The Essential Question

Today is Global Studies Day at my little school. Each year we choose a continent on which we base our thematic studies and the whole school then agrees on an essential question, which we attempt to answer throughout the year in ways that are age appropriate and interesting to our students. This year our continent is Europe and our question is "How does where you live affect how you live?".

As a Spanish teacher, one of the things I've been trying to show my students is how language and culture are never mutually exclusive. The way people express themselves through language is often very revealing in terms of how that person's culture has taught them to conceptualize life. For example, while talking with the other Spanish teacher, who is from Colombia, we both struggled to find a fitting translation for the word "nursing home". For the last two years, I have been watching my grandmother slowly fall apart. It started with some dizziness and some feelings of being over tired and has culminated in two major falls, a broken and then later re-fractured hip, a "small" heart attack, renal failure, and most recently a "minor" stroke. And while I was able to talk about the surgery she needs and how she's feeling and what happened, I couldn't figure out a right sounding word for nursing home. Then it occurred to me that in other countries people live with their families. It isn't expected that you move away at 18, never to return. People actually live in inter-generational family communities, where grandparents are around to help care for newborns, just as parents are around to take care of their elders.

I live in Seattle. My mom lives in Arizona, my dad lives in Oregon. I have two aunts and a grandma in Wisconsin, an aunt, an uncle, a grandma and some cousins who live in Iowa and a wealth of my dad's extended family, some of whom I've never met, scattered throughout Georgia and Tennessee. I see my dad once a month, and my mom once every 3 months or so, my aunt and grandmothers maybe once or twice a year...and this is my family. Because we are all so far apart geographically, it has been crazy trying to negotiate care for my grandmother, especially now that she has been immobilized by the fractured hip that no one seems to want to do surgery on.

As I think of that essential question: how does where you live affect how you live, today I'm thinking about this country and what happens to the old and the sick. In this country we live with the constant fear of either getting old or getting sick or both. I didn't have to see Sicko to know what happens when you don't have health insurance. I've had my own first hand experience at walking a mile and a half to the nearest free clinic, only to wait four hours to be treatment, all because the insurance I had at the time didn't provide me with out of state coverage. Or them there was time time I got a huge bill because apparently my insurance didn't cover one of the tests my doctor wanted to run on me. At first I was really angry that the doctor hadn't told me it would cost so much, but when I really thought about it, I was pissed because I thought having insurance meant something.

When you have insurance, you're supposed to have at least a modicum of assurance that if you get sick, you will be able to get the care you need without having to sell off your furniture to pay for it. That is the point of paying monthly premiums right? And I know that I am privileged in that I even have insurance. There are so many people who don't, but what kills me is that it is always someone who does have insurance who gets to make the laws about who gets care and who doesn't. Here in the U.S., we live in a warped capitalist meritocracy, where if you can't afford something, then you don't deserve it. We live in a country where only the strong and the rich have the right to survive and it makes me ill.

I live in a country where, though my grandma was a public school teacher for her entire life and has dutifully paid her taxes and social security, now that she is ill and stuck in a nursing home, medicare won't pay her expenses because the doctor has refused to treat her. So there she sits, in a wheelchair, with a hip she fractured over a month ago, that still isn't healed because the doctor is afraid to do the surgery...but now what. There is no life plan. Maybe we're not the Hiltons and don't have that platinum care package that pays for you to stay at a luxury resort spa and have daily rehabilitation and massage therapy, but the way the nursing home is designed, it's less about helping someone to live to their potential and more about keeping them somewhat sedated while they wait to die.

If how we live, is a bi-product of where we live, I don't want to live here anymore. I don't care if you call me a communist or a socialist, I want to live in a country where we all have access to the medical care we need. I want to live in a country where people are treated with respect, regardless of their age or ability, where people who are ill are cared for and treated with kindness and regard for how terrifying it can be to feel that vulnerable. I just wish that place were here.

Dating and the Admissions Process

Today on this first day of Spring (also Coco's b-day...HAPPY B-Day!), I find myself somewhat exhausted from completing the latest big Admission and Marketing project. In addition to teaching, being chief lice checker, office extra girl, Suzy-makes-a-lotta-name tags, and my various other strangely titled positions, I am also the Assistant Director of Admission and Marketing. This means I spend a lot of time talking to perspective families, helping out with school tours, repping my digs at Independent school fairs, plugging inquiries into the database, and so much more.

As I grew up attending public school a lot of this process is somewhat foreign to me. Not only do perspective families visit our school multiple times for the grill and schmooze...which is that special balance of asking smart questions, but also sucking up and trying to be on best behavior...but the kids also come and visit. There are two Saturdays devoted to screening of perspective Kindergarten applicants and those in upper grades show up for a half day during regular school time. It was interesting, hanging out with the pre-K kids and evaluating everything from whether or not they knew how to grip a pencil to if they might be insane. The child ranking and background checking and long, long conversations, all culminated in a list of the students we'll be offering spots to for the 2009/10 academic year.

In the meantime, I have been working on this whole dating thing. Like the admissions process at my school, I have been collecting a pool of candidates for the position of "my man" and the interviews have begun. Unlike my school I haven't yet come up with a standardized process and I'm beginning to think that I should. So here is my first shot:

Expectations/ Pre-requestites:
Candidates applying for this position should be male, heterosexual, brown-black (anywhere on the spectrum is good), single, honest, attractive, spiritual, employed, intelligent, well read, and in general about something. Preference will be given to feminist and social justices minded men or applicants who demonstrate kindness, empathy, and a good sense of humor, or have any special talents like knowing how to do math well, fix or build things, speak languages besides (meaning in addition to) English, cook, and/or give good massages.

Then there could be a whole written application. And each date would be an interview where candidates would be evaluated on various categories from whether or not they offered to pay to check to if the conversation was interesting.

I mean really isn't that kind of what we do anyway. We have this idea in mind of what we want. Then we meet these people and try to match them up with what we have in our head and when inevitably, they aren't exactly what we thought we wanted, we try to decide if we can work it out anyway. But I guess that's the hard part. It's all a gamble. As in the admissions process, sometimes you make offers and then the family chooses to go elsewhere. Or if the family decides to say yes, there is still no real guarantee that their child isn't the unibomber waiting to happen, no matter if they had high test scores and good reviews from their preschool. The hardest part in both dating and admissions is the waiting. First you're waiting to see if there is mutual agreement, and then you're waiting to see if the person lives up to the potential you first saw in him.

The people I work with...

Lately life has been kind of difficult between complicated friend issues and family health complications. I have found myself staring out the window a lot and wondering what the hell am I supposed to do to make it all better. I still don't have any real answers, but I did get a wonderful gift. I spent all of last week in AZ visiting my grandma who is not doing too well right now. I arrived back in town just in time to attend my school's annual fundraiser. Coco accompanied me there and got to meet my co-workers for the first time. We drank a lot of sangria, drooled over some of the auction items, and ever few minutes another co-worker approached me to inquire about the health of my grandma. At first I was a little annoyed because though it has been the big thing on my mind, I haven't really wanted to think about it. But then Coco made the comment how nice it was to be surrounded by people who care. And I guess that sums up where I work. I am so blessed to be surrounded by people who care. The other teachers I work with are genuinely beautiful people, and we are led by a head of school who daily teaches me something new about what it really means to be compassionate, to act always out of kindness and genuine concern for others.

Today instead of having a Spanish lesson, my class got kind of derailed. The students came in very upset by what was happening with two of their classmates. One person was physically picking on another and to retaliate the other began sending that student hateful emails. As a result, the entire fifth grade has become polarized. There are those who are taking sides, and those who refuse to take sides, and a whole flurry of rumors based on some truth or dare secrets that got leaked. Though some would say it's just kids stuff, the more I work with the littles, the more I realize that what happens to them on a daily basis is an exact replica of "the real world", they are just newer to the game that us adults and haven't yet figured out of how to cope or what role to play. What was so amazing to me was that I was the adult they trusted enough to talk to...from there, with their permission, I called in my boss, the head of school, who then facilitated a class discussion where every voice was heard, where every opinion was listened to. My students got to express themselves and brainstorm solutions, and I was blessed not only with the privilege of really getting to see what's going on in their world, but also to once again see my boss in action. He really loves his job and he is great at it. I feel so lucky to be able to learn from him.

A public daughter and her Madame Presidents

I always thought Chelsea Clinton and I would be good friends. We had a lot in common: strong minded parents, crazy hair, and we are both what Frances Foster has termed public daughters. I didn't grow up with the whole world looking on, but rather in the midst of a world of academics, with a unique circle of interdisciplinary other-mothers, who some would call the power houses of the black academy. These women are historians, social scientists, writers, literature buffs, political scientist, and feminist scholars by trade, who have collectively published works or in general done the work that has revolutionized the fields of women studies, African and African American studies, History, English, and so much more. They are the Nellie McKays (editor of the Norton Anthology of African American literature....if you don't know her you should look her up she is AMAZING) of the world, who have defied convention and struggled not simply to make names for themselves in the academy, but to move the narrative of black women's stories from the margin to the center.

Growing up, I knew I was lucky. I knew not everyone got to watch their mother braid bell hook's hair, or to share a meal with Toni Morrison. But this weekend I was reminded not only of how incredibly valuable it has been to know these women personally, but how much the work they have done has had tangible impacts on "learned societies" across the board. I joined my mother at ASU for the conference she put together called: "Madame President: summit on women of color, leadership, and the learned societies."

The conference included: Patricia Hill Collins- American Sociological Association, Beverly Guy Sheftal- National Women's Studies Association, Darlene Clark Hine - Organization of American Historians and Southern Historical Association, Nell Irvin Painter- also from OAH and SHA, Diane Pinderhughes - American Political Science Association, Pearl Robinson- African Studies Association, Loriene Robinson - American Library Association, Vicki Ruiz - American Studies Association, and Frances Smith Foster.

The conference began with two panels in which the women talked about their careers and what they had accomplished in general and then more specifically during the tenure of their presidencies. They spoke about the process and path that brought them to leadership, some more intentionally and willingly than others. There were those women who systematically positioned themselves to be in power and others who refused to be president of the organization several times before finally choosing to take up the mantle, not necessarily because they wanted to, but because they were committed to having the job done right, even at their own personal expense.

After the panels, the ladies met with graduate students and professors from their respective disciplines. I accompanied Pearl Robinson to African and African American Studies with my mom (who chairs the department). Unfortunately most of the students had class, but Dr. Robinson was able to meet with the faculty and share about one of the projects she's been working on...a study trip on the topic of gold in Ghana. Dr. Robinson has taken students to Ghana twice to teach a short seminar on the topic of gold and its impact on the Ghanaian economy. I, of course, was fascinated by the logistics of the trip and how she was able to develop a viable business plan and ingeniously use the final project (a video made by participants about what they had learned) to help market and recruit future program participants. But more than this, the professors at AAAS were able to discuss what kinds of curriculum and program they would like to develop in the future. After a short break, we reconvened for dinner at the faculty club and a key note address from Frances Foster.

The next morning, at one of those lush hotels Phoenix is known for, we had brunch with the ASU Faculty Women's Association (of which my mom is the president). This was a much less formal conversation. After the whole thing was over, I sat in the sun and sipped peach bellinis with my mom, Frances, and Beverly. They are working on a project (more about this in future blogs) and took advantage of their downtime to meet, but afterwards we talked about the conference and what each of us had gotten out of it. Everyone seemed particularly interested in what I learned so here are my final thoughts:

What I learned isn't easily articulated or quantified. I was able to bear witness to the experiences of these amazing women. They gave advice and strategies for not only how to do what they did, but what they would have done to do it better. But they also talked about the tolls its take.

I have known this for a long time, but I am still kind of coming to terms with it: I don't want to be an academic. While I am in awe of and inspired by these wonderful, brilliant women who are revolutionizing the academy everyday, I don't have the calling, nor the patience and discipline that are pre-requisite to join the perpetual struggle to reform organizations that are often resistant and unappreciative. The cost is high. I've seen how the job has taken a toll on my mother and on all these women as well, and when measuring the price against their rich and diverse accomplishments and successes, I think it is easy to see that it was worth it....for them.

When I look at my own wants and hopes and dreams, I don't think it would be for me. What I realized also, is that by growing up as a "public daughter" I have inadvertently absorbed not only the high standards of the women around me, but also their framework for defining success. I understand now why it was so difficult for me to give up the crappy job that sucked my soul...it wasn't that I wanted to stay there, it's that from the outside looking in, that job was a respectable position in higher ed in which I was, at times, able to continue the work of promoting academic programs that gave voice to the experiences of people of color. It's good work, and work that I will probably always be involved in, but not that way. By learning more about the path of others, I am beginning to understand that I must find my own way. At least I am lucky enough to have some amazing people in my life helping to guide my journey.