A wonderful thing happened in our house this year. My 12-year-old son began coming home from school and diving into his homework without prodding. He now works on projects for hours, humming to himself, lit up by the joy of learning that his humanities teacher has inspired.
It takes me back to his second-grade experience. After two years of struggling, he was blessed with a brilliant new teacher who really understood him and how to turn his challenges into successes. There’s little I’m more grateful for than when a teacher “gets” my child or turns him on.
So it’s been with a sick heart that I’ve heard about the layoffs of several of Vashon’s teachers, including that brilliant second-grade teacher, Jenny Granum.
I can’t help but wonder which one of these teachers we’re losing could be the very ticket to my — or your — child’s next “ah-ha” moment. And what will our kids lose out on in more crowded classrooms, a library without a librarian or fewer art classes?
It’s with great relief, then, that I’m now supporting an effort to shore up our ailing schools. I plan to contribute to the school board’s Save Our Teachers Initiative — an effort to raise enough money from the district’s parent community to retain some of these excellent teachers.
It would be easy, of course, for me to convince myself to do nothing. Our income — like that of many others on the Island — has fallen, and we’re feeling the pinch. This would offer up a temporary fix, at best. It would encourage the state to continue with its misguided funding priorities. And so on.
But when I turn the prism, I see other, more vivid pictures that remind me why our schools, especially our teachers, are worth every penny we can part with.
In one view, I see the children I spend my days trying to help as the publications manager for RESULTS, an international anti-poverty organization — the 75 million kids all over the world who don’t get to go to school at all. The ones who have to stay home to look after their sick parents, for whom a school is just too far away or who watch a brother leave for school but can’t follow because the family can afford to send only one child.
In fact, school fees are the primary reason children are kept out of school in most poor countries, fees that range from $30 to $150 per year, not much different from what the school board is asking parents to consider contributing. For the parents of these children, such annual fees can equal one to three months’ wages. And yet despite the prohibitive cost, families scrape together the money — because they know how valuable an education is, that it changes and strengthens lives.
Their struggle reminds me both of the brilliance of our education system, which ensures that all children have access to a free education, and the sacrifices parents make worldwide to give their children a chance to learn and succeed in life. Surely, I can make a sacrifice for my own child’s education so that he and his fellow students don’t lose that teacher who could spark a love of learning, as Jenny Granum and my son’s humanities teacher have done.
When I turn the prism again, I see my own father as a young high school history teacher.
He’d just returned to the United States after teaching at an international school in Iran where he’d studied ancient Persian history. He was rich in knowledge and enthusiasm, and his American students benefited from it. But just a year into his new position he was laid off, along with thousands of other teachers during the recession of the mid-’70s.
Unable to find a teaching job, he tried another career that didn’t suit him. When he finally landed a teaching spot at a private school, he’d lost much of his passion for the profession.
Layoffs are profoundly discouraging. As the child of a teacher, I know how many hours teachers put in outside of school, how much of their own money they spend for supplies and how much of their all they give to our children.
If I can help keep one or two teachers from losing the spark that ignites a child, I’m willing.
But I can’t do it alone. It’s our collective power as donors that will have an impact. So here are some more reasons to consider making an offering from your heart of whatever amount is right for you to save our teachers.
We Islanders actually voted to be taxed at a higher rate than the district is able to collect because of a state- mandated levy lid. Had the state Legislature done the right thing and lifted the levy lid as the governor proposed, the school district would have collected another $400,000 in property taxes. We already agreed to pay more; this is one way to do it.
Many Islanders who voted against the school bond said they’d rather give money for teachers. If that describes you, here is your chance.
Finally, our community has a rich history of coming together when other valuable services have been in crisis. Our schools — right now, in this moment — need help, and we are the ones who can give it.
By giving to the Save Our Teachers Initiative, we’re coming together as a community. We’re saying that we value our teachers, that we won’t remain on the sidelines, that we stand with our schools and all their brilliance and imperfections and their absolute necessity.
Now’s the time. Please join me.
— Lesley Reed is the publications manager for RESULTS, a nonprofit anti-poverty organization based in Washington, D.C.
How to give
Those who want to support this effort can make a check out to VISD (Save Our Teachers) and mail it to: VISD, P.O. Box 547, Vashon, WA 98070-0547.
Donations can be dropped off at any of the Island’s three public schools. There will be a drop box in or just outside the office at each school.
Or people may donate online on the district Web site: www.vashonsd.org.
