When I was in the 4th, 5th and 6th grades, our family lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts. My brilliant father was a bilingual Asian Legal Expert and held a PhD from Harvard. Dad was a Research Associate and Instructor at Harvard at the time.
In addition to raising five children of her own, my mother held the incredibly busy job of Resident Advisor in a very large Harvard housing complex. In exchange for this work we were provided housing. And that is how my four siblings and I ended up living quite the charmed life for three years in a spacious apartment with picturesque windows overlooking Memorial Drive and the Charles River; the iconic grounds of Harvard in the distance.
On the one side of our lives growing up in Cambridge for those years, we sat on our balcony and watched the Harvard crew teams work out on the river in the early morning hours. We hosted cultural events for international students. We had access to all the Harvard facilities; the fields and venues, the pool, the ice rink. Our home was always filled with people from different places, who spoke different languages and more often than not, brought us gifts from their countries. My sister and I were permitted to walk to Harvard Square and catch the Red Line to downtown Boston, where we would use the Harvard sailing facilities and often meet up with Dad in the late afternoon after work to launch a sailboat and venture out with him on the Charles, under the iconic Boston skyline.
Life was interesting and privileged.
On the other side of our lives, my parents made the decision to remove my siblings and me from the private school we attended when I was in the 4th grade and enroll us in the public school across the street. We were delighted to be free from the tedious daily commute across town and the strict rules and regulations. Good bye.
No longer burdened with the constant worry about somehow keeping our uniforms pressed and perfect in the car ride, my sisters and I simply woke up on the first day of school, picked out our own clothes, walked through our neighborhood, across the street and right through the front doors into a world we had never known before.
I was the only white child in my 5th grade class. In the 6th grade, there were a few of us, but no more than three.
We tried desperately to make friends across all racial, economic and cultural lines and succeeded on many levels, but it was not easy. We kept trying.
Eventually, we made friends with many of the children in our large housing complex as well as those who lived next to the school in the housing projects.
We walked in to the apartments of our new school friends and could barely process what we observed in those settings, as compared to our own. A great cultural and economic divide, observed in real time by an 11 year old. You simply never forget those experiences and those moments.
No furniture.
No food.
No parents around.
Poverty.
Addiction
Abuse
Suffering
Side by side, we lived and we went to school together.
I don’t recall any other time in my educational journey as a child/ young person of living and experiencing such a front row seat to the contrast.
The real truth is: even in our most affluent schools and highly educated communities and families we have tragedy, suffering, loss, grief, abuse, addiction. I see it every day.
Divorce.
Addiction.
Tragedy.
Suffering
Abuse
As we enter a “distance learning” framework for the remainder of the year, I worry about our kids with no food, much less a computer or access to the Internet. There have been some opportunities to help and there will be more opportunities, but it doesn’t feel like enough.
On the other side of the divide, I worry about the kids with all the resources but in exchange: unbearable stress and pressure on them at age 10 to get into schools like Harvard, even before COVID-19 shut down the entire school system. All the missed instruction in the final months of the current school year. They are worried. Their parents are worried. It’s okay kids. You will be okay. We will make it up.
I worry about the kids in the middle, just trying to get through the loss of structure and routine.
I want to help all of them. But the truth is, after all these years, I’m not sure I know how to help any more than I did when I was 11 years old. I can only do what I can do.
I will just keep trying. And I will just keep loving. Even if it’s only “from a distance.”
“Faith, hope and love are some good things He gave us, but the greatest is LOVE.”- Alan Jackson
How to Help: FCPS Foundation:
FCPS has a Foundation that provides support to our schools and has continued to be a resource for community members who want to help. Please consider making a donation to our Foundation to help our children and families in need.
So far, the Foundation has:
- Provided $40,000 to help order 30,000 school supply kits for students at Title I schools. The kits have 8 items in them, including crayons, paper, pencils, pencil sharpeners and scissors and will be mailed directly to the students’ homes
- Committed funds to support the IT department in its purchase of MiFi devices so that students who do not have internet at home can access course content.
- Given $17,000 to local food banks who assist our students
- Provided $2,500 in grocery gift cards for distribution to homeless students.