To Superintendent of Tacoma Public Schools

CC. my blog page and website, drjenwyman-clemons.com

Dear Mr. G.,

I read with interest your publication and “message from your superintendent”. All the ways your mandates support special programs and giving generations of children opportunity – who had so~little opportunity before, we hope, are helping. As a taxpayer and retired physician with two sons, I’d like to share my vision too.

*

I believe all school activities should support our future endeavors as healthy adults. It is reasonable to expect a child gains implementable skills aligned with a sustainable approach to career (and life) during “school’s” precious years. 

After all, “school”, be it 12 or 20 years, depending on your path– is a small percentage of the average life span of 70-80+ years.

Elementary, middle, and high school are the springboard for our lifestyle. One hopes what we learn is practical, self-affirming, and educes – draws out an individual’s strengths and talents to tangibly build self-esteem.

Other than imparting basic information like reading, writing, and arithmetic, you want school to add value to life.

*

I see a system that purports to create unity and tolerance, but at every opportunity, parses and segregates. I argue school today breeds trauma.

I see a system where we separate children from their families, not because they’re eager and craving to expand their worlds – but because of an age they’ve reached. (A child is not ready if they cry (at all).)

By the time kids graduate, they’re cleaved from their communities by their interests.

In time, no one can communicate– other than about the immediately mundane – tangible and visible, and what’s for entertainment.

This doesn’t lead to interesting discussions or uses of intellect, but furthers cultural fragmentation.

*

NASA did a survey in the 70’s and found some 93% of kids tested age 3-4 were ‘genius’, but of the same group tested at graduation from high school, only 3%. What made their spark dim?

I’ll offer -reading bad things about yourself like a negative report card or teacher’s judgmental comment, is damaging to child’s inner psyche.

When the ‘not ready’ student, the one who wasn’t craving to go to school, gets “C” (or worse) on their report cards, this can further their alienation.

With the words they receive from home, even if it’s from a sibling, they form (false) beliefs about themselves. Now they are a “C” or “D” student. This starts for some in kindergarten. At first they believe the negativity as a literal truth.

Also, starting school before a child is ready and eager to go, like a babe weaning from nipple who you know is ready for solid food when they start looking hungrily at everyone’s forks, can set up chronic defiance- all driven subconsciously.

Those NASA researchers tested children before they left home.

Even if the population was skewed to a white middle class, the process of education itself, as it is now, is destructive to one’s potential- or at least imprisons it.

*

Please know, those who don’t ‘qualify’ for S.O.T.A, the S.T.E.M. schools, and/or all other special programs, suffer from your decision of cleaving kids into classes and teams.

After cleaving off the cream of the crop to go to special schools, you’re creating a “c-d” (seedy) class of those left behind.

Feeling resentful like left-overs, they can’t/won’t/don’t give back.

Feeling less than, they aren’t “OK” any more as in, “I’m’ OK, You’re Ok”. Instead, it’s “I’m not OK”, “You’re whatever”.

This grooms deep-seated frustration and wounds; call them false fixed beliefs.

Not only are their skills comparatively limited, some feel bad that they didn’t get to go to the “special” school or do the “special program” ‘necessary for success’. They might turn to medications or gangs.

These are abandonment issues your system creates as their collective of friends splits up- the ones they grew up and played with in the neighborhood or sat on the bus.

With today’s approach to education, all this is on top of whatever is already going on in their own lives.

Chronic stress shortens lifetimes (but might up survival-based fertility rates).

I’ll wager, compared to the others sent off to “special” programs, a fair percentage of them end up in straits– homeless or incarcerated.

*

By dividing classes, you’re graduating participants with attitudes honed about themselves or another group.

S.T.E.M. students, in particular, are given status over others. Or at least they think so- as do their families.

Focusing on S.T.E.M., schools are breeding engineers – which tend to score high in autism spectrum.

Focusing on S.T.E.M. your “garden” has few flowers.

Is that what we really want more of – people focused on working for the likes of big Plutonic egos of Silicon Valley? Or do we want creative fostering and grounded practical skills for living?

*

(Even those with multiple blessings can end up with untimely passing. Please check out my “Anatomy of a Fentanyl Overdose” essay for more about this. A sad story about my sons’ good friend; they went to Charles Wright Academy together. He had “everything” provided to him.

Anatomy of a Fentanyl Overdose

**)

“Experts” say exercise, rest, and good diet are important for thriving health- in addition to having a family and career. So why not start people off right?!  

Right now, small “hobby” businesses are lifting the economy – we can do much more to support them.

School should model healthy living and it can – with a few key changes.

Now we teach reading, writing, history, sciences, and properties of numbers- abstractly. These subjects, as taught today, are non-sense (-based). They are about meaningless intangibles.

Before eighth grade, when a student realistically goes to the mall first time with just their buddy (these days), who cares really about any of these subjects?  How are they relevant to long term success for a student? They need to know about ~budgets and change.

School could really enhance lives by teaching basic essential skills while they integrate math, science, history into them. Textile management (sewing), cooking, woodworking and ~metal shop are invaluable.

As kids find their niches with those subjects, they learn to ‘go into flow’. Then math, science and history are interesting and helpful.

They should get badges for competence at tasks and be encouraged to wear them. This identifies those who’ve shown competency at that particular task- that they can teach to another.

 The first badge in any essential discipline is “clean up” and safe navigation around the ‘shop’.

 Once you get that right, you can get a job somewhere.

With that ‘badge’ you have tangible proof. That is sure to elevate spirits and bolster self-esteem (like working to become an eagle scout).

**

Get rid of what is fundamentally divisive – including histories and stories about people and conditions that aren’t directly relevant to course work related to essential core studies – sewing, cooking, carpentry, ‘metal shop’.

Instead of ‘honoring’ polarizing history about generations of peoples far removed (but will still trigger someone), have kids interview each other. Get them to tell their stories.

Then to interview their families, then other collectives of people that don’t look like them.

Focus on interviews and stories from those in their class -from same and different neighborhoods and bus routes.  Let them gain confidence to learn from each other’s collective- which are cosmopolitan.

With that, ‘others’ will become more hu(e)-man, humans of different hues, and ‘people’, not just demographic statistics defined by mass media.

Let go of studying current events. Current events divide focus from the long term goals of teaching.

In a year, most won’t be important- let alone 20 – 30 years later.

Current events, as reported by the news and not about events in the student’s actual collective, are happening, but school should be a refuge from their emotional focusing. Don’t take sides.

Let kids wear an “I’m not participating today” badge – so even if they’re fully competent to offer help, they don’t have to when life is otherwise weighing them down.

Remember too, that media reports events in such a way as to mainly drive consumer spending (per Wall Street Journal article a few years ago).

From a planet with billions of people, they focus on ~30 types of stories. Not focusing on what may be irrelevant a year later, will not be missed.

*

Instead, celebrate your students!

Put up distractions and dioramas that cater to special interests of the essential ‘pods’ which are rotated over the months.

Put up dioramas about where your students are from with pictures of their locales and landscapes. Show geographic features and themes with traditional buildings, clothes and meals with their cooking surfaces.

Have a globe greeting students at the entrance with flags on for where a student’s lineage is from.

Teach sustainable cuisines using pulses and grains- besides rice(s) and gluten. and vegetables in season. Let there be monthly menus in cooking class. Teach them how to use chopsticks and their hands (like with Ethiopian dishes).

In sewing class, ~beginners can sew napkins; aprons later. Analyze traditional crafts of stitchery in ‘advanced’ sewing class. Let the carpenters make tables. Some may make new tools.

This will make people become more real to each other and less cartoon-like.

**

Mitochondrial organs of muscles, do like to move.

Exercise or ‘PE’, should be about moving limbs symmetrically to open and flex, gently twist, stretch and use arms overhead after any prolonged sitting. Stick to bilateral, mostly in place movements with limbs extending in all directions but not touching anyone. Isometric exercise is effective; lift up off your toes, one foot at a time. Do lunges in all directions. Or let them tap all over (gently) to get blood flowing.  Walking is good too-in place.

Right now, schools train us to sit.

Sitting down is what dogs do. Leaders stand.

*

Jumping and similarly strongly percussive activity, starts dopamine and adrenaline-fueled ups and downs. This fosters strong (distracting) emotions -that don’t readily resolve- at least not in time for the next class.

Excessive holding (like in “yoga”) and multiple repetitions are subconsciously experienced as punitive. Exercise doesn’t have to cause muscle micro-tearing to pick you up -which is when endorphins are released!

I’ll call these unhealthy “gateway” activities.

When the soma is healthy, it isn’t running anywhere but walks with purpose.

 (I like ballet, square dancing, and badminton. Square dancing is amazing the way it trains the body with the ears!)

**

As well, teach and model how to settle down and listen to their own small still inner voice. Learning how to focus is ~essential to “doing the right thing”- even when you don’t want to.

Teachers, not necessarily students, should set the example of centering before starting class.

The students don’t have to do anything, but quietly honor his/her teacher’s quiet moment (30-60 secs) before they start their curriculum.

**

Team sports inculcate the idea of “winners” and “losers”. And there’s always someone picked last for the teams (like me). This creates sensations of hierarchy- another form of division.

Schools shouldn’t be reinforcing self-destructive and combative behaviors by having games like football or fast pitch -any sport occasionally causing injuries leading to operations (a gateway for substance acquisition and drug abuse).

Percussive training also supports future domestic (and civil) violence by its getting used to sounds of combative corporeal engagement – including that of bat on ball.

*

If a child is going to become a professional athlete, nothing will stop him -as long as he’s not held back elsewhere. (This is true for all prodigies and geniuses.)

As team sports focus on outcomes “winners” and “losers”, they forget they’re all players having a good (or not so good) day.

School and “play” don’t mix well together. Rough play creates collisions and bruises – and more damage to developing egos. Participating in any intense sport (including ballet) shouldn’t preclude a child from gentle PE movements.

*

Lastly, despite the absence of “I” in “team”, any athlete who becomes professional has focused on themselves ~exclusively to maximize their prowess and to gain trophies.

Pretending otherwise instills cognitive dissonance – we see evidence of abusive athletes almost daily in the news.

***

Everyone has “gifts” – they need to be discovered (or coughed up under pressure).

Kids with synesthesia aren’t as rare as you think. They seem slow but they are not stoop-ed (stupid). Here’s an essay on synesthesia:

Synesthesia

**

In seventh grade, I was a chronic runaway. Many days, I dropped my backpack off at the secretary’s office. No, they weren’t pleased, but I got to go to class- and my backpack didn’t fit in the locker. Later, due to their reporting efforts and an arrest, I landed in foster care. I was fully emancipated at 16. I often took recreational drugs.

With public university grants I got to study and do research in an interesting field. I became an MD. I practiced as a doctor for ~ 30 years- and am still giving back!

Please don’t write people off just because they don’t fit in nor share your definition of family collective or do things you disagree with.

**

Sor far, school is really good at:

1) teaching children how to people please and study for a test.

2) How to exist mostly effaced in a clique of “winners”, “losers”, “nerds” or “geeks” or whatever kids are called now. And

3) how to sit for long periods of time.

This last is most pervasive and crippling.

That some 10% of boys are labeled “ADHD” suggests our system is unhealthy. True diseases are rare – like less than 1 percent. Deviant behaviors are present in ~7% (of our extremely parsed and fragmented world). De-viance means actions away from lineage’s terms for thriving and survival.

When it’s 10% – that’s part of normal spectrum of behavior- and evidence of a system’s imbalance.

If one person is acting up – they’re doing the heavy lifting for the rest of the collective.

Collectives

Soon after the first person becomes restless, a teacher should stop and let everyone reach up and breathe. When a child is excited by a subject, their bladder isn’t the size of a thimble and is quite nicely capacious!

**

Because my home environment was so fraught with parental anger and anxiety, school was my refuge. I approached classes like a wrung-out sponge – ready to soak up my teacher’s ideas and words.

Curiosity and basic interest can morph into ‘how can I please this teacher- to get more (from them)?

An irony here is, even though your teacher can teach a subject, no matter where you are in the educational system- even at the university level, what they impart is:

1) a tip of the iceberg of the subject’s matter, really even less than that.

2) skewed to what interests them, and

3) teaches to a test.

4) Most of what we’re taught now as “fact”, turns out to be wrong.

What is taught is a fraction of a subject’s essential value. Call it tip of the iceberg of future knowledge.

Fundamentally, if their subject really resonates and you decide to major or go into that field, what you end up doing is usually completely different. 

The teacher, I’m sorry, really knows very little- so shouldn’t be judging anyone. Unless they’re been in the field practicing, they have little application of skills in question.

So, to judge anyone at any stage who doesn’t relate to the course matter, is inaccurate and spurious. Don’t use reports to count against them.

Students either can or can’t do a necessary task with competency. Why crush their egos with letter grades?

*

School is a privilege. You can’t force anyone to become interested– especially when their lives are focused on lack and fear.

When rapt, rested and fed, one gets to forget about themselves (and their personal collective’s problems) and gain from those teaching moments.

If a child isn’t ready for class time, let them work their big muscles and go do field work (they get to choose how long).

And, as we are what we eat, maybe they’re eating too much pink and red-meat- especially pork!

(Pigs are quite aggressive with each other- their muscles carry the resonance. Goats are intractable and persistent. Cows are docile. Chickens are land bound birds with few defenses – other than pecking each other. Can you guess who eats what?!)

***

Visiting Cairo’s souk in Egypt, I was struck by the idea of its resilience over millennia. Thousands of years old, the souk has stood the time and adapted- yet still provides the basics needed to live in Cairo as well as caravan for months in the desert. The collection of markets is useful and sustaining.

The souk meets multiple sets of needs – each with its own requirements; No two souk visitors go to the same places or notices exactly the same things. They come from all different paths and directions. (This sounds an awful like students going to school!)

The souk is inviting by its din, appearance, and fragrances – all which serve to jolt dulled senses after being in the greige desert for months.This is like some families stuck in desultory quagmires from their parents’ “daily grind”.

 I wrote a couple of essays, Souk 1 and Souk 2 on my drjenwyman-clemons.com website. You might find them interesting. I’ll warn you, they’re long too.

https://drjenwyman-clemons.com/2023/04/09/the-souk-part-1/

**

Most children when they’ve reached kindergarten have been to the supermarket and/or the mall. Many have been to a church or religious institution, zoos, and parks. Some have been flying.

They’ll each have favorite parts they like. Already, they have a large vocabulary reflecting these experiences.

When teaching reading and writing, draw those words on those cue cards – while they write their stories, rather than inane and insipid stories about Dick, Jane, and Sally or whatever’s in vogue.

Bring kids outside with (cheap) magnifying glasses (plastic cards with a magnifier built in) or binoculars to learn how to be still and observe.

Come back and write a story or draw a picture about it. Share the best three– and you’ll identify your future writers and artists.  Let children read each other’s works.

Bind the best from each child at the end of the year in simple yearbooks. CWA does that with original music the students write- it is precious.

Let formal reading be about children on other continents with completely different lives.

Assign kids to a buddy system- even to go to lunch or restroom. Change them often. This will give more opportunity for exposure to different minds.

Have the library carry practical books directly related to math/science/history of sewing-carpentry-cooking/ fire-works. Just think of the science of cooktops! Let the public library carry everything else.

*

While working with your hands on creations, one can get into relaxed “flow” state.

Then people are more approachable and attractive. You might meet someone who shares your ‘hobby’ interest and have a relationship – where together you can discuss what makes your hearts sing.

Your “hobby” collective can celebrate together and talk shop without leaving anyone out. Such a venue would offer much more opportunity for connection across neighborhoods too (and demographics).

*

As adults, it would be vastly helpful for society if the ‘souk school’ were continued as a community program where “graduates” can further learn new skills and switch gears.

Instead of being trapped in dead-end jobs which, where once you “fail” or become injured, your options are a version of chronic health care and public assistance, we’d have true resilience.

Let it be staffed by paid retirees (supported by local taxes) and junior volunteers (with those badges affirming task competence).

Basic funding could be by wealthy “philanthropists”- since they’re looking to cut the Department of Education – to pay for the infrastructure.

“Philanthropists” claim they want to make a difference – let them prove themselves -instead funding galas for hospitals and charities, let them support the “souk school” with their name on a building.

**

Please know– as probabilistic electron clouds with neutron density, we are mitochondrial organs breathing in concert of our being.

We are pure energy- with qualities of both particle and wave. With measurements, we flatten our potential – as light does in quantum mechanics slit experiments.

*

Also, we are 100% the manifestation of our natal, progressed, and transiting astrology as the summation of their planetary forces. Our inner milieu reflects our planets and how they’re aspected.

Everyone has their own ‘marching orders’ (but they can be predicted by 5^th house condition). And also each has what looks like love (or l’ove – what supports one’s individual Orphic egg) for them.

*

Lastly, our waveform of meiotic egg receives epigenetic imprinting before it is fertilized -by our grandmother’s environment.

In utero, the pregnant mother’s life of sounds, vibrations, emotions and responses, is ‘recorded’ in the embryo’s soma.

Emotions are hormonal responses. Their intensity is proportional to gland size which is grows with use after mom “trains” it with her hormonal responses. (The body always wants to be efficient and responsive – glands grow (or shrink) accordingly!)

Baby ‘knows’ who’s got the “power” before s/he takes their first breath. They are not a clean slate – but ready receptor being waiting to be activated and programmed.

**

If you really hope to lessen drug overdoses (and nihilism), chronic preventable illness, incarceration, and homelessness, you’ll consider my proposals.

Blessings,

Dr. Jennifer Wyman-Clemons (retired allergist)

I both sent by email and snail mail a copy of the letter to Mr. G.

*****

I got this nice comment on “Nextdoor” :

from Heather:

I agree 100% with what you’ve written. I taught in inner-city schools over the course of 23 years. I chose to not eat in the teacher’s lounge most days. It was heart-breaking to hear some of the teachers’ discuss their students. I prayed every day for my students and myself. I prayed to be able to see beyond what was presented. It made a difficult job easier and enabled me to encourage and build up even the most challenging students. I have had many of my former students look me up and share with me how their lives are better than they thought they would be, in part because of the time they spent in my class.

1

I responded to Heather:

Heather,

Teachers make a huge difference- especially when there’s a sense of genuine connection. I take ballet on line and one of the teacher’s corners of her eyes widen pleasantly when she’s greeting her students. You can’t fake that! I know she make a huge difference to those students days! Thank you for your dedication!.