By Mindy Schlegel
(From Indystar.com, November 12th, 2010)
Fifteen years ago, I sat with 60 other young and idealistic Teach for America corps members in a final meeting of summer training. Director Mike Feinberg began to read “The Polar Express,” a story of a boy who lies in bed and waits to hear Santa’s bell on Christmas Eve. The story ends with the boy opening a present — a bell from Santa’s sleigh. Both he and his sister marvel at the beautiful sound, while his parents are unable to hear the bell and assume it’s broken.
As Mike read the story, he held a broken bell and slowly built a parallel between the children’s intense belief in Santa and our commitment to work with students in predominantly failing schools. “Do you believe? Can you hear the bell?”
“Yes, we can hear it,” we shouted.
He warned us that, like the boy’s bell, the sound would dim as time passed, that throughout the year it would be harder to believe our kids could succeed. His warnings, however, were met shouts of affirmation. “Yes, we can hear it!”
The power of that story has remained with me through my work in education for the past 15 years. As Mike predicted, the bell has long been silent for those who work outside urban schools. Until now. The debate is currently raging on how to fix failing schools, hold adults accountable and reward those who are successful.
A few weeks ago, NBC turned Rockefeller Center into a weeklong marketplace of ideas on teacher evaluations, unions, tenure, collective bargaining and charter schools. More than 40 states, including Indiana, engaged their citizens in intense conversations as a direct result of the national grant program called Race to the Top.
Many states have passed innovative and, to some, radical legislative agendas that fundamentally change the way we talk about schools and teachers. Giving schools more flexibility and autonomy while also holding them more accountable is the clear trend.
Hollywood has taken up the debate in a dramatic documentary, “Waiting for Superman,” highlighting our failure to meet the needs of many underprivileged students. A few weeks ago, I watched Oprah hand a good friend a $1 million check for his successful urban charter school network.
And finally, with laser-like focus, The Star continues to spotlight the challenges Indianapolis students face and the failure to help many reach basic levels of achievement.
In my daily work, I am astounded both by how far we have come and how far we have to go.
Indianapolis, the bells are ringing. We must agree that what we are doing for so many students is not good enough. In fact, some of it is shameful.
Gov. Mitch Daniels is right in calling to put children at the center of our efforts. We have courageous leaders advancing the conversation, and all who call Indianapolis home must participate. It is going to be an active legislative session, and we must engage, listen and seriously consider taking risks and making dramatic changes — in particular for the children who need it the most.
There are more than 1 million students in Indiana, 32,000 here in the heart of Indianapolis.
The bells are ringing. Can you hear them?
Schlegel, of Indianapolis, is a former teacher and member of Democrats for Education Reform.