I still have regularly scheduled time with one college tutee, and I have a couple of other high school tutees who occasionally call me in a panic.
Plus I'm getting to know most of my 250-ish students at the school a bit better. They're a diverse group of good kids. My hardest adjustment has been getting used to how ordered and by-the-book public school is. In some cases, it's good and necessary, but I also think it's rather prison-like in others. I'm not much for being a prison warden.
One student, who sports burgundy hair and a septum ring, told me I was "pretty chill", I think as a compliment? Either way, I don't think that's a typical descriptor for a prison warden.
In the meantime, I have short conversations with a couple of crossing guards along my commute - nice ladies, as most all crossing guards are 😉. Some may recall that, back in my crossing guard days, I had a daily customer fondly known as "Bike Lady".
I never did learn her actual name. We would exchanged pleasantries, and I knew how long her commute was, but that was about it. In fact, I probably wouldn't even recognize her anywhere else because of her bike helmet and glasses she always wore with a ponytail.
Now, it seems, I have become Bike Lady.
One of the crossing guards commented on the large amount of traffic, noting that the high school and middle school were neighborhood schools, yet hardly anyone seems to walk to school anymore. I took this pic from my classroom one morning before the start of school.
No, that's not the parking lot, it just looks like one. It's the steady stream of cars inching to and from the "neighborhood" school. At least there's one representative on foot.
There are buses for students who live over a mile from school, and some of the cars are students and staff. But a large majority are students who live less than a mile away, being driven to school and dropped off by parents.
This is quite different from my own high school days. Parents rarely drove their kids to school, and typically only on days when the kids had something big to bring to school, and only if the kid didn't have a driver's license. I went to a relatively small school in a small town, so thought that might help explain the difference, but Magnum went to a big school in a big city where no one was driven by their parents either.
Is this a new thing now? Did YOU get your own self to high school and back?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Love,
Bike Lady
13 comments:
I took a bus since I lived several miles away, but nobody's parents drove the kids who lived within a mile or so of school. I think everyone's afraid their little snowflakes can't take the hardship of walking, plus all the predators who will snatch unsuspecting (teenaged) babies. Bah! Toughen them up! Or, the parents could walk with them.
You are pretty chill. Not sure if that means much coming from someone with no facial piercings and brown hair.
Magnum and I agreed that we would've been embarrassed to have our parents drive us to high school, as would most of the other students. Now we live about a mile from our kids' high school, and one of us parentals driving them there was never an option :) Kids these days...
You have awesome footwear though, so it's golden!
I always walked to school until I bought my first car halfway through my junior year of high school, Mom never did drive us to school.
As I recall, you even went a bit NASCAR with your mom... and won!
I'm not surprised he thinks you're "pretty chill". You're very accepting of all kinds, and treat kids of that age with respect (as long as they deserve it).
I'm not even sure I knew my mom was an option for a chauffeur, and if I did, I highly doubt I would have wanted her to take me. My kids probably preferred I take them, but they took the bus most times.
I suppose my mom was a chauffeur option? Just not one I considered in high school. Meego drives himself when he's got some band haul, but usually walks.
I took the bus to school and back home until I could drive. Occasionally, I would get a ride to school if I had an early morning club to attend. Honestly, I don't even remember what my early morning club was...
My kiddos ride the bus. One of their schools is the furthest from my house than any other school. I am on one edge of the district boundary and the school is on the other. Something like eight miles. The other, her bus comes at 6:40 am and sometimes she misses it (or thinks she misses it because it's so late) so I drive her to school. Not many parents drive their kids to school around here though.
Wow, eight miles. Sounds like a long bus ride.
I'm surprised at how many kids get driven to school - high school even - around here. I know of other kids who are driven to their bus stop - What??
I used to get a lift to school but always walk home. I think my mother wanted to know that I'd arrived safely. By the time I was at college at 16 I had to walk, and then get a train.
College at 16 would be a good thing for several kids I know.
Our suburban neighborhood schools are close to my house; 5 minute drive - and 3 of those minutes are to get out of the neighborhood. We've always had lovely yellow buses (that's what I thought of them) to collect, as they say across the pond, the children. And MINE were expected to get on it!
However, many of my neighbors get in the school traffic, and then the long pick up/drop off lane, day in and day out for their kids. One mother told me that it's her time to talk and cozy up with her daughter during the commute. To each her own.
Oh... yes, it was the yellow bus for me during those years! And at one point, a city bus.
Post a Comment