This Week at South

This Week at South - 6.37: Crossings and Liminal Space

Greetings South Students, Parents, Staff, and Community Members,

Past issues of this newsletter are available at the following link: TWaS Archive.

TWaS is also sent via Canvas Messenger and linked to my Canvas Module for all students and families to access, and shared on South’s FB page.

Part I: The News

Content Disclaimer: I am not omniscient. Don’t see your event or results in the newsletter below? I rely on parents, coaches, and others to send me information to include in the newsletter. Feel free to share positive news and results anytime via my email.

Activities This Week: Full schedule HERE.

Spring Break 2026 to Japan: South is going to Japan for Spring Break 2026. We filled one bus, but we can get a second one if 12 more people sign up (you will be placed on a wait list until we get the 12). There will be an informational meeting tonight at 6:00 p.m. In the library. Learn about the trip at: https://www.eftours.com/tour-website/2850504UJ. If you have any questions, please email Lydia Frankenburger at frankenburger_lydia@asdk12.org.

Summer School Information and Form: South High School will be offering on-site summer school. Please see the following form for information. PLEASE NOTE: There will be no credit recovery classes at South next year. So, summer school is every student’s best option to stay on track to graduate. Summer school will run 9 days at South and allow students to recover necessary graduation credit.

PTSO Board Elections: The PTSO election was held last week, and the following Board members were selected to lead the organization next school year: Landon Forth, President; Courtney Luff, Vice President; Jennifer Wagner, Treasurer; Jyll Green, Secretary; Aubry Forth, Student Representative.

South Music Department at State: The South Music Department had a great showing at the ASAA State Solo/Ensemble Music Festival last weekend. Five groups took first place. Congratulations to: Aurriana Smith -Classical Vocal Solo; Matthew Norstrom - Trombone Solo; Grant Chythlook -Cello Solo; Kristian Kagerer, Ben Gust, Matthew Nordstrom, Drake Ward, and Jonas Reynolds-Brass Quintet; Auriana Smith and Maren Lund- Classical Vocal Duet

Boys Soccer Results: JV Boys Soccer beat East 8-1 with goals from Andrew Marshall (1), Kadin Buss (2), Chris Saspa (1), Adrian McCray (1), Chase Gleaton (1), Kai Green (1), and Danny Horowitz (1). Kinsey Dufour had two assists.

Boys Varsity Soccer lost to Service 1-0. Boys Varsity Soccer beat East, 3-1. Goals from Owen Brown (2) and Chase Gleaton (1).

South Baseball: South had a couple tough losses last week, falling to Chugiak and Service. Chase Mascelli was a walking highlight reel all week long, showing why he was last year's Golden Glove winner, and one of the most dangerous base runners in the State. Scoring pivotal runs in South’s win over Dimond on a two RBI groundout by Jack Zuspan.

This week South takes on Service at Mulcahy Stadium Tuesday @ 7:15, West at Mulcahy Thursday @ 7:15 and Bartlett Saturday @ 1:00.

Next Monday the 19th South Varsity will play on our home field, Taylar Young Stadium vs East, at 5:15, we will be honoring our seniors, come out to South and support them!!!

Part II: What I’ve Learned

It’s graduation day.

It is a day to both celebrate and to acknowledge the thousands of young people who are crossing an important threshold. This time and space is often referred to as liminal space. That is, in between. Neither here nor there. Where graduates are neither children nor adults.

It is a middle space where disorientation and uncertainty is likely to occur. It can also be a time and place of great discovery. Whether the graduates know it or not, today is a crossing. There may be no literal boundary or river, but they are stepping into the partially known. Most may know what is next in a literal sense, but not have much vision of what lies beyond that first step. So, it is not just one crossing, but several crossings in succession that will hopefully lend them more certainty as they slowly gather more clarity about their direction.

In this sense, none of us step in the same river twice because we are different people each time we arrive at the riverbank. This illustrates the impermanence and general transience of life. Being midstream is another way of understanding liminal space.

Later today I will share a lesson I have learned with the South High School class of 2025 about how I think they can approach this liminal space and move through it with a little more certainty and a little less doubt. In short, that lesson is to approach uncertainty like a child or an elder. These two groups of people tend to be open to experience, to be curious, to take calculated risks, and to learn from experience. They possess a sense of awe at the dawn of each day, and this keeps them attuned and open to opportunity.

This perspective is defined as neotenic, which is a scientific term referring to an organism that retains juvenile traits into adulthood. In the human species we might call this being young at heart. And in human terms it is synonymous with looking at the world with uncontaminated wonder, despite having undergone hardship. This trait allows the very young and the very old to make uncertainty a positive experience. This is how I would advise our graduates to approach their liminal space as they cross into early adulthood.

Beyond how, I also think there is what to do with liminal space. As I was considering what I would do with uncertainty, I came across my notes on Cormac McCarthy’s novel, The Crossing. It’s an aptly named book to provide context for what we can do with our own crossings. The main character makes six border crossings and in that liminal space, he runs into elders who give him advice on what to do with his time.

One of those elders is a priest living in a condemned church in a small border town. He tells the boy that all lives must be lived for others to have true meaning. This prompts the boy to reflect and think that, “what we seek is a worthy adversary. Something to contain or stay our hand. Otherwise, there are no boundaries to our own being” (p. 153).

McCarthy’s conversation between the Priest and the boy echoes Viktor Frankl’s advice about how to seek meaning and happiness. He wrote the following about success and happiness:

For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself.

So, even in liminal space, when there may be confusion and uncertainty, we can always look outside ourselves for meaning and direction. It’s often when we enlarge our context that we begin to see ourselves more clearly, and that makes the next steps easier.

In The Crossing, the narrator ends the reflection and conversation thinking “that the lesson of a life can never be its own. Only the witness has power to take its measure. It is lived for the other only, that there is no man who is elect because there is no man who is not” (p. 158).

In short, we all have inherent value and dignity and what we do is often not defined by us, but by others who give our actions value. So, looking out for one another, serving a purpose larger than ourselves, and attempting to find ways to be good to one another is one of the best ways to structure our crossings and to define the uncertain liminal space in which we sometimes find ourselves.

Congratulations to all the graduates of the South High School Class of 2025. Stay open to experience, look to serve others, and move confidently into your liminal space.