Art v. Guns in Schools: What We Can Learn From Our Children about Living Well

The City of Boston Web site describes Roxbury Massachusetts as a former farming community that has become the “heart of Black Culture in Boston.”  The Web site adds that Roxbury is experiencing a “renaissance,” and it would appear that in at least one Roxbury school, a rebirth is having a positive impact on the youngest of Roxbury’s residents.

Someone on the Peace and Justice Studies listserv, of which I’m a member, posted the most inspiring story of a drastic renewal of educational philosophy at the Roxbury elementary school, Orchard Gardens.  Katy Tur, an NBC News correspondent reported the story on The NBC Nightly News and it ended up online.  Tur’s report sets the context for the story, an elementary school known more for its violence, total lack of faculty/administration control, and low student test scores.   The story begins three years ago, with the new principal, Andrew Bott, who, Tur points out, is the sixth principal at Orchard Gardens—a new school in 2003—in seven years.  

Tur notes that when the school was built, it was furnished w/ lovely spaces for teaching the arts.  Yet the arts never became a part of the curriculum….until Bott arrived.  At the time of his arrival, Bott made the bold move to remove the school’s security guards and use the money saved to instill an arts program, a fruitless risk according to his many naysayers.

Tur brings her report current:  

"But now, three years later, the school is almost unrecognizable. Brightly colored paintings, essays of achievement, and motivational posters line the halls. The dance studio has been resurrected, along with the band room, and an artists’ studio.

"The end result? Orchard Gardens has one of the fastest student improvement rates statewide. And the students — once described as loud and unruly, have found their focus."

As Bott acknowledges, the school’s journey is not over, and they still have problems to confront.  But he points to the students themselves as evidence that his radical decision is paying off.

 

I was so inspired when I read the story.  In the context of an ongoing debate about guns, with pro-gun advocates insisting that the only way to keep our children secure is with armed guards at their schools if not armed teachers and administrators,  and budget cuts to education, the story was a breath of much needed fresh air.  The Orchard Gardens transformation is anecdotal evidence, I know.  But it’s the sprout of that first crocus as winter transforms into spring, a sign of hope, evidence of the possibilities for a new way of being in the world, a new way of educating our children.

Guns may be an answer to the problem of gun violence in our schools.  But guns absolutely do not have to be the only answer, and I will continue to argue that guns are not even the best answer, because of what their chronic presence in the hallways if not classrooms of children’s schools teaches those children about the world around them without anyone having to say a word.  Fear is one of the underlying seeds of violence, and security guards with very obvious weaponry invokes fear.  

In Roxbury, music, dance, painting, creative writing transformed not only the atmosphere of a school, but transformed the students as well as their engagement with education.  It sure is a model I would love to see followed right here in Tennessee, and around the nation.   

You know, I love word puzzles, and one recent puzzle I worked on resulted in an adage about light:  There are two ways to bring light:  to be the candle or to be the mirror reflecting it.  These transformed children have become both candles of their own light and mirrors reflecting the light around them.  Isn’t that the most awesome story you’ve heard today??!!

http://dailynightly.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/01/18005192-principal-fires-security-guards-to-hire-art-teachers-and-transforms-elementary-school#.UYriZRMyoWA.facebook