No one talks...

We lost a student Sunday night. Not just any student, but a senior who was 5 weeks away from graduating. A student who had transferred to our school and had worked tirelessly to raise his GPA so he could walk the stage. A young man who was a leader on our campus and for the men's basketball team. I worked with this young man daily and had just sat with his Mom and him on Friday talking about graduation and creating a plan to ensure he makes it.

And his life ended. He was standing on the sidewalk in front of his house and was killed.

Yesterday, another student I work with had his house shot at twice. He was hit in the hand.

I am numb unsure of how to feel. But my body aches, my heart hearts and my stomach is in knots. I am still processing it all and will continue to each and everyday.

I sit here, at school today, angry and sad. These incidents do not make national news and they barely make local news. Why? As a country are we immune to these tragedies and the conditions in which they occur? Do we not wish to admit that we have cities that are being left behind?

Oakland has had 35 homicides so far and although I don't wish to acknowledge it, I know there will be more this year. Where is the conversation or national coverage? Where is the investigation? Or the public outrage?

I want to talk about this. I want you to talk about this. I want our state and country to talk about this. Conversation is the first step to addressing this. Silence does nothing. Talk. PLEASE. Our kids deserve it.

To be of use...

So fitting for the work that I do daily....

To Be Of Use

The people I love best

jump into work head first

without dallying in the shallows

and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight

They seem to become natives of that element

the black sleek heads of seals

bounding like half-submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,

who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,

who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,

who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge

in the task, who go into the fields to harvest

and work in a row and pass the bags along,

who are not parlor generals and field deserters

but move in a common rhythm

when the food must come in or the fire by put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.

Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.

but the thing worth doing well

has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.

Greek amphoras for wine or oil

Hopi vases that hold corn are put in museums

but you know they were made to be used.

The pitcher cries for water to carry

and a person for work that is real.

Marge Piercy

Brought me back...

I had a moment today that brought me back to year # 1. What do you do when an adult wants to physically fight a young person? What do you when both students involved are on your caseload? How do you talk "down" a mother, someone who is your elder, a person from the community, when they are so passionately angry?

The easy answer is to walk away. The easy answer is to turn your back and come back tomorrow forgetting what today brought.

But, in life I have learned there is no easy answer.

So instead, I tried and I failed. I failed to protect the institution of education today. I failed to protect two young people among hundreds. I failed to connect with a passionate parent.

And instead, I cried. I cried during 4th period by myself. I cried because it is painful to watch. It is painful to watch. It is painful to not fully understand one's circumstance despite trying. It is painful to feel helpless. It is painful to feel useless in a situation that so desperately needed me.

And while I cried two students I care deeply for fought among adults.

And then to cap the day off, I held a meeting with a family where the family cried. They cried because they know their young daughter can do so well in school, can graduate and go on to be successful. And again, I watched. I watched feeling empathy and determined to not give up.

Four years after I began this journey, days continue to be just as tough as year 1.

Our superintendent is resigning, our director of special education resigned and so many other teachers will walk out at the end of the school year. I cannot be one of them and that is why I stay. The community I teach in deserves to be a community filled with hope, love, resources and equality. I will have successes this year...today was just not one of them.