Category: Education VT Style

Is School a Place Where Children Die?

Is School a Place Where Children Die?

by Kelly (and the Buck) ♥ 7 Comments
Malala Yousafrzai
Malala Yousafrzai

Has going to school become a risk for our children, even in the United States?

This is the question I ponder after receiving an automated message saying that a threat in our district has resulted in increased security– even here, at our tiny elementary building in rural Vermont.

Of course there are no “even here’s” anymore. Shootings can “even” happen in first-grade classrooms during morning circle time in a “safe”  New England town, not just in crowded high schools across the country.

Columbine. When my husband considered shifting from elementary to high school, his safety was my first concern. Who knew that within a decade, violence wouldn’t be limited to teenagers.

Map delineating 387 school shootings since 1992.
Map delineating 387 school shootings since 1992.

“What will be our new normal?” asks a friend.

I think it has already come.

Sobering statistics creep up on us revealing that 387 school shootings have taken place since 1992; and that children in America are 13 times more likely to be murdered with guns as children in other industrialized nations.

“I’m not going to school tomorrow, Mom,” my oldest tells me after we get the call about the threat. “What I learn in a day  isn’t worth my life.”

What about 14 year-old Malala Yousafzai–shot in the head for encouraging fellow girls to pursue an education in Pakistan? Shouldn’t education in the land of the free be that valuable?

Or have we become that cheap?

Kelly Salasin, lifelong educator, mother of 2, January 2013

School Threat

School Threat

by Kelly (and the Buck) ♥ 9 Comments

So the violence that has spread through our Nation has reached our community–with a phone call telling us that our schools will receive extra patrol this week due to a threat.

That’s all we know.

Do we really want to know more?

Are we supposed to send our kids to school now?

Is this a test?

“Mom, I’m not going. One day of school isn’t worth it. I’ll be lying there shot on the floor thinking, ‘What a waste.'”

This is what it’s come to. Our children are casual with the possibility of being shot at school.

“Lock the doors!” parents holler.

But Sandy Hook was locked.

I do think we need to be cautious about threats, but I also think we need to be cautions of our fear. This is a society riveted by violence. Defined by it in many ways. Proud of it. We don’t want to encourage those who are prone to acting it out by titillating them with our hysteria.

Local educator, Dan Braden, just returned from the March on DC with his young family. He makes this suggestion to channel our angst:

It’s a great day to write your representatives at every level asking them to take action to reduce the number of weapons such as those used at Sandy Hook immediately.” 

Another educator suggests we seriously ARM teachers in this bold statement that has been circulating around FB (from Mary Cathryn Ricker, the President of the St. Paul Federation of Teachers):

You want to arm me? Good.

Then arm me with a school psychologist at my school who has time to do more than test and sit in meetings about testing.

Arm me with enough counselors so we can build skills to prevent violence, have meaningful discussions with students about their future and not merely frantically adjust student schedules like a Jenga game.

Arm me with social workers who can thoughtfully attend to a student’s and her family’s needs so I. Can. Teach.

Arm me with enough school nurses so that they are accessible to every child and can work as a team with me rather than operate their offices as de facto urgent care centers.

Arm me with more days on the calendar for teaching and learning and fewer days for standardized testing. Arm me with class sizes that allow my colleagues and I to know both our students and their families well.

Arm my colleagues and me with the time it takes to improve together and the time it takes to give great feedback to students about their work and progress.

Until you arm me to the hilt with what it will take to meet the needs of an increasingly vulnerable student population, I respectfully request you keep your opinions on schools and our safety to yourself NRA… “

Kelly Salasin, 2013

Sign of the Times

Sign of the Times

by Kelly (and the Buck) ♥ 2 Comments

“A new worldview is the work of scientists & philosophers, poets & mystics: scientists to understand how the Universe operates; philosophers to ponder what this means and how we should live; mystics to experience in the depths of our being a felt sense of the Universe; and finally, poets & artists, to articulate the myth by which we all live.”

~Theodore Richards, Cosmosophia

I stopped listening to the news back in the days of Clinton & Lewinsky, the moment my son called out from the backseat, “I’m sick of this Bill and Monica stuff.”  (He was 4.)

Up until that time, Lloyd and I enjoyed listening to Public Radio, VPR or NHPR, whichever one we could tune in, especially on our twenty-minute trip over the mountain to his preschool.

The highlight of this drive, when we timed it right, was The Writer’s Almanac–with the delicious voice of Garrison Keillor. The opening music from that program still stirs my heart, especially as my little boy heads to college next year.

Lloyd grew out of diapers listening to Public Radio and perhaps it was unfair of me not to play kids music like the other moms, but he didn’t seem to mind; and I hadn’t realized he was really listening until the day he pulled out his thumb, and said “Turn it off.”

He was wise like that. Maybe it was because we didn’t have tv. Lloyd could clearly see what mattered in life…  like money.  He was always intrigued by numbers and their value. When he was about 8 or 9, he sat on his bed pondering the ten-dollar bill that came in a card from his grandparents: “What makes this one worth any more than the other? They’re all just pieces of paper.”

As he watched his (teaching) parents struggle over that paper, Lloyd grew up with the aim of making lots of it.  No one was surprised then to learn that he decided to take business classes in highschool, or that he set his sights on a career in finance.

Just recently however, a chance meeting with a family friend at a funeral refocused his goals. Though Lloyd has long been enamored with expensive clothes, fancy cars and bling, he suddenly noticed something was missing in the self-absorbed success of a businessman.

Soon after, he announced that he planned to study development economics; after which his father and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Last week his senior “Elections” class received a visit from the Republican candidate for Governor.  Lloyd eagerly waited for the Q&A time, and afterward, his teacher pulled my husband aside. Lloyd was respectful, he said, but he wouldn’t let the guy hedge around the question he asked him about environmental policy.

Apparently, our son’s persistence led the candidate to finally quip: “What would you be willing to give up for that?”

This kind of response makes my blood boil, and it continued percolating all the way to the mall in Holyoke, where no rural mother likes to be, even if she did break her only pair of glasses.

In my dismay, I hadn’t thought to bring along something to listen to so I resorted to the radio for the hour drive, irritably jumping from station to station, until a British voice soothed my attention… on Public Radio.

As I pulled onto the highway, I turned up the volume when I heard the interviewer say, “What is it about the American psyche that makes them so ‘anti-government?”

It was an intriguing question, and it was just this kind of outside perspective that gave me hope; but moments later I was ready to shut the radio off altogether when the interview shifted to someone at the Republican Headquarters in Paul Ryan’s hometown.

The word “sustainable” stopped me…

The current spending isn’t “sustainable.” We can’t pass down debt like this to the next generation.

I banged on my steering wheel, “But it’s okay to give them polluted water and air!”

The interview shifted once again–to a personal trainer–who talked about the intense workout that Paul Ryan did every day. I made a mental note to pick up an audio book for the drive home.

6 hours of eyeglass shopping later, I settled in on the biography of Steve Jobs, curious about the intersection of success and creativity and relationship. Before the introduction was over, I realized that the author picked up the line of thinking begun by Lloyd as he questioned the value of paper, and later asked about the environment:

The creativity that can occur when a feel for both the humanities and the sciences combine in one strong personality was the topic that most interested me in my biographies of Franklin and Einstein, and I believe that it will be a key to creating innovative economies in the twenty-first century.  (Walter Issacson)

Steve Jobs echoed this with his own statement:

I always thought of myself as a humanities person as a kid, but I liked electronics. Then I read something that one of my heroes, Edwin Land of Polaroid, said about the importance of people who could stand at the intersection of humanities and sciences, and I decided that’s what I wanted to do.

I thought back to the bustling Apple Store in the mall–with its intercultural buzz of curiosity and connection–and I felt hopeful again.

Maybe we’re ready to allow money to serve humanity, rather than the other way around.

Maybe we’re learning that it is truly unsustainable to put humanity on the back burner until it’s more affordable.

Maybe we’re beginning to understand how absurd it is to place so much value on what is “make believe” (money) than that which is real: our planet, our bodies and our relationships.

…And may we be smart enough and creative enough and courageous enough to act on this unfolding understanding.

Perhaps Apple says it best:

The people who are crazy enough
to think they can change
the world are the ones who do.

(p.s. I just learned that VPR is opening a new station–in Brattleboro. I’ll take that as a sign.)

Kelly Salasin, September 2012

Hits the Spot Yoga Teacher Training–in Southern Vermont

Hits the Spot Yoga Teacher Training–in Southern Vermont

by Kelly (and the Buck) ♥ 0 Leave a Comment
Solar Hill gardens, Kelly Salasin, 2011, all rights reserved

When I first moved to Vermont, 18 years ago, I heard about Scott Willis, and a place called Solar Hill, I just never knew where it was. When I finally did meet Scott, just a few years back, he wasn’t what I expected.

The name “Scott” brought to mind a youthful, blonde-haired, tennis player, and maybe he was at one time, but now he was a middle-aged guy with a softer figure and a touch of grey.  Just my kind of guru.

When he opened my first yoga class with Stevie Ray Vaughan, I was hooked; and when he tossed out a few bad jokes, I knew I’d found what I was looking for.

It wasn’t too long before I felt the yearning to become a yoga teacher myself, only I knew that my tight muscled, low-keyed body couldn’t handle the intensity of some of the typical trainings. “I wish Scott would offer a yoga teacher training,” I said to my husband.

And then he did.

In 2011, Scott began Hits the Spot Yoga Teacher Training, a year-long program that takes place one weekend a month.  That first class filled up before I could get on the list, but I signed on well in advance for the 2012 program.

I am both excited and anxious. Anxious for all the reasons I’ve already covered–tight muscles, lack of ability or inclination toward physical exertion; those kind of things. Fortunately, what I look forward to outweighs my fears.

I look forward to the challenge of deepening into the body and out of the mind. I look forward to the challenge of learning basic anatomy–if nothing else than to develop a greater appreciation for the gift of this miraculous instrument we call the body. I look forward to the way the training would seep into my every day life and out into my overall outlook and presence. I look forward to expanding my platform as a teacher and group leader.

Despite all this looking forward, I’m still afraid, but I’m counting on some bad jokes and some good tunes to ease the way.

Kelly Salasin, October 2011

For more information about Scott Willis and Hits the Spot Yoga and Yoga Teacher Training, click here.

To read more about balancing life with yoga, click here.

Our Own Rally for Sanity

Our Own Rally for Sanity

by Kelly (and the Buck) ♥ 2 Comments

Rhyme & Reason have been restored to the Kingdom of Wisdom–uniting the feuding Lords of Words and Numbers. If only this were true of our country!

Alas, this act of sweet sanity took place on the stage of the New England Youth Theater in this afternoon’s adaptation of The Phantom Tollbooth–a classic children’s adventure novel, delighting young and old with whimsy and insight.

The heroes of this story set off to rescue the Princesses of Rhyme and Reason, but first they travel into the Land of Expectations, sink into the Doldrums, face arrests and chaos, deal with ignorance and senselessness–and worst of all: escape the Demon of “Trivium“–who distract the heroes with trivial tasks to keep them from their noble pursuits.

(If I didn’t know better, I would think that Brattleboro was making a political statement.)

This NEYT production with performers of “mixed-abilities” certainly made a statement about “possibilities” rather than “disabilities”–a distinction highlighted by Director, Laura Lawson Tucker.

Tucker beautifully narrated this multi-media production, like a good fairy godmother–cueing lines, gently reflecting redirections, and even enlisting the audience to encourage reluctant actors to shine.

And shine they did!

I was embarrassed to realize that I had generically assumed that all people with disabilities were in some way the same.  But this production by the Theater Adventure Program (TAP), illuminated my ignorance with those who could dance, and those who could sing, and those who could bring a character alive, and those who brought us all to laughter.

“Theater is powerful,” Tucker said, “It gives voice.”

The power of voice was no more evident than in the young man without one who played the part of the Humbug.  He delivered his lines by pressing “play” on a recorder–and beamed with joy each time his “voice” was expressed–delighting the audience.

Suddenly the bigger picture of this production was evident as I witnessed the team of caregivers, costumers and stage crew who worked together to create this experience with the students and those of us in audience.  From the behind the scenes director,Darlene Jenson, who seemed to be in three places at once, to the Interpreter who signed the show with such style that she too supported the show with each glance and expression and smile.

I don’t think I’ll ever forget the sight of Michael Jackson’s “ABC” being signed–and after the show, we were all still singing.

At times, the production was so engaging that I wasn’t sure where to look, and my eyes shifted from the actors, to the narrator, to the interpreter, to the props and scenery, and back to the actors again.  Lots of surprises were built into the show including the accompaniment of an electric guitar for the solo, One is  Lonely Number--and the appearance of a huge gold-eyed monster.

As an educator myself, I can’t imagine what it took to orchestrate this entire production. I was particularly dazzled by the scene in which the sunset was orchestrated by a conductor–creatively portrayed by a spiral of mulit-ability dancers and scarves–first yellows and oranges, then purples and pinks.

The theater was packed from top to bottom for this “inclusive” production of The Phantom Tollbooth, and my son and I were proud to be among the audience.

Although we failed to complete our read aloud of this treasured book before we attended the show, we look forward to returning to it with characters brought to life.

Thank you to all the actors and parents and supporters who made this experience possible–for all of us!  (And thanks to the Vermont voters who brought back a little more Rhyme & Reason to the state.  Now, it’s up to us to show the WAY!)

Kelly Salasin, November 3, 2010

Brattleboro, Vermont