Lakes and stages

When I was a kid, Mrs. Allen taught me a clever mnemonic to remember the names of the Great Lakes:

HOMES:

Huron
Ontario
Michigan
Eerie
Superior

I like this one better.

I think Mrs. Allen would’ve loved it, too. She was a fantastic teacher.

Mrs. Allen had a stage in her classroom, which I found wondrous and amazing, and it’s partly why I also had a stage in my classroom for 20 years — funded by grants and complete with curtains, lighting, a sound system, and sets. Every year, my students performed a Shakespearean production on that stage, and to this day, it is the thing my former students and their parents speak about most often when remembering our time together.

Twenty years of Shakespeare with elementary students was one of the highlights of my career.

Then the pandemic hit, and the district rightfully removed the stage for social distancing purposes, assuring me it would return once the pandemic subsided.

Instead, it was deemed that my stage — 16 inches off the ground – was too hazardous for a classroom, even though it had been in my classroom for two decades without any injuries and (more importantly) raised platforms like my stage exist in music rooms and other teaching spaces all over the district.

Even worse, the emails, phone calls, and one certified letter I sent to the person responsible for this decision went unanswered.

Apparently, I am not important enough to warrant a response.

So for the last six years, I have been without a stage, though the lighting remains welded into the girder, and the tracks for the curtains remain as sad reminders of a once great thing.

When my former students come back to visit me, they are appalled by what has happened. They are angry, sad, and despondent. One of my students said, “I feel like I grew up on that stage. I found my voice on that stage.”

Sadly, a slightly elevated platform posed too much of a risk for her to find her voice.

“Find it elsewhere!” the powers-that-be might say.

Someone recently made the mistake of saying to me, “It’s a shame the pandemic took away your stage.”

“No,” I said. “Not true. Never make that mistake.”

I explained — as I have often to parents and anyone else who will listen — that whenever something is taken from students, it is always because its removal makes adults’ lives easier.

Nothing more.

A field trip disappears without a suitable replacement.
A schoolwide event is permanently canceled.
A worthy educational program is cut.
A position is eliminated in a school.

It’s never anything more than making adults’ lives easier.

It’s certainly true for my stage, which was permanently removed for illegal reasons, and when I attempted to appeal the decision, was ignored by people in power.

Easy-peasy.

I hate everything about this. It was a mean, stupid, and cruel decision that made children’s lives less wondrous, fun, and meaningful.

I hate it so much.

Mrs. Allen would’ve, too. She was a fantastic teacher.