Catchy title, huh? It’s not mine, it belongs to James P. Comer, the Maurice Falk Professor of Child Psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine’s Child Study Center.

“It is important to note that the school does not provide all of these services itself! It simply serves as a hub for community-based partners to provide needed services for families and students right on the school site. That’s really what “locked in a conspiracy” means—schools and communities working together to support whole children, for their future and ours.”

Interesting idea, the school providing the “hub” for the community. When my great grandmother was alive, she spoke of her church as the place for everything. You would go to church on Sunday and catch up with your child’s teacher, the local doctor and good friends. My own experience was similar to my great grandmothers, though we didn’t chat with our pediatrician during coffee hour, rather we met with friends and had Ladies Aide, where I learned about helping others. My school experience didn’t give me any direct community, though I made friends, it wasn’t where you would go to get information.

Now, as a mother myself, I have begun to look at community very critically. I feel that the group of friends that I hold dear our my community. Do I have a central place to call home, a place where everyone comes together to help each other? I have a church home which provides some of our needs but not all. I have a school that provides very little community, well, scratch that, they do try to foster community but to me it feels forced. As the town of Fredonia, do we come together with one common goal? Will our children find a sense of purpose, a sense of being part of something bigger than them? Do our children get their basic needs met? Do our children feel that they are loved? Can we create a conspiracy?

I wonder if faced with a large scale crisis how we would react? I think there is a large scale crisis in our community, a big sleeping bear, that is getting ready to wake up and growl. We know what we want for our children and yet, we continue to sleep, like the bear who forgets to come out of hibernation. Let us take a stand and say that “All children deserve to be

Healthy. Safe. Engaged. Supported. Challenged.”

Posted on May 12th, 2008 by karen
Filed under: Uncategorized