"Dear Governor Cuomo,"

"You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose." - Mario Cuomo 

Dear Governor Cuomo:

I'm not exactly sure when your father spoke this quote but I find it interesting that he references poetry and prose.  Two things I happen to know something about, because you see Governor Cuomo, I am an English teacher in New York State.  I have worked diligently, faithfully, responsibly, with my heart soul for nearly nine years. Teaching is a second career. I came into my position having worked in the business world without unions

 I am used to flying without a net with nothing less than my work ethic.  My work ethic kept me employed at IBM for many years. My work ethic awarded me a master's degree with honors. My work ethic awarded me my first teaching position which came only after I worked for an entire year, filling in for leave replacements with no guarantee of full-time employment. I worked without benefits and without job security.This effort awarded me my first tenured track position.  I was grateful and felt accomplished.  My universe opened up. But my work ethic can not make a student care about a state test that has no consequence or meaning to them, unlike a final exam for a core class or a Regents exam in high school. Unless there are ramifications to the end result, teachers are the mercy of their students' apathy just as you are at the mercy of your constituents.

My first job was to teach an additional English course without a curriculum to eighth graders. I was 47 years old. My colleagues and I used our resourcefulness to develop materials and plan to assist students with their reading and writing skills. That year, our state test results were extremely positive. I know the value of hard work.  What I don't know is how we can be discussing the complex issues of what is taking place in public education today without addressing the change in the structure of the family unit and the effect this has on student performance.  Children need to be held accountable to their parents or guardians not to a test.

Governor Cuomo, I cannot fix the apathy that is rampant as a result of high stakes testing.  I cannot, hard as I do try with every ounce of energy within me, fix the lack of interest that is sadly festering, now growing in our students.  They come without the pencils, and notebooks which I bought for them.  When I assign work outside of the classroom to supplement what we've already started in class, it comes back unfinished. I contact my parents and I counsel my students and offer all I can to get them to see the importance of their work.  I walk into my school each day, with a smile and the composure and the diligence to inspire my students to not only read but grow a conscience and yes, a work ethic.

I cannot fix the ever increasing number of students who are troubled and are struggling to make sense of a world they didn't create and are severely conflicted by with each passing year.  Drug use, suicide attempts, bullying and prejudice have not decreased.  Governor Cuomo, schools can not remedy a lack of discipline that should be instilled within the family unit. These are core values that a student should have long before they ever reach my classroom. It is apparent to me that some families need effective support and the resources to create success outside of public schools.  Why aren't those of you who govern by our vote addressing those issues?  Why has a test become the measure of teacher effectiveness when clearly, our love, compassion, and the establishment of healthy boundaries for our young people matters more today than ever? 

Teaching has become a high risk profession.  Every day, we are at risk. In the wake of Columbine, Sandy Hook and other tragedies, our safe return home to our families can no longer be taken for granted .  Your new legislation is not addressing this nor is it putting the responsibility of student success on the home.  Your father and mother understood this.  He understood his voters and his audience. Look within Governor.  Do you really believe that this new legislation with high stakes testing is the revolutionary answer to fixing our educational issues?  Or is this legislation simply a political ax to grind? Governor Cuomo, with due respect for your position, think...Does the education of our young people have any place in politics? 

I support as any sensible person would, releasing teachers from their positions that are dangerous or detrimental for our kids. However, what are we doing to fix the apathy that is already infiltrated the public school system as a result of these past few years of change? I would like to hear our politicians address these issues rather than speak about tests that are not valid or a curriculum which indeed makes sense but does not address the additional opportunities we can generate by developing trade schools and alternative education for those who do not desire further education.  Instead of paying millions for testing, and wasting the funding available, how about developing alternative education that can train and generate employment for those who are not college bound?  If you want to shake the apple tree, to its "core" why not start there.

Just once, I would like to see elected officials stop grand-standing and remember that WE voted you into office based on the principles we could understand and believe to be true. Within the last year, the public has spoken and spoken loud and clear.  You cannot change a system without relying on the professionals already doing the job. And yes, teaching is a profession. We are trained.  We are educated and paid our way because we believed in the calling. Most teachers are thousands of dollars in debt before they even walk into a classroom because they believed in calling.  And yes, teaching is a calling.  It's not the summers off or the perceived hours of a 7:50 a.m. start time and an end of 2:50 p.m. It's a calling and requires more energy than running for office...perhaps.  This is why most new teachers leave within the first five years. It's a huge undertaking just like the governorship or the presidency for that matter.  If you want a better educated, innovative and more compassionate society, answers A,B.C or D will not get us there. Common sense will.

"My Mother's Daughter"

“The relationship between parents and children, but especially between mothers and daughters, is tremendously powerful, scarcely to be comprehended in any rational way.” -Joyce Carol Oates

I was four.  My mother, “Ma,” was fighting a cold and was lying down in her bedroom, nearly asleep.  I felt so badly that she wasn’t feeling well that I decided, at four years of age, that I would heat up some chicken that was in the fridge.  We had one of those gas stoves, which needed matches to light the oven. Sooooooo I turned the oven on like I had watched Ma do so many times.  The gas came on and then I lit the stove. “Boooooooom!”  Explosion.  An explosion so loud it woke Ma up and well...she ran into the kitchen, frantic, yelling.  “Claudia!!!!!!!  What happened????”  My eyebrows and eyelashes were singed. I cried inconsolably.   I really wasn’t clear as to what happened.  I was most likely in shock.  This was the first time I had ever heard my mother yell and yell she did.  I had frightened her beyond any fear she had felt in a very long time.  At four years old, I didn’t understand why she was so frantic.  Now I do.  Mothers, good mothers, spend most of their lives trying to protect their children and when we, as daughters do things that are out of our mother’s control, they get scared.

Then decades later, the tables turn.  Our mothers, our parents age.  Some age better than others, like Ma, but age they do and then it is our turned to be scared.  We watch these incredibly tough, strong, sometimes difficult personalities fight the aging process.  They want their independence and they still have their free will but at what point do their children, their daughters step in and tell them, “You can’t do this by yourself anymore.  We need help to keep you safe.” This is a discussion that becomes the very definition of who we become.  We are, “our Mother’s daughter.”

Everything I can appreciate about myself and everything I can NOT appreciate about myself as a woman, comes from my mother, my “Ma.”  She taught me so many things.  Most of all, she taught me the following: how to cook, to knit, to crochet, and even more importantly, how to read and write.  She taught me how to lose too.  Every time we played cards, she would win and never felt badly about it.  There was the most valuable lesson.  Sometimes you will lose.  Losing is part of living.  She knew that.

Ma was a Great Depression baby.  The fifth child of eight but from the stories she would tell along with her sisters, they knew they had each other and learned how to be resourceful.  They were tough, all of them.  It could be argued that they were too tough, too strict and just plain difficult.  But what we learned is that we need to take care of our own.  Hard as that can be when we want so much to develop our own identity and personality; we need to take care of our own.  My mother taught me that.

It’s hard for mother’s like mine to let go.  They don’t like admitting that their daughters are adults and very, very capable of thinking and acting on their own behalf.  Ironically this is the same mother, who insisted that each of her daughters get a college degree or more and develop careers and stand on their own two feet even when she couldn’t or wouldn’t admit they could.  These are the same daughters who fulfilled her dream and are hard-working professionals.  These are the same daughters who are struggling to take care of her now that she’s alone.

We look to our parents for guidance and want to admire them for their knowledge.  Parents hold the key to our future relationships and influence who we are and what we want to be.  They’re not perfect.  None of what they did was exactly perfect but they tried.  They had their ideas of what kind of lives they wanted us to live.  We had our own ideas and somewhere in between we were left to find the balance.

In the end, there is only love of all the memories we were given.  We are our mother’s daughters.  We have traditions, talents and our dreams just like them.  We have our individuality, in spite of the occasional dissensions. We are our mother’s daughters and for that, there is nothing but gratitude and perhaps some sadness.  The gratitude comes with maturity that we are what we are and that has to be good enough. We need to maintain dignity for our elderly. We need to fight for that dignity.  The sadness comes from the truth that we can’t keep those we love around forever.