The Importance of Each Individual Life: Brenda's Story

We'll call her Brenda, and her mother we'll name Raynelle.

Raynelle came to Minneapolis from Chicago, as so many have done in the last several decades. She had had enough of drive-by shootings, the heavy drug-dealing, the whole maze of dangers that could lead to a short life--- for her and for her two children. Raynelle, now 25 years old, had seen fourteen friends die while she and they were still in their teens; four of them had died in cars in which she herself had been riding, and one of those had gasped her last breaths in Raynelle's lap. Raynelle is still on speaking terms with Brenda's father, who visits Minneapolis from time to time, and welcomes Brenda back to Chicago for a visit every once in a while. But Raynelle has no contact with the father of her second child, a three year-old we'll call Anthony.

Brenda is eight years old, a Grade 3 student in a K-5 school of the Minneapolis Public Schools. Pretesting upon entrance into the New Salem Educational Initiative showed Brenda functioning at Grade 1 in both math and reading. She has an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) and teachers think of her as a special education student. There has been some talk among those teachers that she might have Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), and that this might explain the fact that she frequently zones out in class and regularly fails to turn in assignments.

I have found Brenda to be a student enormously interested in math and an enthusiastic reader. During her first sessions with me, she did give some indications of the struggling learner. She had trouble counting by 2's past 12, and she had difficulty counting backwards from 20. In doing multiplication, she did not at first even have the concepts of multiplication by 0 or 1. But she now has all of those skills under control, she has a firm idea of multiplication as a short form of addition, she can perform multiplication in single digits through 5 and with 9, using in the latter case the trick that I teach all of my students. She also has a rudimentary idea of the relationship between multiplication and division and can perform simple operations with the latter. She is adroit at double-digit addition and subtraction, including those operations requiring regrouping (carrying or borrowing).

Her reading comprehension is now solidly at the Grade 2 level and she can handle grade level (Grade 3) material as long as I am with her to help her with new vocabulary. She has proven quick and adept at mastering new words, and delights in doing so. After each session we go back and show Raynelle the new words that Brenda has learned that day, and Brenda reads to her mother portions of the story, article, or poem from which the vocabulary came. Brenda is now asking for extra reading material to take home, which I am elated to provide.

Brenda has reached what I regard as the take-off point for the young learner, the point at which it becomes clear that she can handle all grade appropriate math operations, and at which reading for her now is mostly a matter of continuing to catch up in what had been seriously lagging vocabulary development. She has excellent focus when reading and answering oral comprehension questions that I pose on the spot. I find no serious learning disabilities, and I have come to regard the notion that Brenda might have ADHD as a serious misinterpretation.

Brenda just needed, as so many students do, someone to sit side by side with her and guide her to each new level. She responds with alacrity to the lavish praise that I give her for genuine accomplishment, of which there are numerous instances in each weekly session. She seems to find in me a level of interest that she has never encountered from any other teacher. She smiles often, laughs warmly, works hard, proceeds enthusiastically to each new academic task and presses me for more explanation and more information. She will be approaching full grade level performance by the end of this academic year and, since continuation in the New Salem Educational Initiative is the usual path for each student who enrolls (my commitment is permanent), she will with virtual certainty manifest full grade level performance or above as a Grade 4 student during academic year 2011-2012.

The circumstances of Brenda's life feature many descriptors that so often lead to failure. But at this point she is on a promising path to academic success. Her case serves as a case among many in the New Salem Educational Initiative indicating clearly the capacity of young people from challenging life circumstances to thrive when properly guided. Her story shows the importance of each individual life, every one precious, each one deserving close and caring attention. We can give up on no one. We must care about everyone. We should do this out of honest altruistic motivations, and we should do it in the knowledge that the practical result will be fewer welfare recipients, fewer prison inmates, fewer incidents of urban violence, fewer drug addictions, fewer wasted lives.

By honestly caring for the individual life, we build a better world for us all.