Read For Your Life
Noisy, excited kids filled the room. They moved from box to box searching for something they hadn’t read before. Some of the younger kids found their perfect book and plopped down to read, unable to wait for their parents to purchase it, let alone till they got it home. Parents read to young children while their older siblings still hunted. Welcome to the used book sale at the Canton Public Library—an event that many wait for all year.
I spoke to teachers who came to buy for their classrooms, ecstatic upon finding a class set of “Goosebumps”.
“This is the only way that I can afford to send my students home with books,” one third grade teacher told me. “Some of them have never owned a book in their lives.”
That wasn’t true of the kids who were there that Saturday morning. These were the fortunate ones brought up in houses filled with books. They visited the library every week for story time, or research, or to graze the stacks for the sheer pleasure of reading.
“Mom, look at all these books!” one little boy screamed excitedly as he walked into the room.
“But dad, I want more books,” a young lady pleaded with her father upon being told that she had enough and they had to leave.
I totaled up paperbacks and hard covered books, fiction and non-fiction, mysteries and classics. Four paperbacks or two hard covered books for a dollar-- people couldn’t believe how little cash they had to hand over. “Are you sure?” they asked me again and again.
“Oh yes”, I assured them as I bagged their purchases. “Just promise me you’ll enjoy them.”
Many kids struggled to narrow down their selections. Even as a parent would ask, “Are you sure you’re going to read this?” They would answer, “But mom you don’t understand, I need this book!”
How often do you hear a kid say that? Families carried out bags of books, all of them smiling, all of them excited about going home to read. Others went on to the adult room to collect yet more books. These are families who understand that reading is the gateway to the future, to success, to the world. These are kids who will probably not drop out of school.
They are the opposite of my GED students, who dropped out at 16 or 17 and are struggling to keep their heads above water. When I ask them if they like to read they look at me as if it was a trick question.
When I ask them what they read, they tell me the newspaper--the horoscope or the sports pages. Some may pick up a magazine, a few read the Bible. When I ask if they read novels, they give me the look that they reserve for crazy people though they are too polite to tell me so.
There will be a hearing in the State House discussing whether kids should be able to drop out of school at 16. Boston City Councilors Tito Jackson and John Connolly are sponsoring a home rule petition that would force students to stay in school until they are 18 years old. In his September 24th column, Boston globe journalist, Adrian Walker quotes Jackson as saying,
We won’t let them drink or smoke or vote at 16, but we let them drop out of life at 16. This is about what’s best, what’s right, and what’s responsible for our kids.
The best part about this legislation is that raising the drop out age to 18 is not its only aim.
The state legislation, proposed by Representative Martha Walz, is far more comprehensive. It calls for raising the dropout age gradually to allow school districts to develop strategies for teaching kids who have given up on traditional classrooms.
It’s not enough to simply pass a law to raise the drop-out age. We also have to figure our why so many of our kids want to drop out. The graduation rate in Boston is only 63% and even those who graduate struggle in college. Connolly has talked to teachers who tell him that kids as young as 12 are already planning to drop out when they’re 16. We need to understand why they are already disengaged at 12 years old and we have to develop programs that will keep them in school. This is everyone’s problem. Walker points out that,
Mounting evidence says dropouts are far more likely to be unemployed, live in poverty, or end up incarcerated than their peers who graduate from high school. A study in 2009 by Northeastern’s Center for Labor Market Studies put the average income of high school dropouts at less than $9,000 a year. Jackson says that comes with a heavy price tag for taxpayers, when some of those dropouts stray.
“We spend $11,000 a year to educate a student but $46,000 for incarceration,’’ he said.
The price is high whether you look at it financially or socially. Disengagement begins earlier than 12. It begins when there is no one to read to a child, to take him to the library, to introduce him to the thrill of words flying across a page. Any program we develop to keep our children engaged must be based on reading. Any child who believes that she needs books like the air she breathes will find her own way in the world.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Powerless
Powerless
Sometimes I fool myself into thinking that I’ve got life all worked out, figured out, and straightened out. Then suddenly I can’t dry my hair or have my morning coffee, can’t turn on the computer to check my mail, can’t even open the garage door to get my car out. When the electricity is off--when I flick switches but nothing comes on but a sudden headache, I’m reminded of how helpless we’ve become without our electric conveniences. We’ve become so dependent on them that we’ve forgotten how to do the most basic things when they’re not available. Our world has gotten too advanced for its own good.
Steve and I have been incredibly lucky when it comes to natural disasters. We have never been in the path of floods, fires, tornadoes, earthquakes or tsunamis. We’ve had too much water in the garage, ponds in the back yard, trees down and wasps on the porch, but they’ve all receded in time and have been quickly forgotten. Even with our latest storm, Irene, one of our trees hit a power line rendering us powerless for the day, but we didn’t have to suffer through a dark week.
I’m not sure when I started becoming so nervous at the threat of a storm. Maybe once we had kids I couldn’t bear for them to be frightened. Or maybe it was just a part of getting older and more anxious. I used to love watching a storm from the other side of a window. Now I can’t bear to watch, imagining the trees falling on the roof or the house floating away. I just want it to be over. And maybe it began when it seemed like everything in the house and my life was being controlled by computers.
Computers were the reason that I let my reason run away with my brains before the year 2000. Remember the Y2K crazies? Everyone was sure that at the stroke of midnight we would all be doomed. Every computer in the world would stop working, locusts would ravage our crops, the earth would crack open and the four horsemen of the apocalypse would finish us all off. Everything I read warned me to get cracking and stockpile food, water, money, batteries and chocolate. This went on for an entire year till I finally gave in and began collecting bottled water, canned goods and candles, hiding it all in an unused closet. I knew that Steve would laugh hysterically if he knew what I was doing but I couldn’t help myself—the panic had set in.
December 31st Steve went to bed early and Mariel and I sat up to greet the new year. Unfortunately I hadn’t realized that this night was special for Mariel. She was excited about the new millennium. I ran around the house looking for old noisemakers and funny hats, ginger ale and champagne glasses. We turned on the television to watch the clock ticking everywhere on the globe. Slowly the year 2000 rolled in gently around the world with celebrations and fireworks--no locusts, no tsunamis, no apocalypse. Thanks to my clear eyed little girl I began to see how ridiculous my fears had been. When Steve found out about my stash the next day he nearly split his sides laughing.
So when the weather forecasters began churning up the fear machines a week before Irene, I remembered Y2K and all the times when their forecasted deluges had turned into drips. I ignored it all—up until the day when I had to do my food shopping. Then a little bit of the old panic tickled me and I bought a case of water, some candles and went searching for D batteries. The battery wall had been stripped clean. We would have to do without.
I kept hoping that Irene would disappear like the other scares but this time the forecasters were right. I watched our unwanted guest and wondered how long she would stay. At 11:00 I heard the crack. A second later the power blew out. I ran to the window and saw exactly what I expected to see—one of the large willow branches had broken off and hit the power lines. Those beautiful willows have been the bane of our existence since we moved into this house. Every time we have a storm I pray to the goddess of willows.
We spent the dreary day wondering when we would get our power back. I made plans for the food in our freezer and getting to work the next day. I tried to read but couldn’t concentrate, worrying that something else would happen. By 4:00 Irene calmed down and began her exit. Then at 6:00 the NSTAR cherry picker accompanied by Police Chief Kenny Berkowitz came to cut the limb loose. It was then that I found out that we got our power back so quickly because the senior housing complex next door was blacked out as well. We all stood there watching the limb come down and the power come on.
We were so lucky. No one was hurt and there was no damage to the house. The next day standing on the train platform listening to the crowd’s horror stories and realizing that many of them still had no power, I silently thanked whoever had watched over us. And today I bought some D batteries—for next time.
Sometimes I fool myself into thinking that I’ve got life all worked out, figured out, and straightened out. Then suddenly I can’t dry my hair or have my morning coffee, can’t turn on the computer to check my mail, can’t even open the garage door to get my car out. When the electricity is off--when I flick switches but nothing comes on but a sudden headache, I’m reminded of how helpless we’ve become without our electric conveniences. We’ve become so dependent on them that we’ve forgotten how to do the most basic things when they’re not available. Our world has gotten too advanced for its own good.
Steve and I have been incredibly lucky when it comes to natural disasters. We have never been in the path of floods, fires, tornadoes, earthquakes or tsunamis. We’ve had too much water in the garage, ponds in the back yard, trees down and wasps on the porch, but they’ve all receded in time and have been quickly forgotten. Even with our latest storm, Irene, one of our trees hit a power line rendering us powerless for the day, but we didn’t have to suffer through a dark week.
I’m not sure when I started becoming so nervous at the threat of a storm. Maybe once we had kids I couldn’t bear for them to be frightened. Or maybe it was just a part of getting older and more anxious. I used to love watching a storm from the other side of a window. Now I can’t bear to watch, imagining the trees falling on the roof or the house floating away. I just want it to be over. And maybe it began when it seemed like everything in the house and my life was being controlled by computers.
Computers were the reason that I let my reason run away with my brains before the year 2000. Remember the Y2K crazies? Everyone was sure that at the stroke of midnight we would all be doomed. Every computer in the world would stop working, locusts would ravage our crops, the earth would crack open and the four horsemen of the apocalypse would finish us all off. Everything I read warned me to get cracking and stockpile food, water, money, batteries and chocolate. This went on for an entire year till I finally gave in and began collecting bottled water, canned goods and candles, hiding it all in an unused closet. I knew that Steve would laugh hysterically if he knew what I was doing but I couldn’t help myself—the panic had set in.
December 31st Steve went to bed early and Mariel and I sat up to greet the new year. Unfortunately I hadn’t realized that this night was special for Mariel. She was excited about the new millennium. I ran around the house looking for old noisemakers and funny hats, ginger ale and champagne glasses. We turned on the television to watch the clock ticking everywhere on the globe. Slowly the year 2000 rolled in gently around the world with celebrations and fireworks--no locusts, no tsunamis, no apocalypse. Thanks to my clear eyed little girl I began to see how ridiculous my fears had been. When Steve found out about my stash the next day he nearly split his sides laughing.
So when the weather forecasters began churning up the fear machines a week before Irene, I remembered Y2K and all the times when their forecasted deluges had turned into drips. I ignored it all—up until the day when I had to do my food shopping. Then a little bit of the old panic tickled me and I bought a case of water, some candles and went searching for D batteries. The battery wall had been stripped clean. We would have to do without.
I kept hoping that Irene would disappear like the other scares but this time the forecasters were right. I watched our unwanted guest and wondered how long she would stay. At 11:00 I heard the crack. A second later the power blew out. I ran to the window and saw exactly what I expected to see—one of the large willow branches had broken off and hit the power lines. Those beautiful willows have been the bane of our existence since we moved into this house. Every time we have a storm I pray to the goddess of willows.
We spent the dreary day wondering when we would get our power back. I made plans for the food in our freezer and getting to work the next day. I tried to read but couldn’t concentrate, worrying that something else would happen. By 4:00 Irene calmed down and began her exit. Then at 6:00 the NSTAR cherry picker accompanied by Police Chief Kenny Berkowitz came to cut the limb loose. It was then that I found out that we got our power back so quickly because the senior housing complex next door was blacked out as well. We all stood there watching the limb come down and the power come on.
We were so lucky. No one was hurt and there was no damage to the house. The next day standing on the train platform listening to the crowd’s horror stories and realizing that many of them still had no power, I silently thanked whoever had watched over us. And today I bought some D batteries—for next time.
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