BELLOWS FALLS — At last!
I'm not really referring to the mere three-week delay, but to the long 50 years that the Bellows Falls, Westminster, Grafton, Athens, Rockingham, Saxtons River, Bartonsville, and Cambridgeport children have waited to attend a school that was healthy, clean, well-heated and -cooled without drafts and suffocating heat and, most importantly, a school that is ready to enter the technological 21st century.
Because of lack of loving care and simple maintenance, this beautiful building was left to deteriorate and almost die.
It had been revitalized in the 1950s, shortly before I began attending Bellows Falls High School in that building in 1961. We boomers were already bursting her at the seams.
Being the children of the greatest generation, we had been taught, as our parents did naturally, not to complain. So we loved and accepted her and simply set up traffic patterns to move between classes and moved on.
We won state basketball titles in her tiny gym and moved on. When I applied to Smith College, my interviewer told me that BFHS had the reputation of turning out some of the best-educated students in New England.
Let's fast forward a few decades, when my children were in the building, by this point the Bellows Falls Middle School. By the late 1970s early '80s, the school began to show her age, but it was still turning out some pretty-well-educated students.
Excellent teachers still roamed the halls, but the halls were showing their age and, as far as I could see, not much maintenance was being done. The kids complained of classrooms that were either freezing or searingly hot, and they whined about having no big gym. I, of course, told them to suck it up, as my parents had told me.
The condition of the building was a nagging issue in the back of my mind, however.
Fast forward another decade or so. I was sitting on the school board.
Time and again, proposals came up to repair or replace this and that. Not to mention discussions about the decline of academics and behavior, and an overall breakdown of society in the school. Strangely, most of these issues were not dealt with or dealt with poorly - and with an uncommon amount of ignorance or passivity.
Let's take our last leap into the 21st century.
We have passed through a small league of administrators in the building, a small battalion of teachers, a small army of students, and a large war of battles over changes within our society, values, goals, hopes, families and, most important to this culture, methods of teaching, technology, skills, and interacting with students.
Yet there stood this ragtag old building - still solid, but unfit for the job that stood ahead for her.
Another battle in that big war loomed. Before we could enter the battle of academics, we needed to have the right arsenal. We owed it to not just this generation, but to their children and their children's children: this building wasn't ready for now. We won the battle, but it took a couple of charges on that front. People are still trying to take the field, even though the guns are silent.
Thus we came to the three-week delay and we can now march excitedly and happily into that building. There's still some work to do. There are a few legacies to share, and you will be able to tell your grandchildren about the first day you walked into the building after it was remade.
This great and loved building is a legacy. She now stands strong and new and technologically ready to take new generations into a future where they can indeed “Enter to Learn and Go Forth To Serve.”
But the last and greatest battle is yet to be fought. As hard as the infrastructure battle was, this next battle will be. It's the battle to regain that academic prestige and superiority that we once had.
Where did it go?
Some would blame the changing demographics of our community, teacher quality, students' short-term attention spans, the decline of the family, drugs and alcohol, poverty, bullying, or the methods of discipline.
All would agree we have depressingly high rates of high school dropouts, low rates of college graduates, high rates of youth leaving our communities, overwhelming rates of bullying and, if you insist on using standardized-test scores, our academics will remain weak.
How can we win one massive battle of infrastructure, and not form as strongly together as we did for that for the next battle for academic superiority and pride?
If we continue to use the same script, we will continue to get the same results.
No matter how you tweak it, how loud you demand better results, how many staff you threaten, standardized testing will not improve your academic superiority or pride.
I know what can, I've done it, a lot of people know how. The answer is a lot of hard work, honest, intelligent leadership, willing, caring and courageous staff, and patience. There are ways to still measure progress, but that's not the main thrust; the children and what skills they need in this global economy or to work down the road is the goal.
I congratulate all the people who fought so hard for the beautiful, updated middle school. For those of you who fought it, didn't think we needed it, who lied to keep it from happening, who wanted it somewhere else, who were afraid of the taxes (as everyone was, even those of us who don't pay taxes), who still are complaining: she's back, better than ever, ready to shelter, protect, educate, teach skills, provide those corners and niches that grow friends, manners, pride; that calm fears, build mentors, show us ourselves, start leaders, and so much more.
If the right leaders, the right teachers, and the right staff are there and encouraged and, most importantly, if the best methods are used to make these things happen for all?
That is the next battle.