Cicadas drone in the sharp afternoon sun. An evening chill snaps off more of each crisp day. As a child, my stomach flip-flopped at these signs that spelled back-to-school.
In the 50’s, back-to-school meant a brand-new pair of Buster Brown saddle shoes after romping all summer barefoot. It meant wearing frilly dresses that let boys see your underwear if you climbed on the jungle gym after care-free months in shorts. It meant no more running through the sprinkler in your pink-stripped bathing suit. It meant no more Ding Dong truck cruising the neighborhood selling Fudgsicles, Creamsicles, or Twin Pops that melted in the road if you tried to break them in half to share with your friend. It meant no more playing hide-and-seek till nine o’clock when the sun finally went to bed. The paradise that was my childhood summers slipped away every year when I went back to school with a brand-new teacher.
I remember each one. First grade, Miss La Valley, the one who yelled and gave me a stomachache every day before reading group. Second grade, Mrs. Nottkey, the one with horse teeth who taught me to sing “America the Beautiful” and “Oh, Suzannah” at a tinny piano beside the window. Third grade, Mrs. Duval, the old lady with a steel bun who taught me my multiplication tables and how to make change. Fourth grade, Mrs. Harrington who introduced the New World: Marco Polo, the conquistadors, and Queen Elizabeth, my first role in a school play, and my first crush on the boy who played Sir Walter Raleigh. And fifth grade, Miss Spaugh, the one who read Johnny Tremain aloud after lunch and invited my whole class, to her wedding.
Little did I know that I would one day be a teacher too. I’ve taught English to first generation immigrants from kindergarten to college, and I learned that the American dream is alive and well, and that immigrants are the jet fuel of the U.S. economy. What a privilege and pleasure to be their first teacher in the promise land.
I’ve taught remedial reading to students from generational poverty, and I learned that racism is real and deadly, a disgusting waste of talent and potential. I wanted to be the hero teacher you see in the movies, the one whose struggling students miraculously make it to Harvard, but I have shared their American nightmare, and it disturbed and discouraged me too.
I’ve taught in suburban and urban schools. I’ve taught in public and private, and I learned that schools reveal the inequities in a society that education alone is not equipped to fix.
So much has changed since my school days. My anxieties are larger now than frilly dresses that showed my underpants when upside down on the monkey bars. My oldest grandson went to first grade last fall. What will he remember from his first year in school? His teacher? His classmates? Or the day in October when his school was locked down because of an active shooter? Or the day in April when he was sent home, and Covid 19 ended education as we know it?
Still, some things remain the same. It’s August, and the cicadas drone. The days grow shorter. The Persied meteors shower the night with stardust, and I’m reminded of their creator, high above politics and pandemics, who knows how far we’ve fallen from paradise.
My stomach flip-flops at the fact that this Father of lights sent his son, Jesus, to save us, we, who so obviously cannot save ourselves.
And I recall that Jesus has many names besides savior: messiah, redeemer, healer, provider, king of kings and Lord of Lords. Yet, his closest friends called him Rabboni which means teacher. So, Lord, in this challenging, back-to-school season, teach each one of us what we need to learn and trust.
Ann C. Averill is the author of, Teacher Dropout, Finding Grace in an Unjust School.
