Trust was placed in our school at the beginning of the school year by hopeful parents. Many of the families we accept into our school come to us with feelings of frustration with previous school experiences. This week will help parents decide if that trust was valid when they look at their children’s annual achievement test scores. While it is only one part of the total experience, it is a time-honored means of evaluating what our school has provided for their children during the one-hundred seventy-four days we spent teaching them.
Unlike most schools, we start the evaluation experience with the students themselves…showing them the test results and the graphs of their accumulation of knowledge. Students can argue with numbers and percentages as if these are not important factors for their educational growth. However, when a student is shown the 50% bar line and their closeness to it in each area of learning, it becomes apparent when gaps of learning exist. No student wants to see a lot of white space between his/her scores and that bar line. One just can’t seem to ignore the places that scream…you’re not there yet!
Faith and trust are often interchanged in writing and conversation. However, faith does not require “proof” as does “trust.” I often tell my students that I will trust them as long as they do not give me a reason not to trust them. Once they have proven to be untrustworthy, it takes an awfully long time to gain back my trust. This often is shocking to students who are new to our school. Most of them have come to us from schools where it seems to be a “given” that they are not “trustworthy.” What proof do I have for that statement? My list includes uniforms required; constant supervision by an adult at all times; very restrictive hair codes, and law enforcement officers patrolling the halls of the schools.
It is a great learning experience to watch children check the boundaries of “trust” that are a part of our school experience. Many have difficulties from the start…others flourish with the new-found freedoms. I am consistent, however, and I will remove freedoms when my trust has been violated! But what joy it is to see a student who violated that trust begin working to rectify the situation. Much growth and maturing take place if the child is sincerely desiring to earn back that trust.
I must now spend the last weeks of the school year helping our parents of students who are lacking foundational academic skills look at choices. We will need to work together to see how much the school can help with remediation this summer or work to find alternative help for their children. Because our school’s mission is mainly to educate the gifted child, we must determine what we can and can’t do to help. Above all else, we want parents to feel their trust in us was and is worthwhile.
- Kay