Turnover

June. A time for endings and new beginnings. Summer solstice turns spring into summer. Graduations and weddings. School year ends, non profit fiscal year ends. Boxes and suitcases are packed to leave one place and move to another. Many teachers are laid off, many leave the profession for other fields. Hopeful new teachers start credentialing programs.

This month, I packed up my students' folders, my teaching materials, my keyboard, snack supplies, pens, containers. I cleaned out my tiny cubicle “office” at Oakland Tech High School. I went back and forth in the heat, past forgotten text books and pencils on the floor, and loaded everything into my stuffed car. I said goodbye to my favorite colleagues and to my students, and drove through the gate with mixed sadness and relief. At home, I went through my folders for Elmhurst Community Prep, for Berkeley Arts Magnet, for San Leandro High, my chorus music, my poetry samples. I recycled old papers, filed copies for next year, wrote final reports.

So many times in life we do this. Pack up, finish up, shut the door, say goodbye. I remember at the age of 21 loading my used old Turtle-back Volvo, as I said good- bye to my parents and the East Coast and moved to my new job as a news reporter in Chicago. Not for the first time or the last, I felt the sadness of ending a chapter of my life and the excitement of a new beginning.

On June 30 I will finish a 21-year chapter as founding Artistic Director of Opera Piccola. I will work for Opera Piccola as consultant and teaching artist, but no longer as Artistic Director. Founders usually let go leadership at some point so that their organizations can move into a new future. The challenges of a changed global economy make this an excellent time for me to exit Opera Piccola's stage so that new leadership can bring on exciting new directions.

Opera Piccola will continue to provide ArtGate, the award winning arts education program in the public schools, directed by Corrina Marshall and Candace Workman. I will be presenting Opera Piccola's multicultural Community Performance shows separately, under a new name: SWEET Theater; Susannah Wood Education Express Theater.

Endings and beginnings. The seasons turn.

Change

Just watched "The Cove," and it got me thinking about change. So much is needed: global warming, turf wars, education policy, poverty, hunger, human rights. This documentary did bring about some change in Taiji, Japan. But slaughter of thousands of dolphins will continue there in that tiny killing cove six months out of every year, unless -- what? More children die of mercury poisoning from eating dolphin meat? Murky,underwater images stick in my mind of swimmers in wet suits with wire cutters opening fences that imprisoned the amazing animals.

What changes are needed in public education? How might we free more children to enjoy learning, to love discovering new things? Is it possible without massive socio-economic change? We hail the few schools where students are ready for the Ivy League "even though" in low income neighborhoods. But why do third grade children from wealthier areas where parents have college degrees write at the same level or better than some high school juniors from low income areas where families did not attend college? We like to find out whose fault this is: the teachers, the lack of resources, the parents, TV, the students themselves? How did those few schools and students succeed? And how do we define success in public education anyway? Most long time teachers will tell you that success should not be about test scores.

In the movie, change was driven by a few passionate, determined, persistent people who had emotional and statistical reasons for pursuit of their goals. Their actions demonstrated a commitment to whatever it took: heroism. It started with one man, the former trainer of Flipper, who had an 360 degree about face when Flipper became depressed and "committed suicide" in his arms. Very slowly he gathered collaborators around the world, getting arrested many times in the process. It takes Heroes to change Systems.

Before and After

Are you going to teach this class next year?

June 7th, 6:30 PM. The cafeteria was warm, with lemony sunlight through floor to ceiling windows. The expected rust and white square tile flooring. Tables, old wooden chairs, wheeled carts with ketchup and mustard. Parents, brothers and sisters, and a few visitors gathered near the stainless steel kitchen to see and hear a small group of student poets and dancers. These San Leandro High School freshmen and seniors were beginners who said there wasn't much to do after school except to go to tutoring. They told the group that our program gave them a chance to make friends, have fun, be creative, and learn something new. They looked back and were proud of what they'd done by the end of this short six week program, meeting only once or twice a week. It wasn't slick, it wasn't professional, but they had persisted and it was good.

May, 2007. An old fashioned auditorium at Sankofa Elementary, Oakland. Kindergarteners and first graders burst through the door behind us and came marching down the aisle. "I AM SOMEBODY, I AM SOMEBODY," they chanted in rhythm with the drummer. They wore their African fabric waist bands proudly. The audience cheered as the children showed us their dances.

But before, when they started? They thought it might be boring or take up too much time from other things.Certain other students "got on their nerves." They felt shy reading their poems or dancing in front of the others.

Before and after. An experience of some kind of transformation. We look back and realize we created something, became something, persisted through difficulty and came out the other side. As the school year winds down, we artists who teach in after school programs once again experience our reward. Through the challenges -- absences, sudden room changes, crowding, noise, fights, freezing rain, broken heaters, illness -- when we share what we've done with an audience and look back, it becomes clear. And we want to do it all again next year.

Writing it down

I'm late.. the inevitable dash to the end of school. But I need a moment to honor the essence of some poems written by my middle school students at Elmhurst Community Prep. This was a short project Opera Piccola provided at the last possible moment before summer break.

When invited to express "emotion recollected in tranquility," Wordsworth's definition of poetry, almost 100% of the sixth grade participants expressed passionate grief at death 'for no reason.' They were also asked to quote lines that were meaningful to them, from a book or newspaper, as part of the poem. If I hadn't known what country the piece below came from, I might think it was written by a child living in Iraq or Afghanistan. But then the quote from Martin Luther King Jr reminded me that wars have happened here too. In Eva's words:

"My heart cries when a family member is killed,when
I see bullet shots flying around
I have a dream; I have a dream that there’ll soon be peace

I have a dream; I have a dream there will not be a funeral close by
I have a dream; I have a dream that nightmare will be over!
I can’t forget those bullet shot sounds Boom Boom"