is sometimes my parents need parenting.

I'm going to be honest with you.

Sometimes my parents need parent.

And so what we're doing, we do have a liaison for the district.

Mrs.

Onions Williams, who?

We do parenting classes.

So we're trying to educate parents on.

Because, you know what?

I'll be honest.

What?

You everyone, everyone needs help sometimes.

So what we do, we try to do parenting classes will throughout the district.

So to try to help our parents become better parents, you know, because some of the, some of our parents were very young when they had their kids and some of them, you know, just don't know.

And so what we're trying to do, we're trying to help them all out, you know, I mean, I have many parents reach out to me.

Hey, Mr.

Gordon, you know, you know, maybe there's absence in the house.

You know, we have a lot of different things.

And so parents are reaching out to me for advice and talking to me.

And guess what?

Often and doing the best we can.

No.

No one is perfect.

But again, you know that.

And that's what we want to be.

We want people to know we're here for the whole family.

We're here to try to support the family.

And that's what Saginaw Public Schools and Saginaw United does.

We try to reach that whole family.

I don't want people to think that.

We just want your kids here for educational purposes.

We're trying to reach that whole family because if we can impact that whole family, we can impact that kid at a much better, deep in depth way.

Can you give me a success story?

From from that process?

Oh, man.

This is so many success stories.

But to this, I mean, if you look at, I have a new AP this year.

Our name is Archambault.

I'm sorry, what does AP stand for?

Assistant principal.

I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Single mom.

You know me.

Her son last year was the valedictorian.

You know what I mean?

So, again, this is many parents who go through as a single mom.

She got her some of the valedictorian and also state championship wrestler last year, our, 175 pounds.

You know, maybe she was a single mom who did it, you know, I mean, with the support of the school system, support of her family support, you know what?

They're, you know, the kid's father as well.

You know me, but she you know, she embraced family, embraced all the things that try to help and built that whole child.

And, you know, she has and she has two sons, her other son, he's now a student at U of M, he's a he's he just two days ago, he's doing an internship now at a law firm.

You know, I mean, so when I say it's so many success stories from from kids who guess what we're of out.

But guess what?

They made it.

You know what I mean?

Because we do a lot, we go above and beyond to try to make sure that these kids get what they need so they can be great, you know?

I mean, so that's that's just one story, but is, is is so many that I can go on and on and on.

When you talk about, Saginaw, being counted out, what do you specifically see when people, when it's being, under looked as you feel.

Well, people look at, hey, you know, it's they got it.

They got a lot of violence here.

They got this and that.

But guess what?

My kids are just as good as the kid next door, okay?

It's just they can be just as successful.

It's just surrounding with the proper things around them to nurture them, to get them to be successful.

And that's what we're trying to do.

I mean, so people count students out in the inner city many times, but I students are just as good as everybody else doing, you know, mean a kid is a kid.

And sometimes, you know, people don't look at that and they look at, man, they from the East Side or doesn't it doesn't matter where you from.

If you want to succeed, you can.

You know me.

I grew up on the East side, you know, I mean, I grew up on the East side right here and Saginaw, born and raised.

They've been here my whole life.

So you can't see them.

You can't be successful because you can know.

I mean, guess what is the obstacles out there?

Many of them.

But guess what?

You have to learn how to guess what?

Climb over that fence, go through that window.

Whatever you have to do, you have to do it.

But you have to want it.

If you don't want it, you won't get it.

So we're just trying to build that, that sense of hunger in our students, well, they want something better for them.

I mean, just because, hey, mom didn't do this or mom didn't do it or a dad didn't do that, that don't mean you can't do it.

So we're just trying to put that into the students.

Let the students know you can be whatever you want to be, but guess what?

Nothing will be given to you.

You have to work for.

Have you, had that moment, as a principal, as an educator, you know, where you think back on your education and then you see something that happens in your professional, academic life where you're like, all right, where we're at a different level.

We we've moved up.

Things are are better now.

I mean, I just look at me, you know, I started off as a classroom, you know?

I mean, I started off as a classroom, a, a classroom, a, became a teacher, you know, from a teacher, became a dean.

Madine became assistant principal, assistant principal, came elementary principal and then went to become a high school principal.

So I look at it's not where you start is where you finish.

And, you know, you have to have a sense of I want more.

So that's what I'm trying to put in my students.

This is because you start here.

I started off at the bottom.

I mean, my father was a custodian.

My mom was a counselor.

You know what I mean?

What they always put in put in me.

You can be what you want to be.

I mean, my father moved in.

He was became, maintenance and grounds and all that kind of stuff.

My mom, she's still a counselor right now.

One of the oldest ones in the district.

She's over in SEC.

Which, you know, again, because she.

She just loves the job.

She loves what she does for kids, loves to try to help us to win out.

So again, that's all you got to do.

Just want something.

You've you got to want better for yourself and want better for that next person.

And when you do that and you can climb, you can reach, you can reach whatever goal you want to say.

So that's what I think every day.

That's what my goal is as well, to try to try to reach students.

So I'm trying to get students understand you can be what you want to be, but you got to understand, you have to want it.

I can't want it for you.

And so, you know, that's the biggest thing I will say.

And then, I also have just one last question about, the staff, because I think we all know that, in a lot of communities, teachers are underserved.

And, I do think in education, a lot of people, you know, go in wanting to make a difference.

And years go on and, you know, because of because you're being underserved, you can, you know, some teachers do become jaded over time.

You know, the the, the beginning of the journey might not look the same way it did towards the end.

What are you doing to to support your teacher?

What are you doing to support your, your educational staff?

Well, what I, what I always try to do have first off, I have an open door policy.

I'm still a human being, you know?

I mean, yes, I have a role to play.

They have a role to play.

Yes.

I'm the supervisor at the end of the day.

But again, I'm a human being just like they are.

I have to make sure I respect my staff and I want my staff to respect me.

That's number one, you know what I mean?

And that and you try to meet people.

With what?

Their differences, with their problems.

You know me sometimes it's more personal than sometimes of business.

I mean, sometimes you gotta, you know, sometimes they put a person I need their shoulders to really talk to personally, you know what I mean?

Not business wise.

And so you got to understand, people are still people, you know?

I mean, you get more people by trying to treat them fair all the time.

So that's what I really try to do.

You know what I mean?

When you combine two schools, you had a yeah, a teacher from Saginaw High and I teach from Arthur.

You mean, so you had two different cultures.

And so, you know, and I'll be honest with you, last year I had myself.

It was, Mrs.

Tibbs and Mr.

Laporte.

I came from Saginaw.

Hi.

Miss Tibbs and Mr.

Paul, my assistant principals.

They came from Arthur Hill.

But what we did, we came together as a team to try to meet each and every one of those teachers and let them know it's not about Saginaw, It's not about Arthur Hill.

We're here working together.

So guess what?

We can do it.

You can.

You can do it.

You know what I mean?

And so that's what we did.

So we just try to put up a united front, work together and just let people know.

And you know what?

It was people that Miss Tibbs could reach better than I could do was that I could reach better, and she could.

It was people that Laporte could reach.

But so we just try to form a real team, come together and try to support teachers where they were at and meet them where they were and just let them know, you know what?

It's not about what we used to do.

It's about what we're trying to do here now.

So we so that's how we gained momentum.

And it was able to have a very, very successful first year.

Okay.

Quick follow up about what were those two separate cultures of Arthur Hill and Saginaw.

How do you feel?

It I mean, it was just this the ways they did things over Arthur Hill versus some of the ways we did.

Everybody does things differently, you know what I mean?

I laid a different way to play in a different way, you know what I mean?

But we came together and we just tried to make sure that we encompassed all of the great things that we could do and brought the all the great things together.

And then some of the things that, hey, she did some things better than me.

I do some things better than her.

So we try to take the best from both worlds, incorporate it into Saginaw United, because that's what it was about, you know, wasn't about one about change.

It's about trying to bring the best from both places into one place.

A second in Saginaw United High School.

All right.

And then do you have any upcoming events, of any kind, that you do you want the community out for?

You know, we're going to have our our homecoming will be October 3rd.

No, I mean, so again, that's going to be one of the first big events where, people will be able to come out.

We're going to have our ribbon cutting for our fieldhouse that day as well.

And so, again, we want the community to come out, see what they invested their money into, because I think it's a beautiful fieldhouse.

They, we have already done tours all last year of the school, but it was a it was a two step process.

We had the school academic preserve and now we have, the sport piece of it.

And so we're not working on the football fields, which will be complete very soon on the baseball field, the softball field, the track and so and the fieldhouse where we play, basketball and volleyball and wrestling and all of those things.

So that'll be complete.

We're going to have that ribbon cutting on October 3rd.

And so I think that'll be a great chance for the community to come out and see what they invest their money in, because I think they got their money's worth.

All right.

Eric Gordon, principal of Saginaw United High School, thank you so much for coming on the show problem.

I appreciate you so much.

Thank you.

Having you on.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you.