I had an interesting talk with a mother yesterday.  She came to pick up her son in the nurse's office.  Her son claimed he had a stomach ache but she did not believe it.  He was fine in the morning.   As we talked, I got the feeling it was more than that.  They had just moved up from Florida and this was his first school year in our school.  He was a transfer student.  He was having trouble making friends.  She was worried about that.  I started to talk about encouraging him to get involved in stuff here.  Obviously, I mentioned sports first - it's what matters most here.  He is not a sports kind of kid.  So I mentioned clubs.  She told me he is a gamer.  Well, we used to have a Gamer's Club, but that got cut.  But there are lots of gamers here in school he could meet.  I asked if he was into the arts - fine, music, theater.  She didn't really know.  I told her that the kids I know in those areas are very kind and welcoming.  He might look into taking some classes in those areas to get to know people.

Then he came down from his class and I met him.  He was shy, but polite.  I talked to him a bit, but did not push it.  And in him, I saw me.  I was pulled from schools whenever my mother got fed up with a situation.  I know what it is like to transfer and try to make friends when your interests do not fall into the mainstream.  And then I got to thinking about the situation here.  Sure, we've got tons of sports and while they deal with cuts, their cuts are nowhere near as devastating as the cuts the art classes have been dealt.  The cuts in the clubs dealt some serious blows to the kids that fall under the radar, the kids who are not mainstream and have nothing else here.  In their eyes, they lost everything.  There were some kids who cried last year over the loss of their club.

But the people who make the decisions that affect these kids have no idea what it is like to be them.  I look at the make up of the decision makers.  They are sports minded.   If they have kids, the kids were sports kids.  They were popular.  They came from "good" families who had no troubles or if they did, they hid it real well (rehab, drug addiction, alcoholism, abuse, police encounters, all get swept under the rug).  But the kids that don't fit in here at a sports oriented school?  I am not sure that they really matter.  They have problems at home of all sorts and don't have the luck of societal buffers.  The art classes have a 30% cut for the second year in a row.  The clubs will not be reinstated.  While I am so grateful for the fact that the staff in the arts have not been cut, our hands are tied when our budgets are dealt some serious blows.  And in the case of Photography, I built this up from one level/one period to three levels (now AP) and eight full periods.  I was told a number of times that they could fill 10 periods.  We had to add a seat per period to accommodate the requests.  Yet I never asked for more money.  The students requested a period zero so they could fit photo in with all their other classes.  They refuse to pay the extra that entails.  I do not play games with my budget.  I do not try to sneak in over the allotted amount.  I compare prices and get the best prices possible.

However I was just told by my boys that their team just got new uniforms for the Spring season.  Other sports get new uniforms every year or every couple of years.  Sure, they are dirty.  But think about this.  The camera is held to the face when shooting.  Think about all the make up and skin oils.  Guess who cleans that stuff off?  Me.  And some of it is caked on.  I wish I could get a new camera because of bodily fluids.  When I was a cheerleader for our pathetic but lovable basketball team at Holy Spirit School, we were using uniforms that were 20 years old.  We bought our own bloomers.  We budgeted for the thorough cleaning of the uniforms for the next year.  And the money that is being thrown at programs that do not benefit 100% of the student population bothers me.  Our male students population is such that we will not have a great football team.  We do not have boys coming in with the build you need.

Here's what we do have:  Kids who have a growing interest in creative technology.  I have had so many kids talk to me about game and web design.  Kids are starting to show interest in product design.  And of course, there are all the kids we have who want to do something in photo as a main or side career.  And how are we serving those kids?  We have barely anything for some, and we maintain hurtful cuts to other programs (if the cut is administered and kept, it is still a cut when the rosters are at the same numbers).  Do we care about 100% of our student population or only the sports kids?  We are supposed to best serve all of our kids - their families all pay taxes.  To borrow the DC motto, "Taxation without Representation".

And please, spare me the "Melanie hates sports" bs.  I am a lover of basketball, worked for the NBA for six years, love sports such as skateboarding and bike riding, either actively or as a viewer.  However, it makes me sad to know that if I was a current student here, I would be made to feel that my interests and strengths do not matter one bit.  I would be insignificant.  And that just might be how that boy from yesterday feels.