Find your people, and don’t eat the sugar
As I write this, there is ice on the ground, Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow, and omicron is still rampaging two years into the pandemic. But you will read this in March, and it will be spring, a time for rebirth. There will be hope, longer days, shorter nights, and a collective sigh of relief that we have survived another COVID winter. At home, when I pick up a publication, I must check and see whether it is a medical journal or an education magazine because many of the articles have the same feel. It seems the struggles run in tandem. In these challenging and unpredictable times, physicians feel exhausted and burned out. Educators feel unappreciated, burned out and worried about their students’ possible learning loss. Local school boards are struggling to maintain district autonomy. Communities are polarized. Ever-changing COVID guidelines result in boards and administrators having to make school policy revisions. Many districts must undergo first-time zoning or rezoning. How do we survive in these tumultuous times? In the 1990s, the American Medical Association sponsored a campaign to encourage physicians to cooperate
by Tad Margolis ASBA President in order to maintain autonomy against insurance company intrusion into scope of practice. Their slogan, “Together we bargain, alone we beg,” has stuck with me all these years and resonates as relevant in so many areas of public education. We as board members can’t navigate these uncertain times alone. We need to maintain contact with “our people,” those that had the confidence in us to put us here, and remind them that they can’t just vote and then sit back and say “Good job!” Our district is fortunate to have a vibrant and active PTA, and I have been active in it for many years. Nine years ago I became the third female to serve on the school board, accomplishing
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2 March 2022 Report Card
something that had only been done twice before in the 97-year history of our district. I still attend monthly PTA meetings and publish monthly highlights, and I remind the members of the words of Plato: “One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.” I keep them informed to keep them engaged, and they in turn support and encourage me, and sometimes they are considerate enough just to let me vent. My challenge to you is this: Find your people, keep them informed and motivated, and remind them that their job didn’t end when you sat down at the table. Encourage them to fill needed positions of service to our children and communities. There is an unverified story that is attributed to Mahatma Gandhi that fits the message I want to share. According to this story – again, it’s unverified, so it’s more of a fable – a woman brought her young son to speak to Gandhi and said, “My son won’t stop eating sugar. Please tell him to stop.” Gandhi listened to her and then asked her to return in two weeks. Two weeks later the woman and her child returned, and Gandhi looked at the boy and said, “Stop eating sugar.” The mother was perplexed and asked him, “Why couldn’t you have told him this two weeks ago?” He replied, “Madam, two weeks ago I was still eating sugar.” This analogy can easily be applied to board members. We must be willing to stop eating the sugar, make the tough decisions, make our needs and interests secondary to those of the best interests of all the students, and lead courageously by example. Only then will others be willing to stay the course with us. So as spring arrives and along with it the filing period for May elections, and the groundhog predicts six more weeks of winter, I predict omicron will recede and give us a break. I hope with the advent of the new season, you find some time to catch your breath and reach out to your constituents with relevant information, support and motivation, and maybe a chance for a little friendly venting.
