A Lifetime of Learning
I had a chance to work with some teachers last week.
In a previous life, I have written a lot about how much I admire teachers because we all trust them with out most precious possession and the hope of our nation, the children of America.
I often say and write that the children I meet in schools are already so much smarter than I�ll ever be, my own children included.
The trick, of course, is we all blazed the trails they are following and extending. The classes after them are smarter than they are. It�s one of the best circles of life. The teachers who are the most obvious leaders, the ones who start the knowledge se-quence, who infuse the sense of awareness and self-worth from which all else flows.
In my own family, I have two sisters who are or have been teachers. They have worked with the most disadvantaged youths you can imagine in two of the worst inner-cities of America.
I could not do it. They see it as what they do. Just as they do not understand how in the world I can write so effortlessly, constantly and always thinking of the next article, so I cannot understand their ability to work where they work, doing what they do.
One of the best people I have met so far is Cyril Cole, the principal at Madison Township Elementary in Wakarusa. And I mean best as a person, not even counting what he has done for his school. He is as much an American Original as any of the famous people, including Knights, presidents and kings, I have been fortunate enough to interview.
I have sought teachers all my life. I remember James Lynn, sixth grade, Saint Mary of the Lake in Gary, 1966. He was the first person to ever tell me I had leadership skills. I was the skinny runt of the group, shy beyond belief, sharing my thoughts only with myself.
He saw something I didn�t know was there. He saw the flicker of a candle of life and fanned the flame. Everything I have become is because of him. He asked me to share my thoughts.
I had a guy who stepped in when my dad died and I was 15. Dan McNally offered me full-time employment, pumping gas, $1.50 an hour, in 1969. As importantly, he gave me a place to be and to not be.
He gave me a place with a lot of adult males doing male things so I could pick and choose habits I wanted.
He saved me from what some of my friends became, running the wildest streets unrestricted at night, taking any drug that popped into view.
He gave me a sense of self, of earning my way, of staying on course. He�s also the guy who kicked me in the rear years later when I was settling in at U.S. Steel and said get to college, you�re destined to be better than a steelworker.
I have had some life teachers who showed by bad example what I did not want to become.
One of my first bosses has this obnoxious habit of dressing down folks right on the spot, in front of coworkers.
At another newspaper, though, I had two wonderful mentors, The first, the guy who hired me in, is as calm and sophisticated as I am not. Tall and good-looking, too, for that matter. I couldn�t hope to copy that.
At the same paper is another writer who is the best political writer I have ever read. Unlike most writers, both major political party leaders like and respect him. We had some wonderful late- night political discussion when the both of us were too tired to drive home right then.
He�s about to retire from the paper. The state and the world of politics will miss the class Jack brought to field not used to such royalty.
I thought of all these folks when pondering my day in the life as Don Gandy�s shadow at Plymouth High School last week.
He does what he does exceptionally well, has a good team to work with and mentors when he needs them. The high school support staff runs the school and he is smart enough not to get in their way.
I have seldom come away from any of our schools without feeling refreshed and enthused for the work that goes on there.
For the majority of the adults I meet there, I am forever in awe. I have benefitted from four years of public high school, a college experience at a state institution and the shared experiences of public school teachers, principals and other staffers.
One of things this country does well is offer the opportunities for education.
I learn more every day. Once the process is started correctly, it becomes a lifetime vocation.
I am forever in teachers� debt.
And I don�t mind a bit.
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