A Quiet Revolution

My mother just had her last day of school. It feels so strange to write that, to imagine my mother as a separate entity from her school, that I'm not sure I can even explain what I want to say in a way that makes sense. But I will try. To me, my mother--her essence, all of my memories of her, her identity itself--is inextricably linked with her schools, and none more so than her current school, the school she conceived of and built from the ground up, that embodies all of her most deeply held beliefs about elementary education. Yes, she had a lot of help. Yes, the school exists thanks to the efforts of so many hardworking, like-minded people. But if you know my mother, and you know her school, you will know what I mean when I say it is hers--a structural translation of who she is as a person that exudes her philosophy from every brick and tile.

My mother is not really retiring. Anyone who knows her knows this. She is moving on to another stage in her life because this is what people do, what life does: we move on. We change. And my mother's school will go on, too. But as my mother's daughter, a person who has followed her career as closely as is possible for the last 38 years, anyway, I would like to express my thoughts about this particular moving on, this change: what my mother has meant to thousands of children and their families.

Do you remember your first grade teacher? Of course you do. And every kid who was in my mother's first grade classes remembers her because for decades we heard them tell her so: at restaurants, gas stations, airports, she was approached by men and women of all ages who wanted to say, "Thank you. You made me love school, and you changed my life." Seriously. It started to seem like an extended Candid Camera episode. And then she went back to school, which she would have done earlier if not for us, and extended her reach, transforming entire communities.

But do you remember your principal? A looming presence or faded bureaucrat who rarely emerged from his office but for occasional assemblies or disciplinary cases? You didn't go to my mother's school. My mother, she of the neat blonde pageboy and unfailingly tidy dress, spent the last twenty odd years riding a scooter, throwing tea parties, harvesting and housing hermit crabs, wearing costumes, distributing apples and shells, celebrating birthdays, saving pennies, hosting auctions, defeating bullies, fighting for the underdog, educating teachers, and falling in love each fall with a whole new universe--with the undiminished enthusiasm, energy, creativity, sense of justice and celebration of learning that she brought to that school building every single day.

It took me a long time to understand why my mother worked so hard, such long hours, on weekends, all summer, on every vacation we ever took. Many people think education is a field for those who like summers off, early dismissal, dinner at home. These people have never met my mother. I can safely say I have never encountered anyone, ever, in any field, at any stage of my life, who gave as much to their job as my mother did to hers. And when I finally did come to understand, to see that my mother was one of those rare individuals in this world who found what she was meant to do and did it as well as a human being possibly could, I also understood that she was lucky, but not as lucky as those who reaped the benefits.

In brief, my mother can make a child who hates school, has been labeled a "problem kid," has been thrown out of another institute of learning, steals, lies, cheats, beats up other kids, is a social outcast, is suicidal, is literally destitute, into a child who spends the rest of his life respecting and living up to her values: wanting, needing, to learn, and treating other people with kindness. Unequivocally. How do I know this? Because I saw her do it over and over again, up close and personal, met the children whose lives she transformed, not just the downtrodden ones but the average ones, who never felt average under her gaze, the show-offs and overachievers, who learned how to be humble and kind under her tutelage.

Life is unfair, and my mother knows this, but she must have decided at some point that her school, anyway, was going to buck the trend. There was never any room, not so much as a crack, in her school for the popularity contests, bullying, "mean girls," raised Cains, teacher favoritism, sucking up or playground hierarchies that infiltrated every school I ever went to in some way or another. People always say you can't control these things, that kids will be kids, and we need to let them hash it out amongst themselves. My mother, I know, has always found that lazy, sloppy, unacceptable. How do you have a school full of children who treat each other with kindness? You make it the fundamental guiding principal of the school, the Core Value, as my mother would say, and everything else falls into place.

Guess what? It works. Ask around, Nobody's ever bullied twice, been bullied twice, in my mother's school. Dick Cheney himself would surrender after one visit to her office, where the only disciplinary tool is a conversation based on empathy and respect. Children left that office transformed. Again, I saw it myself, with my very own eyes, over and over again. And when children feel safe, when teachers and staff feel safe, and supported and encouraged and respected, the door swings open so wide that the learning is limitless. For everybody.

How many of us can say that we have made the world a better place in a practical, hands-on way? How many of us can say that we have changed the trajectory of thousands of lives by virtue of the work that we do? My mother, a woman who singlehandedly, personally and unilaterally ensured that no child in her school ever missed a meal or wore clothes that were not clean, warm and suitable in every way, a woman who vacationed on an island with a school with no library and built them one herself, a woman who was just invited to the wedding of a boy I knew decades ago when he was a student in her class who told her, when she had to decline the invitation, "That's okay. You'll be there anyway"--and a woman who has never mentioned any of these things and so much more to another soul, who has never asked for attention, let alone accolades, for the awesome work she has done--she can.

She won't, of course. She never would, never will. And she will be angry at me, on some level, for doing so myself. But I don't care. My mother is many things, not the least of which is: a tough act to follow. Her standards for herself are unimaginably high. Although it is inconceivable to me, I suspect she doesn't quite fathom what she hath wrought. I would like her to know that the work she has done will reverberate for generations, not just in her school and its community, but far beyond those parameters. She has accomplished nothing less than a quiet revolution, and every teacher, custodian, nurse, secretary, volunteer, parent, sibling, and most of all student who ever had the privilege of working with her, will never forget. And neither will I.