THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, September 22, 1994 TAG: 9409220454
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JON GLASS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
Teachers most often get the blame, but local communities share responsibility for the problems faced by the country's public schools, says Sandra McBrayer, the 1994 National Teacher of the Year.
More important, she contends, communities hold the key to solving those ills.
``The ills of society happen to be knocking at the schoolhouse doors,'' McBrayer said Wednesday in an interview at the Norfolk Waterside Marriott, where she spoke to the National Council on Teacher Retirement.
``We seem to be surprised that issues of poverty, homelessness, drug abuse, teen pregnancy and teen suicide are coming to our school campuses, and we're looking at one set of people, who happen to be educators, for a solution. I'm not letting the community off the hook.''
As a teacher of homeless middle and high school students in inner-city San Diego, McBrayer, 33, knows the challenges of trying to reach kids written off by mainstream society.
But McBrayer, who founded the Homeless Outreach School for San Diego public schools, has succeeded in large part because of help from businesses, churches, civic groups and police.
How did she get them involved? Simple: She asked.
``You've got to go to the door and ask,'' McBrayer said. ``I know that's hard for some people. They say, `Look, I'm tired, I'm overworked, I'm underpaid.' And I say, `Do you want to be this way forever or do you want to change it next week? You have a choice.' ''
To the business community, she posed the question in stark economics: Give a little now or pay a lot more later.
``We asked, `Do you want to pay $30,000 to incarcerate this child or $4,900 to educate?' They understand,'' McBrayer said. ``Eighty-five percent of all prison inmates are high school dropouts. That tells you right there that if we can get them through high school, they have a chance.''
She recruited the police department after learning that police academy cadets need 80 hours of community service to graduate. Now, future officers come to her class to tutor the kids. It turned mutual distrust into understanding.
``My kids learned that the police don't have horns, and the police say, `Gosh, these kids are cool once you get to know them,' '' McBrayer said.
Teachers and school administrators, she said, must be the catalysts for increasing community involvement and for nurturing a team approach to education.
``I'm looking at how we as a team can attack the ills of society,'' McBrayer said, ``because I can educate you all I want, but if you're going back to a street with violence and drugs, who cares if you can conjugate a verb?''
More than 90 kids in seventh through 12th grades attend the school where McBrayer teaches. The students are organized into three classes, not by age but by behavior and academic ability.
She gets results from her students by holding them to high expectations.
``I think kids in inner cities deserve the same equitable education as kids in the upper classes of society,'' McBrayer said. ``OK, maybe their language is horrible, maybe their behavior needs some help, but I can still teach them.''
Her teaching philosophy is to reach the ``whole'' child. She expects them to learn and succeed. She treats them with respect and gives them love.
``I don't just teach math, science and history,'' McBrayer said. ``I teach life - how to communicate with one another. How to end a conflict in a peaceful manner. How to get what you need without taking it.''
The daughter of Marines, McBrayer grew up in a disciplined household. ``I learned `sir' before I learned any other word in the language,'' she said.
But she was the rebellious sort. She was suspended in third grade for trespassing on school property after hours. For speaking out against school rules, she was suspended again while in sixth, ninth and 10th grades.
``I asked too many questions and I challenged too many ideas and that frightened them,'' McBrayer said. She went on to earn undergraduate and master's degrees in education from San Diego State University.
Her goal as the nation's top teacher is to persuade the country to place a higher priority on education - making it an individual responsibility.
``Whatever people want for their kids, I want them to work towards that, but I also want them to take the next step and say, `OK, I want my neighbors' kids to have the same chance. And I want my community's children' - you see what I'm saying?'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
JOSEPH JOHN KOTLOWSKI/Staff
Sandra McBrayer, the 1994 National Teacher of the Year, says people
must work together to solve schools' problems.
by CNB