When the news and reality just don't match up

I had a great day on Friday. There are a lot of integers I use to judge whether or not my day was great, not the least of which is the weather, what time my kids wake up, what I eat for lunch, etc. But there is one factor that almost always results in a great day: going to visit a school.

Now that I'm away from a school for the first time in my career, I cannot describe how much I miss the energy and intensity of a school setting. I realize it is this very same energy drain that led to some serious exhaustion and tension at times, but the "buzz" from a day of teaching is hard to replace in any other job. Do I sound sad and lonely?

So on Friday I went to have lunch with the teachers at Patrick Henry High School here in north Minneapolis. If you read the local papers, and I do, it is hard to pass a single day without reading some disparaging, depressing story about the state of our schools, especially on the north side. Wide achievement gaps, closing schools, tumbling enrollment, and a host of other very real problems are splashed across the headlines all the time. I had never been to Henry myself, so I had no idea what to expect. "North Minneapolis" has become so deeply encoded for our educational, racial, and socio-economical issues, that walking into the school as a visitor I could have expected anything from Alcatraz to complete chaos.

In fact, I found nothing of the sort. In fact, I found just the opposite.

I was invited to come to Henry to talk about my project during the staff's professional development lunches in their professional development room full of professional development resources. It was fantastic. Between lunches I went on a tour of the school where I saw students who drop everything for 20 minutes a day, as a whole school, and read self-selected literature. Students said hello to teachers. Teachers said hello to students. There was no graffiti, no yelling. No chaos. This was a school that was vibrant and alive and working.

I left the school not depressed about the "State of Education" or the "Achievement Gap." Instead, I left reminded of the critical truth that media stories about teachers, administrators, and students aren't words about some theoretical body of people. Rather, these are professionals and students working hard to combat the very ills that we read about. I didn't leave feeling all that sorry for anyone but myself. I didn't rush out to my car, but instead walked slowly away, the wonderful din of public education ringing in my ears.