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Ask the Superintendent - Oct. 11, 2006
The central theme of my previous two columns has
been school safety and the measures school personnel
take to insure students are safe. As I was
completing last week’s article, I reflected on how
much schools have changed from when I first started
as a student and then later as a teacher. I thought
I would share a portion of my student experience
this week and compare schools “then and now.”
It was the summer of 1945; World War II had ended in
April in Europe. Three weeks prior to my going to
school for the first time WW II was over in Asia.
The school I was to attend was more than a mile away
from my home. Every student had to walk since there
was no district transportation. (Honestly it wasn’t
up hill both ways – only going to school).
Two weeks before school opened, my mother and I
began to practice the route I would walk to my
half-day Kindergarten class. My family did not own a
car, my mother never learned to drive, and as
mentioned, there were no buses. We practiced three
times a week for two weeks. On the “Big Day”,
understandably a little nervous, I summoned enough
confidence from the practicing, even though I was
only five years old, to set out on my own. Many
streets and intersections had to be crossed. Two
wide boulevards with traffic lights had to be
negotiated. It wasn’t long before I realized I
wasn’t alone as I had been during my practice walks.
Hundreds of students were converging on the school
from all directions. It was virtually impossible to
get lost and I soon realized all I had to do was
follow the crowd. Cars, trucks, and city buses,
which were obviously slower and less powerful,
waited patiently for us to cross at the
intersections. Older students helped and looked out
for the younger ones. This “human wave” descended
upon the school at 8:30 a.m. and then intuitively
separated itself to congregate outside specially
designated grade entrances.
My Kindergarten classroom appeared huge. Each
student had a closet and a shelf for their supplies.
We sat on stools for reading and had an individual
small table and a chair from which to work.
Approximately halfway through the year the cookie
basket arrived. Up until that point we always had a
milk break. The cost was 2 cents per day or 10 cents
per week prepaid. The cookies added a penny to the
price; 3 cents per day or 15 cents per week. The
cookies were extra special because sugar had been
rationed during the war and sweet treats were a
rarity in most homes. There were times when some of
us could not afford cookies every day, but thanks to
Mrs. Bailey, none of us ever had a day without a
cookie.
Leaving school for home proved a little more
challenging. Only the Kindergarten students were
going home so there were no older students to
follow, but somehow we all negotiated the obstacles
and made it home safely.
I remained at that school for three years walking
each day in rain and, yes snow, (school did close
for the Blizzard of 1948). The major difference in
grades one, two, and three was that our desks and
seats were bolted to the floor in straight rows and
our teachers had huge desks that they positioned
directly in front of us.
We did have fire drills and when I was in third
grade a selected number of sixth graders were on the
“safety patrol.” They helped cross students at some
of the busier intersections. One of my most vivid
memories was wearing a white shirt and tie (clip on
of course) each Friday for our assemblies. If a
student failed to wear a white shirt or blouse, they
had to sit in the Principal’s Office because it was
“unsafe” to be in a darkened auditorium where they
could not be found in case of an emergency.
In the spring of 1948, I became part of the wave
escaping the city to move “East” on Long Island. My
father, a union carpenter, obtained a job working at
the infamous Levittown and moved his family even
farther East to Suffolk County.
This time, my school was five miles from my home. It
still wasn’t uphill both ways; in fact it wasn’t
uphill at all. This school district did provide
buses, but since I had been “conditioned” to be self
reliant, I only took the bus on days that had
exceptionally bad weather. Most days I chose to ride
my bicycle to school and never once had to lock it.
The desks in this school were also fastened to the
floor, but now the playgrounds were grass and dirt
and not the cement, to which I had become
accustomed. I remember riding to school early and
staying late just to play on those fields
(unsupervised both before and after school).
Junior High School and Senior High School were
housed in the same building. Four of the six years
were spent on a true “split session.” Senior High
started at
7:00 a.m. and ended at 12:00 p.m. Junior High
started at 12:30 p.m. and ended at 5:30 p.m. I was a
Junior in High School before I had a “normal” day of
school. This school was only slightly more than a
mile away from my home, thus I was not eligible for
school transportation during these six years. It
made little difference because in 7th and 8th grade,
I rode my bike and still never had to lock it. Once
I entered ninth grade, a strange metamorphosis took
place during the previous summer. I discovered
riding a bicycle to High School was no longer
“acceptable.”
We now walked to High School in groups of four to
six friends. By the time we were seniors a few
students had cars; hot rods and jalopies. In the old
building, the desks were still bolted to the wooden
maple floors. The new wing had asphalt tiles and
movable desks, state of the art science labs (for
1956) and aluminum windows that didn’t work half as
well as the huge wooden double hung windows that
were opened and closed with a long pole. “Duck and
Cover” civil defense drills were added to the
traditional fire drills and appeared to be the only
attempt at safety.
In my Junior and Senior years, we could get to
school as early and stay as late as we wished. As
athletes we practiced football and baseball at
fields other than at the High School, because they
were under some type of construction for six years.
I never played a home football or baseball game in
High School. We had to get to practices at other
schools in the district on our own. School
transportation was never provided. Our lunches were
eaten in the bleachers of the gymnasium with one
teacher supervising. I never had the option to buy a
school lunch my entire time in school because there
was none available.
To leave a class, you simply asked the teacher who
was the sole arbiter, and if permitted you left
without a pass! If you lied and got caught…..the
French Foreign Legion was your best hope for
survival. Principals and Superintendents were in
their respective positions “for life.” Approximately
a third of the teachers had a two-year degree from a
“Normal School” of which many years ago, SUNY New
Paltz was one. Educational research on how “kids”
learn was in its infancy. Schools were “wide open”
and the most serious discipline infraction was
truancy or a very rare student fight. Academically,
we had fifty years of less history to study and only
needed 16 credits to graduate.
It was a different time, a much simpler time, and a
time that was far less demanding and hectic. It was
truly a much safer world.
Next week, my impressions as a first year teacher in
1964.
Roy Reese
Superintendent of Schools
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