Video: Cooper Celebrates 40th Anniversary

Current and former students and staff gathered Tuesday night for a celebration of the school’s 40th year.

Cooper, which opened in 1970, showcased the school’s past and present during an open house event featuring building tours, performances by student musicians, memorabilia displays and presentations.

Dozens of residents and current and former District 21 educators visited the school and filed into the gym for performances by Cooper band and choir members and remarks from a retired teacher and a current student who reflected on the middle school’s past and present.

Hugh Brady, who started teaching at Cooper in 1973, reflected on how the school’s policies and the village’s infrastructure have changed over the years. During his early years at the school, the principal kept a paddle in his office for use on misbehaving students, Brady recalled. And, he said, Arlington Heights and Dundee roads had only two lanes.

But, he added, some things have gone unchanged.

“Twelve- or 13-year-old kids are still nervous, stuck between childhood and adulthood,” he said. “Kids at this age are standing on tiptoe to something they think will be grand.”

Attendees also watched a slideshow that incorporated photos of teachers and students over the past four decades, along with some advice for current Cooper students.

“No shooting rubber bands at other people. You could get in trouble,” advised one Cooper grad who was interviewed for the film.

A teacher had his own words of wisdom for today’s middle-schoolers. “Learn how to do things yourself… don’t depend on others to do things for you,” he said.

Buffalo Grove resident Kellie House, who graduated from Cooper in 1976, was among those in attendance. She laughed as photos on display in the school’s library reminded her of her middle school years. She recalled Brady’s science class on the first day of seventh grade. “He walked into the classroom with a canoe on his head,” she said. “Teachers are like performers getting up on stage.”

House, who has lived in the village nearly all of her life, now has a seventh-grade son, Casey, who attends Cooper. Her older son, Erik, is a Cooper grad who now attends .

Looking around the middle school, House noted that while additions have been made to the building, “It looks pretty much the same. The feeling’s the same,” she said.

Cooper seventh-grader Kristina Dominguez, who spoke about what it’s like to be a middle school student today, knows that one day she, too, will be an adult looking back on her Cooper experience.

“I look forward to seeing how much Cooper changes over the next 40 years,” she said.