Skip to main content

Supply Schools



I've been watching the usual "Back to School" slew of commercials this week. Yes, it is true that for the most part, students and teachers do get excited about the beginning of a school year. There is some sort of renewal that transpires. One of the best things about teaching is that every year you have the opportunity to begin again.
One thing that has resonated stronger than usual is a local school supplies drive sponsored by a TV station, a credit Union and a few other businesses. People have been asked to drop off pencils, paper, backpacks and the like in several conveniently located barrels around town. For some reason this strikes me as particularly sad. I see it as a powerful reflection of inequity in our schools. Because it's something true about our schools, it's bigger reflection is our society; our culture.
I know I should feel pleased that people are opening up their hearts and placing gluesticks, colored pencils, and fancy file folders in these bins, but, to me, it's disquieting. I don't begrudge the generosity, but I can't help thinking that this is more a statement of how underfunded public education is. Here in Portland, one school district actually laid off 60 teachers last week, right before they were to return t the classroom. Yesterday, the union and the Administration got together and communicated for the first time in a couple of years and 42 got their jobs back. What a way to begin the year.
In similar fashion, I met some of the student teachers I'll be working with this year. One found out just recently that the cooperating teacher he'd been scheduled to have, the one he'd been observing all last year, was having his schedule changed and would not be doing anything in social science, his field. All this against a background of ridiculous calls for more standardized tests, more curriculum driven by those bullshit test scores, and teachers asked to take pay cuts or work furloughs, or teach subjects they don't care about, or, in some cases, substitute or hang around to see if they can have their old jobs back.
No, we don't need school supplies, we need to supply schools.

Comments

Lisa Dale said…
I think this is such a timely and apt post. As a writer, I can't help but think of the arts in particular, how easily they are sheared from the curriculum. I was lucky to go to a high school that had amazing artists, musicians, and thinkers--it really changed my life. To donate gluesticks...it seems too small an offering.

Still, here in NJ, I'll keep an eye out for those donation bins. And throw in a pack of pencils or two.

Popular posts from this blog

To a Tee

 I'm a sucker for a good t-shirt.  They are the foundational garment of my life.  My day starts with selecting a t-shirt and it ends with sleeping in one.  Once thought of as under garments, t-shirts are now original art and no doubt, a billion dollar business.   You can get a t-shirt with anybody's picture displayed.  You can commemorate an event, a birthday, a death, even a specular play in any sport.  Family reunions usually have a commemorative t-shirt.  Also, any organization that solicits your support in the form of a donation is likely to offer you a t-shirt. Where once I only had the basic white t-shirt, my drawers are filled with all manner of colorful choices.  Some recognize major events in my life, some, spectacular performances or plays I have witnessed, and some unforgettable places I have been.   I say I'm a sucker for a good t-shirt because I have taken the bait on what I perceived as a must-have only to be disappointed. ...

Illusory

What does it take to enrage you?  That moment when your words fly on pure emotion because enough is enough.  Is it a driver that cuts you off at high speed?  What about being an eyewitness to blatant racism or on the receiving end of some obvious injustice? I know some people who never express rage.  I admire them but know full well I am not capable of such distance from that which would bring about such a strong response. Another senseless shooting and 7 people die at the hands of a mentally ill gun owner.  The father of the 20 year old college student lets it fly and somehow millions feel a new sense of relief.  He calls the politicians bastards who do nothing, he wears his pain in public.  The news media responds but we all know that nothing is going to change.  We are the gun country.  We are the place where anybody, anytime, can be cut down just for being there when somebody else snaps. Usually the perpetrators are delusional. ...

Mr. Greene v. Mr. Brown

I want to tell you about something. Something I've carried inside myself for a number of years now. Perhaps if I were a different kind of person I wouldn't need to talk about it. I'm not. My need to tell it is stronger than your need to hear it. Because, however, there are a number of teachers and former students of mine who may read these meanderings from time to time, I need to tell this story all the more. About 7 or 8 years ago I was asked if I would allow a university PhD. candidate to observe an English class. At first I decided against it because I was scheduled to have a student teacher placed with me the second half of the semester in question. After some urging, however, at the request of a respected colleague, I agreed. Soon I was committing to extra meetings, signing documents and explaining to the class in question who the young woman who thoughtfully pounded away on a laptop in the rear of the classroom three times a week was. I knew that the topic of ...