Pub. 8 2018-2019 Issue 2

13 243: What Every Student Needs to Know T here is a void in many of our most vulnerable student’s lives. That void is often indistinguishable. The students often look and act like a typical teenager. They come to school, or often don’t, and go through the paces. Sometimes they are completely compliant and sometimes they aren’t. That void is a lack of unconditional love. At Roots we had a staff member that told a student that they were loved. The student looked at the staff member and simply stated, “No one has ever told me that.” This greatly affects the education process. To find value in the knowledge that we are hoping our students will obtain, our students must feel that they have and are valued as a human being. When students know that we love them more than we love the curriculum they will learn to love the curriculum more than their distractions. Last year at Roots we had seven suicide attempts. Seven. Seven students that in some way or another felt as though they didn’t matter. Seven stu- dents that felt in the moment that the world was better off if they weren’t in it. Some of those students had a build up and the signs were there but some of those students attempted without warning. There is a wise saying that I heard years ago, "When you meet someone, treat them as if they were in serious trouble, and you will be right more than half the time.” As an educator I have tried to follow this advice. It has never led me astray. Entering the new school year, we had the goal to remind our students on a daily basis that they are valued and that they had a placewhere they are loved. Fred Rogers loved the number 143. He often said, “It takes one letter to say “I”, four letters to say “Love” and three letters to say “you”. I was reminded of this as I watched the new film, “Won’t You Be My Neighbor”. That week we decided to incorporate the concept of 143 throughout the school. I wanted it to be a visual daily reminder that they are loved. We spent $14 on paint and spent a couple of hours painting 243 throughout the school. It takes two letters to say “we”. So 243 is “we love you.” We also went to a local screen printing studio and screened shirts for all of our staff. Nowhere in our school can you stand and not see the number and often you will have at least one staff member who is wearing their 243 shirts. Will this change everything? It won’t, but it will change some- thing. We want our students to know that they can and should be loved exactly as they are. We want to focus on small love interventions instead of focusing all our resources on prevention. When we as educa- tors do little things to help fill the void of love that many of our students are dealing with change will come. Knowing that we can be loved exactly as we are gives us all the best oppor- tunity for growing into the healthiest of people. – Fred Rogers BY TYLER BASTIAN, DIRECTOR AT ROOTS CHARTER SCHOOL