ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, June 27, 1996 TAG: 9606270054
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
SHE WAS OFFERED JOBS at schools in higher-income neighborhoods, but Margaret Thompson chose to stay where she thought she was most needed.
For nearly four decades, Margaret Thompson lived her childhood dream.
As a young girl growing up in a black neighborhood in Northeast Roanoke, she decided to become a teacher. She never wanted another job.
"Teachers were respected then, well-dressed and such good role models," Thompson, principal of the Roanoke Academy for Mathematics and Science, recalled recently.
"It was during the days of segregation. Teachers kept pounding in our heads that education was the way for poor people to help themselves."
It was the ticket for Thompson and her five siblings to a better life.
Neither of her parents finished high school. Her father was a cook at the former Burrell Memorial Hospital. But all six of the couple's children received high school diplomas, and four graduated from college.
Two of the children became teachers, a third worked for the federal government, and a fourth became an environmental engineer. The other two began their own businesses.
Thompson believes even more strongly in education as she prepares to retire after 37 years as a teacher, assistant principal and principal.
She spent almost all of her career in schools in poor neighborhoods in Roanoke, where she thought she could help children with the greatest needs.
"I've been asked to move to high-income areas, but I stayed where I thought I was needed," Thompson said.
She taught at Lincoln Terrace and Westside elementary schools for 27 years before moving to the Roanoke Academy, formerly Northwest Elementary, to become assistant principal and then principal.
Richard Poindexter, a teacher at Woodrow Wilson Middle School and 25-year veteran with city schools, will succeed Thompson at the Roanoke Academy, an elementary magnet school.
Thompson is a traditionalist who sometimes longs for old-fashioned values.
When she began teaching, she said, children could be counted on to be obedient, respectful and mannerly.
But children and schools have changed. Some parents are not teaching their children morals and manners, she said. Some are afraid to spank their children - and laws prohibit teachers from spanking them.
Children have so many rights today that it sometimes seems they are in control, Thompson said.
"Oh yes, it's a lot tougher for teachers and principals now," she said. "There has been a lot of change in family values, and some of it has been for the worse.''
As a teacher and principal, Thompson said, she demanded that children obey rules and show respect for school officials.
"If children get away with being disrespectful, then all of the children will think they can do the same thing,' she said. "It wears you out; it can be tough in an inner-city school."
Still, Thompson is optimistic about schools and education.
While schools can't teach morals and religion, she hopes more churches will establish after-school programs to help fill the gaps.
"Some of these children have never been to church and never been taught some things. Maybe the churches can take up some of the slack."
Thompson has a reputation for saying what she thinks.
"She is one of the most straightforward and intuitive ladies that I know," said Mary Hackley, director of elementary education for city schools. "She doesn't mind speaking out."
Thompson and Hackley went to school together at the former Lucy Addison High in Roanoke and Virginia State University in Petersburg. Thompson later got a master's degree at Hollins College.
"She is an advocate for our young people who nurtures and looks out for them," Hackley said. "She's a religious person, a believer, and all of that spills over into her leadership style."
Hackley said there also is a playful and fun-loving side to Thompson when she's away from her job. "She can cheer you up when you're down and have you feeling better quickly."
Thompson began her career when Roanoke schools were segregated, and she recalls the initial resistance to integration by some white parents.
"I remember on the first day that we integrated, some white parents came to school and demanded that their children be taught by white teachers," she said.
But the attitudes of some white parents changed quickly, she said. "The next year, some white parents came in and wanted their children to be taught by black teachers."
The toughest part of being a principal is the paperwork, she said. "You have to document and keep a record of everything."
Thompson said the job has been demanding because the Roanoke Academy has 350 pupils - and no assistant principal. The principal must provide the overall management of the school in addition to being the instructional leader, she said.
Thompson believes the magnet school concept has improved the quality of education in the city, but she doesn't like the racial guidelines that prohibit some black children from attending some schools.
Most magnet schools, such as the Roanoke Academy, are in predominantly black neighborhoods and are federally funded to help promote voluntary desegregation. The federal money is used to buy the latest in educational technology and develop innovative curricula to help attract white students from outside the schools' attendance zones - hence the name "magnet" schools - to achieve a better racial balance.
But some black children are denied admission to magnet schools outside their attendance zone because it would cause more racial imbalance.
"That's the only part I don't like. Some black children, for example, can't go to the Addison Aerospace Middle School because it wouldn't help the racial balance," she said.
She supports Superintendent Wayne Harris' emphasis on improving academic achievement and raising test scores. She is distressed that some students make fun of those who make good grades.
"Some students have the attitude that those who study and do well are nerds. They think that it is cool to be mean and tough. That attitude has to go," she said.
Thompson said she agonized over her decision to retire. "It was a hard one, and I shed some tears," she said, "but anyone who works in inner-city schools deserves a rest at some point."
She said she will spend more time in volunteer work for her sorority, Delta Sigma Theta, and its educational support programs. She also hopes to help the school system recruit more black teachers. And she'll have more time for dancing, sewing and reading - her three favorite hobbies.
LENGTH: Long : 124 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: DON PETERSEN Staff Margaret Thompson, the retiringby CNBprincipal of the Roanoke Academy for Mathematics and Science, was
among the first in her family to go to college. color.