The rewards of education
John Heim - Emporia Superintendent of schools
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Everyone expects to go further than his father went; everyone expects to be better than he was born and every generation has one big impulse in its heart — to exceed all the other generations of the past in all the things that make life worth living.
— William Allen White
ECONOMIC hard times are causing challenges for many people as we enter the season of giving. One thing that remains constant in good times and bad is the value of an education. Emporia is fortunate to have high-quality educational institutions. More than ever, it is important to provide the greatest educational opportunities we can for children and adults. I have seen the rewards first-hand.
Fifty years ago, a student was preparing to spend his second year in eighth grade. He had already been held back in third grade and had attended more than a dozen different schools on his way to Pioneer School. The student was being raised by his single mother and they would have qualified for free lunches had there been such a thing in the late 1940s. What are the chances for success of this “at-risk” student?
In the late 1960s, a student’s learning problems became apparent when he scrawled to his second-grade teacher that he “can’t do anything.” Later, after years in a self-contained classroom for learning disabled students, he dropped out of high school. What are the chances for success of this “at-risk” student?
In the late 1990s, as I drive my son to an early morning practice, we pass a group of boys riding their bikes to practice. I tell him that we can give the boys a ride and he says, “Dad, they don’t want us to see where they live.” As the years progress and they become friends with my son, I learn about their background. They moved to Emporia in their early teens, their dad works at Tyson, and they live in a trailer that is, as one of the boys later joked to me, “so small I have to sleep standing up.” The boys knew no English when they moved here, and neither did their parents. They know little of the culture or language and have limited literacy in their native language. What are the chances for success of these “at-risk” students?
It was a rewarding day in my life when I gave the introduction speech for my dad as he was inducted into the Kansas Teachers Hall of Fame after a career in education that included successful stints as a teacher, principal, superintendent, college professor, dean and mentor. In the late 1940s, a teacher at Pioneer Grade School saw some promise in a student and made sure that he finished high school.
My first year as a superintendent, I watched my younger brother take the oath to be a Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper. What a rewarding moment to see a man who had dropped out of school after having spent time in what he had labeled “dummy classes” go on to earn his college diploma and to assume one of the most respected positions in law enforcement.
Every year I watch students like my son’s teammates graduate from Emporia High School. It brings tears to my eyes when these students walk across the stage to receive their diplomas, because I know they are going to college and I am proud the Emporia Public Schools played a role in helping to unlock some of the great promise the future holds for these young men and women.
My dad was successful because an individual teacher happened to take an interest in him. Half of the students of his generation were not as fortunate, as the graduation rate at the time was around 50 percent. My brother dropped out of school because we knew students like him needed help, but we tried to do it in isolation — in pull-out programs that didn’t capitalize on the power of the entire school or community. He was successful in spite of our attempts to help. My son’s friends were successful because the Emporia community and school system responded to their individual needs.
In Emporia, and in many other school systems across Kansas, success does not depend on a chance encounter with a special teacher. Success is ensured because we have built a system of support for every child. That system includes a community that provides help for the poor, a school culture that nurtures all children, and an instructional system that diagnoses a child’s problems and through collaboration and specific knowledge provides the prescriptive support that each individual student needs. This system of support starts with a school district that envelops the student and the family to provide for and address the basic and most comprehensive needs of learners. It is a system that ensures success for all students.