Mayors, Governors, Secretary Duncan and Mister President; Remember When

© copyright 2013 Betsy L. Angert. BeThink

Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Governor Chris Christie, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, Pennsylvania State Commission Chairman, Pedro Ramos, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, and President Obama, by now you have likely seen or heard the news. Nine-year old Asean Johnson took a stand on school closures. He spoke out and indeed, audacious as it was, he posed a question to each of you. Sure you and others might think a child being so bold is cute. Cynically, you could even believe that Asean was coached, or “misguided” to believe as he does, but that notion begs a question, not only on the subject of education, but also on the topic of “self.”

We, the children invite you to reflect on your own life and how you look back on it now. We heard your stories about “When I was your age,” and marvel. Why might you not recognize that when you were young you did not feel less wise than you do now? You thought for yourself! You chose to be who you are today.

You had your favorite Teachers and likely none of these were a test. You, not your Mom, Dad Grandparent or Guardian, understood which subjects served you best and why. You knew! You chose to connect in ways that honored your preferred learning style. If you liked to read it was not because someone pushed you to pick up a book. If you thought story telling was wonderful, you sought to seek sages who shared their personal truth through the spoken word. Athleticism, no one could have forced you to run faster, jump higher, and/or throw further. That too was you! You practiced or not. A computer, had their been one, did not and could not have led you. Nor can a calculation formulated after a battery of examinations make you think. You chose!

No one told you what to do or think, although many adults tried. If you rode your bike on the road, and not the sidewalk, that was probably not because someone said that it was safer. You took a risk! You dared to believe that you knew best what was right for you!

Mister President your relationship with your grandfather taught you. You considered who you were, what you might wish to be and why. Your reflection on the interactions led you to think and feel as you do. It was not your grandfather imposing his adult will on you that led you to think or speak out as Asean does. No “Barry” Obama, you gleaned what it might mean to be empathetic. People have a profound effect on us. Your mother. Your grandfather. Your classmates…Nonetheless, you choose.

The same is true for Asean. He thinks! He feels! He expresses his beliefs aloud and well because he chooses to. Asean Johnson too had a deeper connection to his grandpa. He learned or affirmed what he knew instinctively, for him self “Do what you love.” That makes sense to Asean. He was not forced to take a stand or speak publicly. He feels, to his core that if his school closes, if other public Chicago Community Schools are shuttered students will fall through the cracks, fail, be left behind, if they survive at all considering the gang-lines children will have to cross.

Mister President, Secretary Duncan, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Governor Chris Christie, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, Pennsylvania State Commission Chairman, Pedro Ramos No one was able to stop you from being the person you were or are today. Only events , circumstances, experiences, and the emotional effects of these can alter your being.

That is what scares us! We the children wish to ask…does becoming an adult mean you forget your feelings about learning? Will we too grow up to place money above the needs of children? Might we reject well-researched reports on school closings in favor of flawed theories? Even we, little people find credence in The Pew Charitable Trusts said in a 2011 study that states: no district has reaped a financial windfall from selling shuttered buildings. These structures are often in declining neighborhoods and thus, difficult to sell.

The Closing Public Schools in Philadelphia, Lessons From six Urban Districts, 2011 found that 200 vacant school buildings in six cities, after being shuttered and placed on the market, remain empty for several years after children were evicted.

Does having a “mature mind” mean that you never look back? That is a strange and troublesome irony. Were adults to remember what life was like when they were truly wise and wonderful, as well as cute, they might recall, that the three schools now Secretary Duncan closed in Chicago “school daze” and revamped, are all being “shaken up” as part of the newly announced closure of 50 public Chicago schools.

What is now the largest mass school closing in U.S. history might be a lesson missed in the past. How did that plan fare for the children, the schools, for Chicago as a whole? We see the murders executed daily. We know that these young people were lost in the earlier tradition. What will be for us, we the children through Asean Johnson ask. Please tell us Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Governor Chris Christie, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, Pennsylvania State Commission Chairman, Pedro Ramos, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, and President Obama, do you care? Will you show it? Or is money the matter of consequence in “mature minds”? Most importantly to us, the children, will you listen to Asean Jonson? He speaks for all of us.

Nine-year-old activist, Asean Johnson, joins MSNBC’s Alex Witt and shows that you can never be too young to stand-up for what you believe in. The city of Chicago recently announced that it was closing 50 schools due to budget shortfalls and Asean made an impassioned appeal to stop his school from closing—it worked. He explains to Alex that there was no reason for his school to close and the criteria for it closing was incorrect. Asean explains that if his school had closed, the students would be forced to go behind gang lines and expose them to dangerous situations.