Tomorrow is the end of a very long and stressful school year. Due to a very snowy winter, narrow borough streets that were hard to plow, and a myriad of other reasons, we had the year that would not stop. Fighting, runaways, dropouts, drug abuse, pregnancies (students' not mine!) reinforced the idea that education is not a priority for many of my students.
What keeps me going? It is that silent majority, the ones that don't make any trouble, that really do want to learn. They come to school almost every day, do their work, and try to succeed despite everything that is going on around them. One of my favorite students graduated yesterday. Actually, I never had her in a class, but she was a member of the Asian American Club I sponsor. She followed in her sister's footsteps as vice-president and then president of the club. But she was the rebel in the family. She found herself pregnant at the beginning of her junior year. Her parents insisted that she marry so as not to shame the family. She missed only three weeks of school and not only kept up her grades, but graduated with honors. She is going to Temple next year. She'll commute and work part-time to help support her family.
No comments:
Post a Comment