Category:Hitchhiker's Guide to GSSM

The Hitchhiker's Guide to GSSM is named after Douglas Adams' book The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which explains how to "get around the galaxy" in an easy and layed-back form. Similarly, the Hitchhiker's Guide to GSSM is formatted to give students a guide of the school from multiple students over many years.

The Student Handbook provides a list of most of the rules at the Governor's School, but Residence Life Staff (and in some cases, Faculty) seem to be able to issue Violations for whatever they deem irresponsible.

The Course Catalog provides a comprehensive list of all courses that the Governor's School offers, but it sometimes has inaccurate entries. Additionally if a student has a subject they wish to study (and can find a faculty member willing to commit to teaching them) they can create an Independent Study, which is registered as an actual class and goes on your transcript.

A student at the Governor's school is required to attend and pass multiple seminars. In 2024 these were: For Juniors, LLS101 Life and Leisure, LLS102 Academic Transition, LLS103 College Planning I, LLS105 Everyday Survival Skills, LLS106 Public Speaking, and LLS107 Preparing for Research Experiences. Seniors are only required to take LLS104 College Planning II. ^[1]These courses are pass/fail and typically don't require a lot of effort to effectively complete.

Students are also required to complete a number of hours of community service. In 2024, the requirement was 100 hours. Various means exist for completing these hours, but a number of popular activities include managing a sports team, Tutoring, Eagle Scout projects, Student to Student. Because anything that a faculty or staff member will verify counts as CE, it's impossible to create an exhaustive list of activities that qualify.

Because the Governor's School is a high school, gossip and rumors run rampant. This is further accentuated by the small class size. Information that "everybody knows" is not always true, so it's important to make sure to verify any facts that have significant bearing on a student. A key example of this was in course selection time in 2024, during which rumors about which teacher would teach which subject were commonplace. Other potentially harmful and unsubstantiated rumors include one claiming that Wellness Counselors would send students who seemed depressed or suicidal home, which may have kept students who were depressed from going to the wellness counselors.

Course load can be the difference between constant work and too much free time, so it's important to balance it. There are obvious things to avoid, such as taking a large number of very difficult classes, but taking courses from unorthodox teachers can also make it difficult for a student to participate in activities other than school (like writing on a wiki).