As I write this, the polls have been closed for an hour and election results are trickling in.   Though I spent my day engaged with teachers and students, I am spending my evening waiting and worrying.  Education is such a politicized endeavor.  I suppose other professions can declare as much, but I find it very difficult.  Schools are the pawns in political chess matches far too often.  We are vilified when it supports someone’s agenda.  We are heroic when it serves another.  Changes in administrations at national, state and local levels cause the political winds to shift directions and inevitably new initiatives are thrust upon us.  We roll up our sleeves to plan and implement only to be stopped short by the next ‘great reform’ from the victors.

We wait to see whose teacher evaluation proposal will judge our expertise and skill.  We wait to see if the winner wants to inflict even deeper cuts into our anemic budgets.  We wait to see if we will be stripped of collective bargaining rights.  We wait to see if our retirement system will be there when we need it. We wait to see if our students’ struggling families will lose access to services they rely on.

This time tomorrow, the waiting will be over.  The political ads will stop running.  The phone calls will stop.  We’ll sift through the results and try to figure out ‘now what’?   Elections have consequences.  We will begin to deal with those consequences in the morning.  Tonight we wait.  I hope that will be the hardest part.

What’s On My Book Radar?

Tomorrow author Suzanne Selfors will be Skyping with a 5th grade class in our district.  I wanted to read her Maine Student Book Award offering beforehand.  Luckily for me, The Sasquatch Escape was a fun and quick read.  I think our students will love this book.  The characters are quite likable, the combination of illustrations and text are entertaining and the plot is engaging.  Looks like a great new series for middle grade readers.  I recommend you check one out-I don’t think you’ll be disappointed!  Can’t wait to “meet” the author and hear our students’ questions and conversation with her.