How to support teachers & kids at the school board...

and a request from us!

Photo by Greg Childress

The first students I taught in North Carolina, 17 years ago, were fifth graders who had learned the state motto, esse quam videri, as fourth graders. It translates as “to be, rather than to seem,” and is a fitting slogan for a state that didn’t think it needed a motto in the first place (we were the last of the thirteen colonies to adopt one).

I remember reviewing the motto with my fifth graders in a game of North Carolina trivia, played on a whole-grade field trip to the headwaters of the Haw River. They knew it well, and embodied it through their embrace of their own, and their peers’, varied enthusiasms, quirks, abilities, disabilities, interests, fears, and senses of humor. This was a class of kids who showed up every day as their honest, true selves, in part because our classroom, and our school, made it possible to do so without fear.

That isn’t possible in North Carolina classrooms today. From toxigenic mold that shut down an entire school system, to a dangerous teacher and bus driver shortage, to a hateful, harmful new law targeting LGBTQ+ kids, school is a scary place for many kids and teachers.

A new teacher, and former graduate student of mine, texted me this week about the training they received in pre-service meetings: not to call any kid by a name other than the one on the roll (not even a nickname), not to ask about pronouns. “No chance I’m outing any of my students,” they told me. This teacher is also queer, BIPOC, and a brilliant writer—I encouraged them to become a teacher here, and I know they’ll make an important, positive impact on their students. But how long can they last in a system that exploits LGBTQ+ people as political targets? This teacher, and others, are living an upside-down version of the state motto: forced to seem like we’re supporting parents and families, when in fact we’re creating a hostile place for kids and teachers to learn and teach.

It’s hard to know what to do, as a parent, other than vote and try to support your own schools as best you can. But more and more of us are showing up to school board meetings, each month, to voice our concerns or just to give support to the teachers and administrators who have been put in this awful position.

If you live in NC, one way to get prepared to support your schools is to complete the free, online, Public School Strong training. You’ll get a free T-shirt that you can wear to school board meetings, and—more importantly—connect with like-minded public school supporters in your county. Then you can start showing up, meeting up, and organizing to help your public schools.

The first time I spoke at a school board meeting, I was nervous. The room (at George Moses Horton middle school) was huge, and full of people! Did anyone really need to hear what I had to say, scrawled in a notebook while my kids were in music class? What if I went over my allotted three minutes? Would there be a hook, a buzzer, boos?

Of course nothing like that happened, and by the time they got to public comments (after the student and staff awards for excellence are given out), the crowd was actually a lot smaller and less intimidating. I said what I had to say (praise for our small school’s ability to handle problems at the school level, rather than taking every issue to the school board), and the next day—this was unexpected—our principal thanked me for my comments, and I had a nice email from one of the board members too.

Public School Strong hosts useful trainings on giving effective public comment, but here are the basics, as I understand them:

1. Write your comments ahead of time, and time them so that you are comfortable not going over the time limit (a speedy three minutes!). If you can print out your public comments, the board will take a copy and enter them into the record.

2. At some school board meetings, like ours, you’ll need to show up thirty minutes early to sign up to speak. In Chatham, that means showing up before 5:30 pm on meeting days. (Other counties, like Wake, allow for commenters to register online.)

3. Keep your comments positive. Start by thanking the school board and superintendent, who have difficult and important jobs. (Fun fact: Before he was governor or president, Jimmy Carter was a school board member and chair in Sumter County, Georgia for seven years!).

4. Remember that your audience is primarily the board. You’ll be facing them, and your comments are intended to help them make decisions about issues facing your community and schools.

5. But! Teachers, principals, staff members, and parents will be in the room too. It’s a useful place to praise your school, letting the board and community know the great things that are happening there (in spite of challenges), and to acknowledge the dedication of school workers.

6. Be specific in your requests, if you are asking for them, and be prepared to pivot if these requests have been granted or are being considered.

7. Yes, it is possible to take your kids to school board meetings! Just take some books, drawing paper, and snacks. I’ve taken Bea and Harriet to a few (there were jokes about the “school bored”), and they were welcomed by everyone. You could also organize a kid-watch system, with activities outside the room that would allow parents to focus on the meeting or giving comments.

At the September Chatham County school board meeting, my Public School Strong group came prepared to talk about Senate Bill 49, the “Parents’ Bill of Rights,” which we wanted the board to address, in opposition to the bill and in support of LGBTQ+ kids, especially trans and nonbinary kids. SB 49—which, by the way, has not come with a dime of support from the legislature—has many elements that are redundant, or already inscribed in our laws. But it also says that teachers may not call students by a different name than what’s on the roll, and that teachers and counselors have to notify parents if a child asks to use a different pronoun or name. It creates new processes for parents to challenge books and textbooks, prevents discussion of gender identity in K-4th grade, institutes burdensome new requirements for principals and administrators, and establishes confusing and dangerous new rules preventing school nurses from treating injured kids without parental permission.

(Oh, and here’s an un-fun fact: one of the main sponsors and pushers of SB 49, State Senator Amy Galey, represents Alamance County, where she served for four years on the Board of Commissioners. Alamance kids spent the first two weeks of the year with almost the entire system shut down because the chronically underfunded schools there were contaminated with mold.)

Before the September school board meeting, the Chatham County Board of Education released a draft resolution in response, and our comments reflected our thanks to them—as well as our ongoing concerns for the way SB 49 will impact our schools.

More than a dozen Public School Strong supporters showed up at our most recent school board meeting, and four members of the group spoke. Emily Boynton read part of her letter to the board (which helped move them to create the resolution, and provided a great template for many of us who followed her lead with letters). Emily Moose read a statement focusing on questions about how SB 49 will be implemented (a great strategy). Emily Fox Martine (yes, we have a lot of Emilys!) read a statement including specific suggestions about how board policy could be tweaked to avoid challenges from individuals who don’t even live in Chatham County (a tactic used by the national Moms for Liberty group). As Emily Fox Martine said, “The vast majority of Chatham County parents know that clogging up the system with demands to inspect materials and requests to ban books will not help us attract and retain top-notch educators.”

Julie Ricker focused her comments on the challenges laws like SB 49 will create in recruiting teachers. “Let’s keep doing all we can to keep our teachers coming back another day, another year so that they will tell their educator friends that Chatham County Schools is the place to be,” she said.

She also ended her comments with a powerful quote from a beloved children’s book—a great idea, I thought, for the audience of a group of people trying to make our schools the best they can be. Here’s what Julie said:

As a lover of children’s literature, I’ll end with some quotes from The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster.  At the end of the novel, Princess Reason says, “Whatever we learn has a purpose, and whatever we do affects everything and everyone else.  It’s much the same with knowledge- whenever we learn something new, the whole world becomes richer.”  Let’s keep allowing our teachers to make Chatham County richer by growing our learners and expanding their worlds. 

Beautiful, right? I think the next time I plan comments for the school board I’ll grab a book from the kids’ shelves for inspiration.

I’m also happy to report that the board’s resolution, affirming support for all kids and families and expressing concern about the impacts of SB 49, passed unanimously. Read more about our efforts here, in this great NC Newsline article by Greg Childress.

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In other news, Bea and Harriet’s small-but-mighty public school is having another DIY, no-fuss fundraiser. You may remember that last year, our school decided to create our own fundraiser after we realized that the private fundraisers many schools use (ours was Boosterthon) do things we dislike. Namely:

• “Rewarding” kids with plastic toys that break immediately and cause litter and waste

• Creating a too-intense, always-be-closing fundraiser atmosphere

• Taking almost half of the profits (49%!) for themselves!

Our DIY fundraiser depends instead on local businesses, kid creativity, experience-based rewards, and the generosity of families, friends, and the local community. This year, we’re trying to raise $20,000 to improve our playgrounds and outdoor play spaces. The kids are really excited about this—Harriet came home from the opening pep rally on Friday with lots of ideas about how the playgrounds could be improved.

Last year, we raised a good chunk of money from Frog Trouble Times subscribers, and we’d love to do that again. We’re a free publication, but if you’ve ever pledged a donation or support we'd love it if you could instead direct your generosity to our Support Our Schools fundraiser. Click here to donate securely, and let us know in the comments if we can send you a thank-you socktopus (which Steddy says makes a great dog toy).

So far, we’ve raised 7% of our $20,000 goal—it would be so cool if we could get that number higher (maybe to 10%?) by tomorrow? We’ll let you know how it goes!

Also, here are some cool frogs we saw this week! The first is the tiny guy we showed you last week—he hopped away!

They grow up so fast…

How has your week been, Frog Troublers? We’d love to hear! Also, can we send you or your dog a thank-you socktopus?