I grew up attending marches and protests, making posters and chanting for human rights, against discrimination, violence, and oppression. From my early teens until the age of about 20, I didn't touch a grape because of the 1980s grape boycott to support farm workers. Our protest themes varied from this to demanding the end of apartheid in South Africa and the U.S. government involvement in Central America. I corresponded with Lolita Lebron, a Puerto Rican political prisoner, and then met her when she visited my school along with other released political prisoners. My father was a feminist and pro-LGBTQ rights before it became more widely accepted and in his quiet way. When I began college, the Latina organization I felt most kinship with and joined quickly was Mezcla, a group of U.S. Latinas who worked on different political issues - such as the grape boycott.

After college, my political activism waned somewhat as I navigated my twenties. In the early nineties the extent of my political action was walking in the AIDS walk in New York, in honor and memory of my uncle Mariano. Figuring out life took over, and then I got married and had 3 babies in 4 years. We moved back to Massachusetts, I began a Master's program, and teaching and raising kids filled every possible second. My activist upbringing was always there, though it was dormant for a while.

When the pandemic began, and George Floyd was murdered, I attended a protest in town with my daughters. It brought back memories of all those marches I had participated in and I felt I had come home. After years of teaching public school, I began to become more aware of what was happening in my local teachers' union; I had always been a supportive member but not very involved. Then, recently, things came to a head in my district. In 2022 I began to become aware of our leaders turning a blind eye to corruption and other serious issues in our school district. In the fall, I began contemplating and researching what could be done. A retired friend published a letter about corrupt hiring practices and nepotism in the district, and that motivated me to find out more. In the winter of 2023, I got together with a few colleagues to discuss and plan. Slowly but surely, others in our union came on board, willing to help and spread the word, in order to preserve the safety of our students and the well being of our staff. Working together in this effort has brought back some hope and joy.

Celebrating Mother's Day today seems appropriate because I feel like I birthed another baby with the letter of no confidence pasted below (publicly released yesterday) - the product of many conversations with colleagues, research, and careful planning by a small group (at first).

The activist spirit in me never died, it was just hibernating and waiting for an issue that I could not sit back and do nothing about: standing up for my school, my students, and my colleagues.


Dear Members of the ----- Regional School Committee,

We are writing as concerned staff members to express our lack of confidence in our district leadership. In this letter, we outline some of the issues we have observed in the actions of -----, Superintendent, and -----, Assistant Superintendent for Diversity, Equity and Human Resources.

We understand that the School Committee has a responsibility to ensure the well being of all staff members and students, and we trust that you will take appropriate action to address these issues.

We express our loss of confidence in district leadership for these reasons:

Superintendent:
-Failure to properly supervise the district offices and people in his employ, especially the supervision of the assistant superintendent
-Failure to promptly deal with complaints of anti-LGBTQIA+ behavior on the part of some staff, which has created an unsafe environment for children, especially those whose identities are marginalized.
-Failure to collaborate with staff in planning how to support positive leadership in our schools.
Assistant Superintendent:
-Unethical hiring practices.
-Use of position of professional power to enrich self on school time.
Acting in ways that undermine the district’s stated mission of equity and excellence.
-Unsafe environment, where people do not come forward out of fear.
-Toxic work environment that stifles open communication and collaboration.

These actions:
-Harm students.
-Have led to a decline in employee engagement and motivation.
-Have a negative effect on our district's ability to promote and maintain an environment that supports our mission of equity and excellence.
-Create toxic work conditions where staff well-being is declining.

We call for the immediate resignation of the assistant superintendent. In addition, we call for an investigation into the leadership of the superintendent. To aid in this investigation, you should know that all of these assertions are verifiable; each one has someone willing to come forward and attest to their veracity if requested by the committee or investigators.

We appreciate your prompt attention to this matter and look forward to working with you to create a more equitable and inclusive environment for all at ----- Regional Public Schools.

Due to the culture of fear and retribution, an anonymous vote on this letter was held. 
 
                            




 

I have struggled to continue blogging regularly this year, and I've been thinking a lot about why that might be. As things often are, it's a complex answer involving grief, exhaustion, my doctoral studies, family needs, and challenges at school. Grief has changed my writing audience. Since my dad died, I have been writing to him - one long letter processing what's happening in my family and with my grief. 16 months later, his death is still very raw, but writing to him helps me feel close to him. 

This year I started my 29th year of teaching. I'm happy to report that 1) I still like what I do!; 2) I haven't become that jaded, bitter teacher I was afraid of becoming, and 3) I still have new and creative ideas all the time. That feels like a win.

Unhappily, though, teaching has become harder and harder, and it's never (almost) because of the kids. It is true that I am seeing more trauma, more anxiety, less attention, and more distractions in my students than ever, and I can bet that many teachers around the country are also experiencing this. Post-pandemic teaching is no joke, too. It's not easy to try to get students back on track, help them regain studentship skills, and propel their learning.

However, the hardest part about teaching lately is what's happening all around me. Criticism of teachers in the form of social media posts, school committee public comments, articles, and more leave many teachers wondering how much longer they can stay in the profession and stay positive. More and more this year, I have come to understand the power of having a strong collegial community, and of an active union. Both of those aspects of my profession have shown me what can happen when groups come together and work collaboratively with a goal in mind. 

Next year, I will start my 30th year of teaching. I have a hard time believing that I have been teaching that long when I had never planned to be a teacher! I still have some years left before I can retire, and I just hope I remain enthusiastic, caring and unjaded until that day comes. 

Keeping up with my blog was a struggle this fall. In other years, I churned out posts easily. This year has been hard because for so many reasons: educators all over the country are struggling with the challenges of teaching, and on a personal level, I am still grieving, and will be forever in various degrees, my dad. It was hard to focus and find something I felt was worth writing about.

But last week, I started a unit I love to teach and talk about: Immigration Stories*. I change it a little every year since sometimes I have the same students 2 years in a row. This year, I needed a movie to show before the break, but I also didn’t want to show just any movie that wasn’t related to the curriculum. Knowing I would be introducing this unit, I did some research about movies related to immigration (they had to be appropriate for middle school and the one I love to show, Bajo la Misma Luna, some of my students had already seen). I came across Paddington - yes, Paddington, the one about the bear who goes to London! After reading about how to relate Paddington to issues of immigration, lessons began to form in my head. Paddington is an immigrant. He is a natural disaster refugee, having to leave his home in Peru because of an earthquake. He stows away on a boat, leaving his only family behind. He shows up in London, not knowing anyone. People ignore him or are rude to him. He doesn’t understand the customs and makes a lot of mistakes. He is undocumented.

After watching the movie, I asked the students to answer this writing prompt: How was your immigration journey similar or different to Paddington’s? It might seem childish to compare yourself to a bear, but the students were game. They wrote that they were different from him because they didn’t come on boats, they were not alone, and they were not refugees (not in this particular class). They were similar to him because they were both sad to leave and a little excited or nervous. The most touching answer was from a student who recently arrived from Brazil. She said “We are similar because Paddington found a home, and we found a home, too.”

The next day, I took out the photos from the photo-text exhibit I worked on in 2017 along with Elena Betke-Brunswick, Patty Bode, other teachers, and many students. As a result of a large grant we had received, we created a photo-text display for the whole school to observe, and then recreate in their social studies classes. We took photos of students, had them professionally framed, and laminated the immigration stories they wrote in my class. Students visited our display in small groups, writing and discussing the stories they read about. As I took out these photos, I was reminded of how special and beautiful this project was.

I placed the framed photos around the room, and asked my students to look at them all and then choose 2 to take notes on (using the questions “what do you notice, what do you wonder?”). The next activity was to match the text, which I had not put up yet, to the photos. Each student got 4-5 texts. They did pretty well except for a few they needed help with. As they asked me about the students, I told them who was at the high school, who went back to their countries, and who had graduated. Some students had chosen an object for the photo to represent them - a lacrosse stick, the Statue of Liberty. My current students and I talked about why those students might not have wanted their face in the photo.

The next step in this unit will be to learn about immigration to the U.S.: push and pull factors, the many different groups of people who have come to the U.S. and so on. Then students will both interview someone else about their immigration story, and they will write their own stories and publish them in small books. Another activity I have done in the past is Immigration Songs, which we may repeat also. I hope to show the final products here if all goes well!

*A note about wording: I say immigration stories here, but in class we will broach the topics of how people from Puerto Rico are called migrants, how Africans experienced forced immigration, how the only people who were always here are indigenous people, and about how not everyone knows their own story (and that is an opportunity to find out someone else's). We talk about using the term “movement story” instead of immigration.

 It is already week 5, year #18 in this school, and year #29 teaching, and I am constantly struck with how quickly time went by, and yet how every year has me feeling like I am a new teacher, with the worries, anxieties, and hours of preparation.

I don’t remember my very first day of teaching, but I know I must have been queasy with anticipation. I was only 8 years older than my oldest students, and 13 years older than my youngest students. I remember that every day I would go home and prepare for 2-3 hours for the next day, until I finally got the hang of it and learned to prepare for a whole week, and then sketch out plans for the whole month. I taught 5 different levels of French, with 0 educator preparation classes, 0 hours of student teaching, but a high level of French thanks to a few years living in Paris, and also, some pretty good instincts.

That first teaching experience was transformative, difficult and wonderful. I’ve written in other blog posts about my mentors at that school and how they helped me develop as a teacher. A big part of what made it so transformative, though, was meeting Claire Lecomte DuNouy.

Claire started as a part-time French teacher during my second year at our independent school. Shewas static with energy, in nonstop motion and hysterically funny. Complete opposites, Claire and I quickly became friends. Claire had an incredible knack for teaching and was the perfect person for middle school. She could be funny and goofy and get on their level, but also could explain things in a way they would understand. Neither of us really remembers, but I have a faint memory that I was assigned as a mentor to her. However, I think I learned more from her than she did from me.

One year, Claire and I were both teaching 5th grade French sections. Though we each had our own class, it morphed organically into a coteaching situation. We planned together and often brought our 2 sections together for activities. Claire excelled at anything performance-related, and I shied away from it. She loved to play guitar and lead the class in games and skits. Being half French, she was familiar with French children’s songs and games, and though I had been a nanny in France for two years, I didn’t know all the songs and games she did. So, when we were going to include one of them in our lesson, we would unite the classes and she would take the lead teaching them the song or game. I still remember the words to one that would probably no longer be allowed, but that was the 90’s:
Promenons-nous dans le bois, pendant que le loup n’y est pas. Si le loup y était, il nous mangerait, mais comme il n’y est pas, il nous mangera pas” (Let’s take a walk in the woods, while the wolf isn’t around, If the wolf were there, he would eat us, but since he isn’t, he won’t)

As I would watch Claire leading the students in this and other games, I would marvel at how she was so genuine, playful, and sometimes even a little crazy with the students. They adored her, of course. Class was fun with her, as it should be when learning French as a 5th grader. Our job, as I see it now, was to introduce them to the language and get them hooked so that they would continue studying it. Claire did not ascribe to the “don’t let them see you smile until Christmas” school of thought. She was more “let them see you be yourself and laugh raucously with them sometimes” school of thought, and that rang more true for me. Observing Claire helped me see that I could also be more genuinely me, but also playful, with the students. Claire helped me let go of some of my timidness and reserved nature by modeling it unknowingly.

When we were in the faculty workroom, Claire's jokes and antics were so outrageously funny that she had our other teacher friends and me literally rolling on the floor laughing sometimes. I am 100% positive that if I were one of the older teachers in the room at the same time, I would have been super annoyed! But for us it was about community and stress-release.

After way too many years of not seeing each other, Claire and I recently got together with two of our other original colleagues from those years. When I say that I laughed so much I spurted out my drink, I am not exaggerating. My cheeks hurt from laughing and I could barely catch a breath. It was as if no time had passed, and we were still those late twenty-somethings embarking on our teaching careers. We laughed as we reminisced about one student we had who really struggled with -er verb conjugation. She just could not seem to get it, no matter how we explained it. Then one day, correcting quizzes the class had taken, we were ecstatic! She finally got it! Well, sort of. Though she had conjugated a noun (table), she got all the endings correct: je table, tu tables, il/elle table, etc. We gave her the credit for it, and I imagine we explained that table was a noun, not a verb – but who cared! We finally got through to her.

If my father’s death last December taught me anything, it is to love, appreciate and spend time with your family and friends right now. Not later. Not in “we should see each other soons” or “let’s get together sometimes”. The other thing that has stayed with me is to tell people I love them, appreciate them, or am thankful for them. When my dad was dying, I told him I loved him all the time, even when he could no longer answer with words. I spent as much time with him as I could. I knew if I didn’t, I would have many regrets.

When I saw Claire, I told her what a huge influence she had had on my teaching practice, and how our time together still shows up in my teaching, especially in the moments I allow myself to be silly or more myself with my students. It might sound cliché, but life is fleeting and unpredictable! I hope to keep my intention of appreciating and loving the people in mine.

Je t'aime, Claire Lecomte DuNouy!

 
 

My blog has been put on the back burner, but not forgotten. This year, it is all I can do to just make it through the days, and the days are A LOT. There is preparing and teaching, working with my student teacher, completing my work for the graduate course in my PhD program, my family, not to mention keeping up with healthy life habits and so on.

I had been lucky in my life to not experience too much grief until December of 2021, when my father died. The pain I felt was unlike anything I have ever felt. It was searing, painful, brutal, huge. My tears were endless, my heart physically ached. Almost 5 months later, it feels a little duller – but by no means is it gone. I realize that it will, in fact, always be present, surging at unexpected moments, taking over when I think everything is fine.

In school, it has been interesting to deal with my grief. Like most teachers, I have gotten pretty good at compartmentalizing my life. Home things stay in one section so that I can focus on school. When I came back to school after my dad’s death, the sadness was such a part of me that I found I couldn’t separate it in the same way I had separated my emotions in the past. I couldn’t even imagine having to face my students and engage in the day to day of school. I knew that I had adults I could rely on if I needed to cry, get a hug, or take a break, and that helped. I thought I didn’t want to talk about my dad, but it turned out that’s exactly what I did want and what was helpful for me.

I decided to be upfront with my students, who are in 7th and 8th grade. They knew that my dad was sick, because I had told them. A lot of them knew that he had died, since I asked some of my colleagues who covered my classes to tell them. At the beginning of each class, I told them that, as they knew, my dad had been sick all fall, and that he died on December 18. I decided not to use the term “passed away” because as beginner English learners, that might not be a familiar term, and in any case, I prefer to say it plainly as well. I worried about how they would take it, but I shouldn’t have. They looked sad for me, and some even said “Sorry.”  And then, in typical middle school fashion, they moved on to asking me about a completely different topic. I let my more advanced English learners know that I was sad, and that my father and I were very close, and I gave them a few minutes to ask questions if they wanted to. I can’t remember what they asked, but I felt good about starting class by acknowledging and normalizing my grief. Once that was out of the way, I could move on with the business of teaching and being present for my students.

Our society does not allow for the time or space needed to grieve. In New England’s protestant-influenced society, grief is best expressed in private, and publicly people are expected to “get over it” quickly. In my district, we are allowed 4 bereavement days. 4 days? It will take me a lifetime to work through this deep grief.

My school is very close to the cemetery where my father is buried in his plain pine coffin that is biodegradable (a natural burial). It is a beautiful, park-like place with paths, woods, natural stone headstones, and hills. I can walk there in 6 minutes, and once in a while during my prep period, I go visit. It feels comforting that my dad is close by. His birthday was 2 days ago; the grass is starting to grow on the earth that is over him, and my family and I spread flowers around his grave.

Though I know that compartmentalizing is essential for me to do my job, I have also learned that sometimes, I can’t keep my two worlds completely apart, and that is also okay. It's also okay to rely on my friends and colleagues for support. It's okay to allow my students to see a more authentic me. When it comes to grief, I am learning, it's all okay. 

Sometimes a student asks you for help putting his unruly curls in an elastic because he doesn't know how. So you do it. And then you give the kid a packet of natural hair conditioner from your classroom toiletry station to help with the dryness. 

Sometimes a student tells you that they want to "fail" their yearly ELL test so they can stay in your class. 

Sometimes a student says "Can you adopt me?", and even though you know they're joking, it touches your heart. 

Sometimes you are sad to have a student teacher only because it means you will be teaching less and you love that part of your day. 

Sometimes your students make you laugh even though you know you shouldn't laugh. 

Sometimes you connect with colleagues in the parking lot of your school and laugh a lot, and it's just what you needed that day. 

Sometimes your student hand crafts tiny paper baskets and fills them with candy, one for each student in the class, for Valentine's Day. 

Sometimes a student says to you, "You look great! Really great!" and makes you smile. That same student, who cried every day for the first week of school in a country new to him, now says "This is the BEST school."
​
Sometimes your work spouse gives you a stuffed Snoopy that you put by your desk and smile every time you look at it. 

Most of the time, your students make you forget your deep sadness with their all-consuming energy, and you are grateful for them. 

As summers always do, this one sped by. On the positive side, I had more of a chance to rest and recuperate than last summer because of all the meetings and planning we had. In fact, I made a wise decision this summer and backed out of a few committees I thought I would work with on different projects, and I am so glad I did so. More than any other year, I needed to forget about school for a while.

In our house, lots has been happening, making it a busy summer in other ways. Helping 2 of my 3 kids prepare to leave home (one for a Coloradan adventure, the other for college) has been very bittersweet for me. Of course I want my kids to fly and to flourish, be happy and independent, have adventures and experience life. At the same time, we are a close-knit family, and I have to admit that my heart hurt saying goodbye to them. We still have one amazing kid at home who will get so much attention, she won't know where to escape to!

We've also had a trying time as a family as my dad suffers from old and new health challenges. We are rallying together to support him and each other, and trying to stay positive while managing our anxiety and stress. At the same time, I'm trying to adjust to a new school year, and teaching graduate students, and my PhD program. "One day at a time" is becoming my new mantra. 

I remember thinking in June, maybe we can go back without masks? But in my district, we are masked again, and I find myself grateful for that as I read and hear about other districts that are leaving masking up to individuals and families while kids and teachers continue to get sick. Teaching English learners with a mask on definitely is challenging because my students can't see my mouth and hear my words muffled, but I would much rather that than compromise the safety of anyone in my school. And with the ever-evolving new strains of COVID, things seem more unsure than ever.

As far as COVID learning loss goes, I think that more than the actual learning, a lot of the loss occurred in other areas. Students are learning to be together again in class, to work together in groups, to socialize at lunch, to walk down hallways, to use paper and pencil, and be fully engaged in class because their teachers can see their faces and whole bodies now. I heard somewhere that rather than "learning loss", it was more of a "learning slowdown", and that makes a lot more sense to me.  Any day they were online with their teachers and somewhat engaged was a day of learning. Did they forget some information? Or not make as much progress as if they were in the school building? Maybe. But I think we have to give our students more credit, at the same time as we help those who need an extra boost to get them back in the flow.

This year, I have two students who are brand new to this country from vastly different places: one from a family of professors from a central European country who are here visiting or doing research, and one who was born, grew up, and was educated in a large refugee camp in a southeastern African country. I don't speak either of their languages at all, so I will have to rely on a lot of gestures, Google translate, pictures, and videos. Two students who are from Central America have been here 2 years but at least one is still in what is called the "silent period". And three students have been here for 3 or so years but still tested at a beginner level in ELL. There is a broad range of educational backgrounds and English levels in my class, and it will be interesting to see how it evolves. Unfortunately, I don't have a student teacher this year, but in at least one class I have an amazing para to help with the diversity of levels and learning styles. In my ELL advanced language classes, I also have diverse groups in terms of home languages, personalities, and areas they need to work on in their "school English."

Here is wishing all my fellow educators a positive start to the new year. Take care of yourselves, too, because we have been known to overdo it, caring for and teaching our students.

 On the longest day of the year, I'm counting the days of the longest school year in history. I have written about how well my students have done this year, and it's true - they have. They have been amazingly resilient, they've grown, they've learned, they've adapted, and they've kept me going. At the same time, I know we are all reaching our limits. The monotony and chaos of teaching remotely and navigating an in person group and a remote group are starting to get to me; the students are definitely getting antsy as well.

Teaching this year has confirmed a lot of things I already knew about teaching. For example, a daily routine is just as important online as it is in person. A daily warm-up helps settle the students in and gives my student teacher and me a chance to gauge how the students are that day, and get ourselves ready for the  lesson. Using Google classroom where you can see kids while they work on an assignment is really helpful, and I think it helped students improve their writing maybe even more than in the physical classroom. And, a good game of Kahoot or something else is always a good way to break up class and let the kids have some fun.

And, teaching remotely through a pandemic has taught me a lot as well. I've learned that I can adapt a lot of things for online learning, but not all. I learned that putting kids into breakout rooms without an adult present doesn't usually go that well, at least not for middle schoolers. Not having a physical globe or map, we had to devise different ways to teach geography, and that wasn't always easy. I learned that, not being able to move around as much as in the classroom, we all needed a stretch break every day. And most importantly, I learned that you can make warm, strong connections with students even in a virtual format.

However....I'm ready for it to end. Ready for summer, for time away from computers, sitting in the sun, without a schedule. I'm ready for a mental break. I'm ready to ease back into "normal" post-COVID life, slowly. Finally, I'm ready to reset at the end of the summer, and start the year fresh - in person, in my classroom, maybe still masked, but there, to share the daily ups and downs of teaching with my colleagues, and to create community with my new students.

My friend and fellow educator Sharri Conklin recently posted this on Facebook and I invited her to post it here as a guest blogger. 

One year ago, I was going to school each day, worry growing as the news updated us each day with what was coming.  One year ago this Friday, our school sent us home.  I held it together all day to support my students, but the pit in my stomach knew this was different than anything we had ever experienced before.  I have held my students through the death of a beloved staff member, 9/11, school shootings and the daily crises that come with living.  This felt different.  This felt heavy in a way I had never experienced.  

As I walked my students to the buses, carrying everything we could think to send home, I began to lose it.  I smiled and waved to them as they drove off.  When I turned around to head back in the building, I couldn’t hold it in anymore.  I went into a room and couldn’t stop crying.  

Since then, I, along with my colleagues, have learned how to teach through the computer.  We took everything we knew about how to teach and adapted it, with no training, to engage students, to keep learning moving forward and to hold social emotional lives during a global pandemic in our hands.  

Each time we needed to, we recreated what we do to adapt to this new situation, all while trying to run our own households, keep ourselves and our families safe and healthy and moving forward.  We bought monitors and computers and upgraded our WIFI and watched videos on how to take everything we did in person and make it accessible through the computer.  We connected with families to make sure they were fed and had access to technology and WIFI.  We taught students and families how to access learning without being in person with them to do so.  

Some of our colleagues have since returned to their in person classrooms, some have stayed remote and some have done a combination.  Some of us have been heralded, some of us vilified and all of us have felt a combination of all those feelings for ourselves at one time or another.  

Good teaching is adapting.  It’s what we do.  Adapt to the unique learners, the new standards, the new methods, the new rules that change overnight.  And we do this because we love our kids and our community.  

We really don’t ask for a lot.   We spend our own money, spend our own time and lose our own sleep over our jobs.  We are, at once, not important enough because families can teach their own kids at home without us and so important that families can’t function if their children aren’t in school. 

We get it.  Life is messy and hard and changes on a dime.  We get it. It’s what happens in a day, in an instant, in schools all the time when there’s a shooting or a death or a job loss of a parent or a deportation or a jailing or DCF report of abuse or systemic racism or a global pandemic.  It’s emotional and it’s draining.  

We are sorry this school year has been unlike any other.  We are anguished that students and families are suffering.  But it’s not all on us.  We are fighting to keep ourselves and our families safe and sane and healthy, too.  

We are sorry we can’t ignore everything in our own lives to come in person to help your family who is also suffering.  Just like you, we have personal experiences and unique family situations that force us to make hard decisions.  But none of us have not been working.  None of us are lazy.  None of us are looking for the easy way out.  We are all just trying to make it through this global pandemic the best we can. 

So as things in our communities change in the next months as the state forces all schools to open buildings no matter what to any families who want their children to come back, please remember we are all doing the best we can.  We will remember you are, too.

Sharri Conklin has been an educator for more than 25 years.  She is currently a 5th grade teacher in Amherst, MA.