Fresh Fruits and Vegetables instead of Sodium and MSG: Perry Food Pantry Refrigerator Fund Raiser

Hello! Last year, the Gender-Sexuality Alliance at Perry High School discussed why kids sometimes come to school angry, tired and ready to fight. We decided that sometimes, it has to be because of factors like food insecurity. As a school group committed to fighting all kinds of intersecting oppressions, we decided to open a student-run food pantry in our school.

With our partner, Mary Shull, and the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank, we now distribute around 1000 pounds of food a week to kids. However, our goal has changed a bit. We see our peers consuming products that are high in sodium and MSG, and we know our communities are the ones hit hardest by high blood pressure, heart disease, strokes, etc. So, we decided we needed to get more fresh fruit, greens, and vegetables into our peers' hands.

That's why we really need a refrigerator. Will you please help us with our goal? This fund-raising project will fund a refrigerator, and keep our food bank running. We are so grateful!

Go Fund Me: Perry Food Bank Refrigerator

#Education Spring

                                                                                                        

Three students and I just made a plan for how we'll survive a school shooting. It's our first lock-down drill, and at an unspecified time, we are to lock our doors, cover our windows, turn off our lights and computers, get kids away from windows and doors, get everyone to turn off their phones (because a ding from a phone will let the shooter know where a child is hiding.) We are to sit, in silence, and wait for an administrator, security or law enforcement to unlock my door. Because any noise, any light, any movement, any sight of us, could mean one or all of us could die-- if this was real.

I am scared. I know it's a drill. I know there's no shooter. But I'm still scared, because having a drill makes it more real. And even though my kids are very aware that school shootings mostly happen in white, suburban schools, we all know Trump has had an electrifying effect on white supremacists in America.

When the drill happens, I'll need to go out into the hall to lock my door. I'll look for kids in the hall to grab and get in my room. We'll get to a "safe" place. We'll sit and try to be quiet. Here's a few of my fears:

* How do I help kids with PTSD, who are traumatized by this drill? If I can't handle somebody's emotional reaction, and if that reaction imperils my other kids while we are hunkered down hiding, what do I do?
* Once the drill is over, and we are back to this new "normal," how do I help those students in my school who have experienced trauma deal with a continuing cycle of being re-traumatized by this experience?
* We don't have the resources to handle the traumatized kids we have already. We have two social workers, who are extremely busy. We have three counselors. On March 7th, I will be proctoring the new way our District has found to evaluate school counselors: by having seniors do a long, computer-based survey, about how many times they have interacted with the counselors, if they've been helpful with college stuff, paperwork, etc. As far as I know, counselors will be held at least partially accountable to whether seniors in springtime, being forced to evaluate their school counselor, take that survey seriously.

During the drill, there were no kids in the Library (this time.)  But we talked before they left for class about what to do. Don't get bottled up-- don't hide in a place you can't get escape from, if you can help it. Fight and distract the shooter if you have to, but getting out is the best way, probably. l told them I would check first to see if anybody was outside the exit with a gun. If someone was, we could be trapped. I *forgot to tell them: if I get shot, run around me, don't stand there. Don't be an easy target. Don't huddle together. You'll be easier targets that way. Spread out. Next time, I'll remember to tell them all of that.

* I'm afraid my big words about "run around me," (meaning my dead or dying body) are too brave. What if in the face of this kind of danger, I freeze, cry, get hysterical, am entirely useless? It happens to trained, armed people all the time. What makes me think I'm a hero?

* What if we are instructing our next shooter what to do?

* How do children who experience gun violence in communities receive this, beyond my speculations and incidental conversations with kids? Where is the research on the affect these drills will have on my particular children?

I lay down between the Library stacks. I was afraid to sneeze. I was afraid to look at my phone, because even though I had the ringer off, what if a video or something started to play? It was too dark to read a book, and I couldn't concentrate. Security came and rattled the door. Once. Twice. Three times.

I had to pee. I thought of David Hogg at Parkland, who had the presence of mind during AN ACTUAL SCHOOL SHOOTING to interview the kids HE WAS HIDING WITH so he could document the experience. So we can learn from it. This child is someone special. I KNEW it was my own security guards out there, I had nobody to save but myself, and I was too scared to sneeze.

* Florida's Governor wants to put armed guards in every school in his state. Follow the money: what a bump in contributions he'll get from his red-state followers, the NRA, gun manufactures, etc. Ridiculous, and criminal.
* Obviously gun control is the way to solve this problem. We look to the data and experience of our well-educated global counterparts, and this truth is right there. To state something obvious, politicians who will not stand up to the gun lobby devalue the lives of American children. Police violence against people of color is tolerated and even celebrated by the current President. See this: Donald Trump Is Serious When He Jokes About Police Brutality

These politicians, unwilling to protect children, do another thing, which feels suspiciously convenient for this group: they contribute to a sense of chaos and churn for kids in schools. All this time, effort, money and thought, professional development, contracts, training, etc. around active shooter drills, when legislation is a way to fix it. I don't think it is necessarily an unhappy consequence for irresponsible politicians that these policies are all the better to push privatized educational options on families as a "safer" or better way.

Call me crazy if you want to for making that connection. I've watched my own kids' education since pre-No Child Left Behind days, until this moment. I've seen the neo-liberal attacks on public education chip away at what they had in public school, to what my students experience now. I just lived through eighteen months in which my Superintendent called out Pittsburgh teachers' demands for better pay, health care and educational conditions in ways that felt hurtful and disrespectful. I'm watching Butler teachers get ready to strike. I'm in awe of the monumental work the West Virginia teachers are doing to save their entire state from austerity. Teachers, students and families in Chicago battle for their children's schools' very right to exist in Black and Brown communities, (See this: On The Last Day of Black History Month, Chicago School Board Votes to Close 5 Black Schools) and so much more.

What began as a movement by young people in Florida after Trayvon Martin was murdered, was followed by the young adults in Ferguson who rose up against the murder of Michael Brown, to brave activists insisting #BlackLivesMatter, to the Parkland students, who are changing corporate policies, and now teachers battling for their kids across the country-- it feels like an #EducationSpring.

Unfettered school shootings because our politicians put money over gun control, police officers murdering Black children with impunity, and the violence that comes when schools are kept churning and chaotic by austerity measures while we spend $610 billion on our military budget, are all interconnected oppressions our teachers and students have been fighting for a long time-- in the streets. It's time we ALL joined them.

While I was writing this, there was a shooting at Central Michigan University.

NYT: WV teachers' strike

Saving West Virginia

Arming Teachers Will Only Increase the Chance of a School Shooting

https://marchforourlivespetition.com/

Staceyann Chin: All Oppression Is Connected

Pro-Child, Pro-Teacher

"As adults, it is our responsibility to work together toward this common goal. And while the district and the union may differ on some points, I believe we can move forward in a spirit of mutual respect, setting an example - even now - for the children we serve," said Dr. Anthony Hamlet, Superintendent of Pittsburgh Public Schools. 

 As adults, Dr. Hamlet, let's level with each other. There is a lot of work to be done in our District. I know you know this. However, there is work I attack daily that I am sure you don't know about, because you simply have not been in my shoes (or in my school) long enough, or authentically enough, to understand what's grittily real here. 

We have a student-run food bank, but no working computer lab. We have a teacher who has been turned down repeatedly for a class set of textbooks for his classroom, so he spends his time copying the tattered remains of the teacher's edition to teach with. We have teachers who do Donor's Choose fund raisers for pencils. 

Today, I spent a lot of my day comforting children facing trauma and need in their lives. That's my job, and I love it, and I love them. One of my colleagues left the building in tears, because she had had one too many classes scream curses and taunts at her, and she just needed a break from the heartbreak. She'll be back tomorrow. She loves her students with all of her heart. She's an adult, and she is committed to her work.  

Firstly: if we, meaning not just you and I, but yourself and all the teachers in this District, are to work together toward a common goal, you are going to have to drop the inflammatory language you are using to shield yourself and the Board who hired you from blame about the break down in negotiations of our contract. 

 In a career such as ours, in which self-reflection is a daily practice, your intention behind the usage of the phrase "as adults" should be clear. Infantilizing teachers in an attempt to make our efforts to negotiate a better deal for the District's teachers and children won't work. Pittsburgh Public Schools' parents know who we are. They know we love their children. They know we don't take the idea of striking lightly. For many of us, an unknown number of weeks off without a paycheck represents a serious financial risk in our lives. But, for a year and half, our union's efforts to negotiate common-sense measures to protect the quality of the classroom experience for children have been met with stonewalling and flat-out denials. 

Here's what we know. Parents want smaller student-to-teacher ratios. They want expert teachers working with the appropriate grade levels and subject areas, and they want teachers who strive to further their own educational levels and masteries. They want the best teachers available in the field, who can choose to work in challenging schools without being financially penalized. They want coaches who know and love their children, and who are compensated well. They want Pre-K teachers who are the top of their field, and who can afford to stay in the classroom as a long-term career. 

These things are ALL pro-child. What they also are, unfortunately for folks who have to be elected, is tax-payer funded. I am sure no Board member or Superintendent wants to discuss raising taxes to fund Pre-K teachers, for example. Why don't we work on elevating public attention to things that undercut funding for public schools together, such as the corrupt EITC system, which allows wealthy folks to fund private and parochial schools with money that could fund public education? Or why our elected city officials seem to have so little interest in garnering equitable funding for our public schools? We know Pittsburgh Public Schools has money in reserve. Let's spend it on the children in front of us, and then work together to secure extra funding we need. 

So, please-- don't stoop to dog whistling with comments such as "as adults," and "set an example for the children we serve," when teachers are the ones getting ready to sacrifice on the grocery bill, and when they are calling their credit card and mortgage companies to discuss the possibility of upcoming late payments, as they prepare for the possibility of a strike.

If we strike, I will be setting an example I will be proud of for the children of Pittsburgh Public Schools, because I will be sacrificing for what I love and believe in: my students. So will ALL of my colleagues. Walking a picket line for no pay, in order to provide smaller classes and better prepared colleagues for my students is pro-child, pro-parent, and pro-Pittsburgh Public Schools.  Let's be adults and agree that nobody has to.

 

Will the Truth Out? A Strike May Be the Catalyst.

I collect masks. I think they are beautiful, but I only collect masks with open mouths. I like the metaphor, of course: we hide behind them, we use them to become someone else, but for me, an open mouth means these masks demand to be "heard." They need to look as if they are ready to speak, or are speaking, or singing aloud for me to want to hang them on the wall. I like a mask that nobody shuts down.

Mask are symbolically important, and "we," meaning everybody, wears them at times. Teachers wear them, in lots of contexts. We wear them when we are with parents. There's a thing a veteran teacher taught me when I was starting out-- the "teacher head cock." It goes like this. When the parent of a particulary challenging kid asks how their student is doing, you cock your head a minute, and smile. This gives you a second to catch your breath and think before you blurt out something too blunt. In those occasions before I learned it, the non-professional, human side of me wanted to say something like, "Yo, come get your kid! He needs to spend waaaaaaayyyyy less time on an ipad or in front of a screen at home and waaaaayyyy more time outside running around, and then in your lap with a book!" But then I mastered the teacher head cock. So, I would cock my head, smile, and say something like, "Well...Johnny has a lot of wonderful energy that we are working on harnessing toward his goals."

A mask, of sorts. Then there's the mask you wear when you write publicly about your life as an educator. You want to write as bluntly as you think, but to do so, you run the risk of exposing confidentialities of childrens' lives you are professionally and ethcially bound to protect. To state the obvious, those confidentialities must never be broken.

You also run the risk, as our District and union begin the last round of negotiations on January 23rd and 26th before a possible strike vote, of exposing things that could hamper negotiations. Here are a few things that are in the public domain, which I can discuss openly.

A strike means that almost 25,000 children will not be in school during the length of a standoff, which to my mind could and should have been prevented by the District. Some kids will have babysitters, or stay in warm, organized, food-stocked homes during that time, with activities and supervision. In many, many homes, this strike could cost so much more: the safety of kids, ultimately.

True, I'm a passionate union member, but the issues are common sense and should have been agreed to by the District a year and a half ago: pay new teachers the same as veterans, and not based on a silly scale that even the impartial arbiter found to be unfair. Pay Pre-K teachers, bound to have the same education and certifications as every other teacher, the same as every other teacher. Lower class sizes by 5 children so they can get better one-on-one instruction. Give coaches, who sacrifice time with their families, a raise. (They haven't had one in TEN YEARS.) Allow teachers to retain their voice in helping their principals make their teaching schedules, instead of erasing any voice or choice in who, what or when they teach.

Why does that last matter? Because a fifth grade science teacher has a K-5 certification, but might be an expert at dealing with pre-adolescents, and have spent years building their expertise and craft teaching scientific principles and discovery to this age group. A Kindergarten teacher quits, moves or gets rated out, so a capricious, inept or malicious Principal (news flash: THEY EXIST) moves this 5th grade science teacher to fill the Kindergarten hole in the schedule. What happens to the students who lose their expert science teacher? What happens to the Kindergarten children, who have one crack at Kindergarten, now faced with a well meaning, but inexpert teacher of this age group?

The problem might be with how our state certifies teachers. But that is outside of this union-District discussion. And everything these negotiations do must be focused on how it affects CHILDREN, first and foremost. When the District begins to authentically respect teachers enough to place them in decision making roles alongside those principals, you'll know that kids are being placed first and foremost. So much more to say there: but. Teachers are chronically afraid to speak out about what they think could improve in their schools for fear of backlash to their ratings, their schedules, etc. That's me stepping out from behind my mask. There. I did it.

You need to eat. You need to pay your bills. Most importantly, you need to keep going to a job that allows you to work with kids whose lives your life is entwined with. They have one shot at filling out FAFSAs, filling out college applications, writing college essays, choosing colleges they talk about the pros and cons with you about, checking out books that could change them forever,  having somebody to talk to alone about what the hell is going on at home and at work and with boys and/or girls with, writing great papers (maybe with your help), learning NOT to Google sources for papers, having a safe place every day at lunch to be with their friends when everywhere else is unsafe and scary, charge their phone, use the in-school food bank, create an in-school food bank, create committees and clubs and projects. You wear the God-damned mask you hate and that burns you up because you are in love with your students, and you need them as much as they need you.

"But," as Shakespeare said, "in the end, the truth will out." Eventually. If there is a strike vote, I predict that the union members will vote overwhelmingly for a strike. And then some teachers' masks will slip a little. You could hear stories teachers want to tell you about what holds our schools back from being as great as they can be, that we are afraid to share, for fear of backlash, retribution and unfair consequences. And that could be the best thing for public education in Pittsburgh that has happened in a long time. Because while masks can be protective, and necessary, they can also cloud truth. And only truth unmasked can begin to heal what is wrong.

In Solidarity.