Letting Go

This Friday is the retrial for the dissolution of the amazing alternative school that George attended for several glorious months during the last half of first grade and the very beginning of second grade, before the school went under in September of 2007—in a rather spectacularly destructive way—due to financial mismanagement and incompetence. The school's going under was totally devastating for many people, not the least of whom George, and myself. In some ways, we have been trying to regain our balance ever since. Let me explain.

It would be an understatement to say that George has had a difficult time at school since, well, preschool. He has been quite unhappy in most of the classrooms/schools he's been a part of; a discussion of why would take too long but the most major factor is that he’s really, really advanced intellectually, and craves intellectual stimulation, and most of his teachers just didn’t know what to do with him. He loves learning and loves a challenge, and gets very discouraged and acts out in various ways when he’s not being engaged or challenged in school. First grade was truly miserable—he was forced to sit still (“criss-cross applesause” or cross-legged on the floor) for 90-minute blocks while the teacher went over the letter sounds, day in and day out. He was already reading Harry Potter and the New York Times at that point, but the teacher insisted that the fact that he knew how to read didn’t mean that he understood the mechanics of the letter sounds (actually, he truly did understand). The more she insisted he sit through these excruciatingly easy and boring lessons, the more unhappy (and uncooperative) he became. I did everything I could do to work with the teacher and the school to try to find a workable solution, all for naught. If you know me you’ve probably heard the story more than once; if not, you can fill in the blanks. It was abysmal. George was crying and begging me on an almost daily basis not to make him go to school, and had even slipped into a sort of depression.

That’s when I finally listened to some friends of mine who had been telling me how great their daughter’s alternative school was. I must be honest, I didn’t like the sound of “alternative school”. (Don’t ask me why, when I was hating his traditional school at that point.) I thought it sounded lightweight, and all hippy-dippy, like a bunch of kids sitting around making daisy chains or doing whatever they wanted. I wanted rigorous academics. I wanted structure! How else would my kid learn anything? But I was desperate. I figured I might as well at least go visit the school. Was I in for a surprise.

When I got there, in the mid-morning, the director didn’t seem to have much to say—she wanted me to go observe the (multi-age, early elementary) class in action, which she said would speak for itself. When I walked in, they were transitioning from one activity to another, and the teacher had them do a short series of sort of yoga exercises to stretch but also to help them reorient themselves and be ready to focus on the new activity. I was intrigued, to say the least.

Next she had them sit in a circle. They could sit in any position they liked; it didn’t have to be “criss-cross applesauce”—they just had to sit, as she explained, in a way that didn’t block anyone’s view of the center of the circle. It made perfect sense—order was requested, and indeed required, but not for some arbitrary, unarticulated reason. It was so that everyone could participate fully. I was liking this more and more with each passing minute.

Next she put the materials for their new science project in the middle of the circle, and asked them to try to figure out what their next experiment was going to be, and how the materials were going to be used for it. They were really having fun with this, coming up with some interesting guesses and building on each other’s ideas. When they ultimately figured it out, she then asked them to try to guess how the experiment would turn out. After several kids had offered their thoughts, one very precocious girl raised her hand and said, “Why don’t you just tell us what’s going to happen?” I was really wondering how the teacher would respond to that one! I thought she might even get flustered. I was thinking about how much George’s teachers seemed to dislike it when he asked them why they were making him do a particular activity. Ha, did I have a lot to learn—about alternative education in general and this teacher in particular. She actually welcomed the question, and was genuinely glad that the student had asked. Her answer was that she wanted them to learn to think like scientists, and that this is exactly what scientists do—they come up with experiments and then they hypothesize about the results before they carry them out. Brilliant!

The discussion continued for a while longer, until everyone had had his/her say; then the teacher told them to get their writing notebooks, find a seat somewhere, and write down their hypotheses and expectations. Since it was a multi-age and multi-ability room, some kids were able to write a paragraph, while others could really only draw pictures. She went around the room while they were working on this and helped each child individually; the ones who were writing a paragraph got instruction/help on punctuation and sentence structure, while those who were just learning to write got help sounding out and writing down a word or two. Anyone who needed it also got suggestions about handwriting, etc. She also wrote on the board some key concepts relating to the experiment, and made sure everyone knew what they meant. This whole thing was a revelation to me. No handwriting worksheets. No copying down random sentences off the board. No fill-in-the-blanks. No seating charts. And yet, boy, were the kids learning! They were learning scientific concepts, scientific thinking, writing, penmanship… each at his or her own level. They were also learning how to work both together and independently, and were required to be respectful of their classmates and teacher, but weren’t expected to follow any arbitrary or senseless rules. It hit me how much closer this educational approach was to my parenting. I could imagine George really thriving in this environment. At that point, there was pretty much no turning back for me! I brought George in for the afternoon and he loved it as much as I’d hoped and figured he would. He never went back to his public school (except briefly to say goodbye and get his things).

Fast forward to the following September. Two weeks into the school year, a letter went home with the kids, informing us that the school was out of money and was going to have to shut down at the end of the month. WHAT?? We knew the school was in some trouble but the Board had obviously lied to us regarding the extent of the woes. We had been assured explicitly and repeatedly that the school had enough money to stay open for at least one or two years, and that all sorts of things were being done to ensure that it would be around for the duration. We had been asked to pay our tuition for at least half the year in advance, which we did. But the $5500 or so that we lost was nothing compared to the utter devastation we felt at the loss of the school we loved so dearly. (Don’t get me wrong—I could absolutely use that $$ now.)

At that point, when the school closed, I felt like we were thrust into limbo. When I told George the school was closing he burst into tears and begged me not to send him back to public school. The only other private schools in the area are religious, and have a very traditional approach to education; as such they didn't seem like a good fit for him. I didn’t think homeschooling was really an option for us at that point. So we set about doing the logical thing(?), and tried to start a new alternative school. That is a very long story and this story is already getting long enough… let me just say that we ultimately ended up with a Montessori school—which George too quickly outgrew. It's been a real roller coaster ride, and has been exhausting in so many ways. Now here we are, homeschooling. Mostly I love it (though it would be a lot easier if I didn’t also have to work), but I still mourn the loss of that school. I guess I can’t quite explain why it meant so much to me and how much its going under still upsets me if I think about it.

Anyway, they are having a hearing to decide something about the assets of the school—the building hasn’t sold, so the debts have continued to accrue. If the building does ever sell, once the mortgage and the lawyers are all paid off it’s highly doubtful that there will be any money left to reimburse parents who prepaid tuition. This hearing was to have taken place last month but due to some technicality it was postponed until this Friday. I went to the courthouse for it last month, hoping to get some sort of closure (if not at least a small percentage of what is owed to me). But I got no sense of closure—and I don’t think it was because of the postponement. I don’t know if I’ll ever really get a sense of closure on this.

What do I want for closure? I want my $5500 back, yes, though I know I won’t get it. More than that, I want somehow to erase the anguish and heartbreak we went through when we found out the one school that was really right for George was closing in two weeks, and that he wouldn’t even be able to have one full year there (let alone a whole scholastic career). I want to have back the tremendous amount of time and energy I expended working to set up a new school that would take that one’s place. Well, actually, what I really want is to have that amazing school back, but that's clearly not happening.

So, I don’t think I’ll go to the courthouse this Friday. I’ll be busy anyway, as George is in a homeschool production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream that’s being performed at a local Faerie Festival. A truly wonderful experience that he never would have had were that school still in existence. There are many, many things I love about homeschooling, and now that I’m really done with trying to set up schools in the area I am finally beginning to find my rhythm with it. I’d like to think that I can educate my son as well as that school could have, but honestly, I can’t say that I’m certain I can. I’m sure as hell going to keep trying, though.