Onward

The first week of school has passed with surprising success. I explicitly talked about the achievement gap with my kids on Friday... incarceration rates relating to education and the disparity among schools in rich and poor neighborhoods. (75% of folks in state prisons did not finish high school; we did some work with graphs.) They were rightfully outraged. At the end of class I was having them reflect- asking them to respond with two compelling reasons education is important. One wrote, "To prove the statistics wrong and be all i can be ya digg???"
I'm loving them right now.

DONATION UPDATE:
Here are some of the things we're purchasing with the money my wonderful cousin gathered for Truman through her senior project:
-A soundsystem for the gym. Assemblies and performances will be so much easier with actual sound equipment. Also- the school owning the stuff will save us $1500 in one year because we can DJ our own dances (dances are the most reliable fund-raisers).
-School uniforms. We have an especially high number of homeless students this year (already, about 75% of our students live at the poverty level). One mom, recently out of a shelter, was keeping her kids out of school for the first few days because they couldn't afford the uniforms. This afternoon I'm going to buy a bunch of assorted sizes so all the kids can come to school looking sharp in their black and gold.
-The Peacejam curriculum. This is a program designed for "at-risk-youth." Very positive, very relevant. I'm excited.
-A video training on peer-mediation. So far so good- I haven't seen a fight yet. (Last year I had one on the second day of school.) A lot of the kids have never been taught alternatives to violence, and it is what they see happening all around them. With a peer-mediation program, hopefully we can empower them to help each other make the right decisions to stay out of trouble and be more peaceful and productive.

I'm also working on writing a grant to be able to take my kids on a field trip. There's a museum of African American History downtown I think could be great- weave in social studies and writing and getting off of the Westbank for a minute.

I am excited.

Also. Start thinking about Mardi Gras.

P.S. I used to babysit this kid:
Look at everyone growing all up.