Sunday morning a guest minister opened his sermon with references to the beginning of a new school year and all that means to children and youth, to teachers and principals, to parents. He elicited knowing giggles and groans from throughout the church as students and parents (and grandparents no doubt) projected themselves into the rhythms of school bus rides, homework, recess, tests, and friendships. Despite recent experiments with school calendars most of us in this country and for the most part globally still feel those traditional patterns of school/no school/school. For me, now eight years out from having worked to ensure that facilities and faculties were fully ready for the opening bell, I still hear and feel the comfortable buzz of a new year in late August. Two experiences suggest in part why those rituals still cling to my sense of time. One is a blessing, and one a tragedy, though both are each. Recently, while checking out of a local hardware store, the clerk greeted me by name. We chatted; he asked how long I’d lived in the area; back and forth for a few minutes as he recorded our transaction. Clearly he knew me, but the best I could do was allow him to think I recognized him since one part of my brain was engaged (and he wore a first-name nametag, “Chris”) while another was in search mode. He talked about when I was his principal, how much had changed in those 30+ years, his family, and his job. I was uplifted by his strong, positive recollections from his childhood, thanked him for recognizing me and speaking up, and left the store. Hours later I finally got it; he’d been in second grade at the first school where I was principal. A great little kid, full of curiosity, possessing a blend of innocence and experience not uncommon in very rural Vermont. During his second grade year his mother and a sibling were killed in a car accident; life as he’d known it was shredded, and eventually the remaining family moved away. Today, he is married and providing for a family of his own. When we reconnected at the hardware counter after three decades, we didn’t talk about tragedy, we talked instead about blessings common to us; homes, jobs, family. Recently, my younger daughter’s first grade teacher died after an arduous battle with multiple cancers. Sue was Lindsay’s teacher more than twenty years ago, and we still remember her fondly as just the sort of person parents want as the teacher for their six-year-old. She was energetically there for the kids, a loving advocate, effective teacher, and nearly perfect in loco parentis. We’d hear from Sue when we’d see each other at the market; she’d have a smile and story ready at the breakfast cafe on Saturday mornings; and in the ensuing years she always asked about Lindsay’s life. That was it, actually, Sue was the sort of teacher who became part of the children’s lives. Sue retired a decade ago and fully enjoyed what that allowed her until stricken with voracious cancer, a tragedy preventing her full celebration and reward. However, when we speak today of Sue we don’t hover over tragedy; we talk more about the blessings common to us; shared careers, family, children. The cycle of a new school year conjures the scent of unbroken Crayolas, the shiver of frost in the morning, and the chorus of animated voices in the hallways. It also speaks to the lives such as Chris, Sue, and me touched and blended forever. It is a familiar, enriching rhythm.

“But Ed, nothing’s perfect in life.” Matthew’s response when I was fretting that we’d glued one leg shorter than the other three on a wooden wolf we’d added to our growing pack. Matthew’s ten; we’re reading buddies at the Boys and Girls Club. We meet for an hour each Thursday and spend about 40 minutes reading and 20 minutes doing something else. A couple of months ago he discovered that I do small wood projects and asked about our making “a bunch of animals, like wolves and bears and deer.” So we negotiated that into our reading incentive contract, and we’re now up to four wolves, one bear and one deer all of which I bring in parts ready to sand, glue, and paint. Along the way Matthew’s reading is improving, our menagerie is growing, we know each other better, and his world view continues to impress as wise beyond his years. I know it sounds like a cliché when it comes to mentoring, but I often leave our times together wondering which one of us gets more out of it. Nothing’s perfect, but our Thursday’s are pretty good.

Essay-Grading Software Offers Professors a Break EdX, a nonprofit enterprise founded by Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will release automated software that uses artificial intelligence to grade student essays and short written answers. By JOHN MARKOFF, Published: April 4, 2013, NYT OK, so some of my fondest memories of my early career are reading and responding to high school student’s essays. As a young English teacher in rural Vermont I was idealistic, eager to truly know the students, and optimistic that I could help develop solid thinkers, thoughtful debaters, and passionate poets all through writing and our conversations about it. Maybe that’s why I cringed at this new software application and its claims. Granted, my efforts at reflection, compassion, and constructive even friendly feedback would often take me as many as two days to provide a class of twenty-two 17 year olds, so the software is much faster. But still; it’s called humanities for a reason, right? More than a few of those young writers from the ‘70’s remain locked in my memory of what it meant for me to “teach,” and it was about connecting with lives, understanding their dreams and challenges, being part of showing them how language matters, how writing is thinking twice, and how the ways we communicate change lives, our own and others. Can software do that?

In our cellar storage area we have kept a cradle made by my fishing buddy before our first child arrived, the disassembled crib that our girls both used decades ago, and boxes of children’s books…all of this waiting for the day when grandchildren would bless us. In the past four months we’ve moved the cradle to one of the guest rooms, the books to the main floor, and realized that the cradle might need some work! Avery is four months old and already loves books as a primary attraction. Granted some of that is because the heavy board pages taste so good, but also she loves the visuals, the cadence of our reading to her, and her own recognition that she can turn the pages whenever she wishes regardless of the narrative flow. We’re fortunate that we can visit on alternate weekends, and each such celebration inevitably includes at least one story. Perhaps just another excuse to cuddle, but isn’t that part of how we pass on the love…of books…of each other?

I’m not often one short of language, but I’ve neglected this blog for months waiting for the right, best words to express my wonder at what a grandchild brings. Still no best words, odd for one others might even call glib. Nevertheless, and, with apologies for my narrative inadequacies in this case, it’s time to try. Avery Anne was born on Veterans’ Day just over three months ago, and I’ve been totally smitten since. Lindsay, my daughter, has been transformed into “Avery’s mother.” Joe, my son-in-law, has been demoted as he put it this weekend to “Avery’s transportation manager.” It’s not that we love Lindsay and Joe any less, it’s simply that we’ve discovered a love so new, so compelling, so full of unlimited promise and unfettered joy, that all else steps back to allow this glow. So now, we have a cradle in one of the guest bedrooms, a growing array of toys, and a soon to be overflowing basket of Good Night, Moon and its family of children’s books. I’m called back to when the cradle was for Marissa and Lindsay, when we built towers of blocks, and when we snuggled with them to read and “find the mouse” on each page. And I’m drawn forward to when Avery will read the books to us, work with me to build the puzzles, and bait her own hook!

Full disclosure: I’m writing this while sipping my second cup of coffee, having been up for several hours this morning. Education Week carries a provocative front page article today ‘Smart Pills’ Promising, Problematic: Brain-enhancing Drugs Stir Safety, Ethics Debates. The article spotlights what it calls an “explosion” in the availability and use of such drugs as Ritalin and commercial drinks like NeuroFuel (called nootropics, and which includes the aforementioned caffeine) and raises predictable questions attendant to such practices. For several years I’ve read occasionally about the potential and actual effects of such drugs to improve concentration, focus, and organizational sense. When I was a school principal (total of 19 years across grades preK-12; four different school systems) I was directly involved with students and families for whom such drugs were a part of their lives helping children cope with the challenges of ADHD, ADD and the like. In many cases parents, educators and the children themselves felt that such drugs were essential to learning and success in school and life. Occasionally I’d find myself engaged in dialogues where either the family or we educators, but not both at the same time, wanted to explore the possible positive effects of such drugs in efforts to “make learning possible.” However, as I read today’s article I cringed a bit. Perhaps it’s that I’m anticipating my first grandchild within the next couple of weeks, or perhaps it’s that my second cup of coffee has become so socialized (in fact, creates social opportunities), or perhaps it’s my sad acceptance that Lance Armstrong used performance enhancing drugs with such utter disregard for “what is right.” So, in briefly trying to unpack my own reactions, a few high points emerged. In a culture where it is increasingly common for parents to “red-shirt” their children from traditional kindergarten entry age in order to ensure little Bobby is actually a little bigger Bobby relative to his school peers, it’s probably not much of a leap for little Bobby to soon be seen needing one of these nootropics, particularly once a critical mass of his peers have also been red-shirted. Even if research convinces us that there are no ill effects (unlikely to be sure, since even my Starbucks will cause tremors and speed-talking if I have a third cup soon), wouldn’t access to such drugs simply expand the existing gap between the haves and the have-nots in terms of educational success and ultimate employability? If we already bemoan that the rich get richer, shouldn’t we be concerned about practices that help the rich get smarter as well if that were to deepen existing gulfs of hope and achievement? No more caffeine for me this morning, though I will have another cup around 3:00. I’ll close hoping that parents, educators, and doctors all will give nootropics for learning enhancement the same wide berth we too slowly deemed appropriate for steroids and athletics.

"Count your blessings." An admonition across generations to the point of cliche. It began simply enough; "Excuse me, sir; I think there's an envelope there with my name on it.". She spoke her name as I turned to help. I turned back, envelope in hand, a split second for memory to spin and stop. I introduced myself and started to ask the, "Are you...?" question when she interrupted with her version. This woman had been an eighth grader when I became the principal of her school---her final year there, my first. Thirty-two years ago. As we spoke past the platitudes, I found the thirteen-year-old in her eyes. She told me in some detail of the layered struggles she has battled on behalf of her son and his myriad physical and cognitive challenges. She conveyed no sadness, no anger; rather a focused acceptance and determination to provide for her son. We nodded and smiled at the perhaps not so random reunion, wished each other well, and I returned to my office counting my blessings.