William D'Abate and Sackett Street School

I did my service project with Stacy at the William D'Abate Elementary School and Lilian Feinstein Elementary School at Sackett Stree. When Anita said that we could work with her friend Melissa Meyers (who the art majors work with a few times a year) I thought it sounded like a fun way to use my experience in art to help some kids whose art program is less than desirable. What I didn't expect was how much I would gain from the kids, the schools, and Ms. Meyers.
Our first school, William D'Abate, is in Olneyville and for the most part is a very underprivlaged student body. The kids at this school were really good and had far less disciplinary issues than at Sackett Street but their lack of an art room and art supplies is pretty low on the list of priorities. The neighborhood is tough, everyone around you speaks spanish, in many ways it feels like another country compared to the sheltered community of lincoln and the neighborhoods most of us have grown up in. At this school Melissa has a closet where she keeps supplies and a rolling cart to bring them from room to room. Our job was to help her get everything ready for each class and then Stacy and I would walk around the room as the kids worked and helped them with whatever questions they had about their project. The surprise at having these two older girls who weren't quite old enough to be real teachers never seemed to get old (at either school). The principal at this school was really friendly and involved in the school and he maked William D'Abate much more effective than the principal at Sackett. It was for this reason that we were only able to take pictures at D'Abate.
Our Second school was the school on Sackett Street. We were in for a culture shock here. Now for the most part I have to say the kids were really good and well behaved...however, there were several students with discipline and respect issues and they really stand out in my memory. In this school Ms. Meyeres has her own classroom but the support pretty much ends there. The principal in disengaged and though we never actually met her, the announcaments she gave in the morning and afternoon seemed incoherent. For a school with such a tough student body a principal lacking the skills to set discipline in place is an issue. With a more authoritative principal Sackett could be a really great school, so fortunately they will be getting a new one next year although no one knows who it will be. While most kids are good the kids who weren't were so far from what I have known it's hard to describe. They will directly defy what a teacher tells them to do, talk back, bully other kids, or just sit and refuse to do anything. It seemed to me that most of these kids just needed more support at home and at school but everyone seems more set on punishment or having them change school than anything. Lunch duty was really something...the teachers had whistles that were blown routinely (to no avail) and the kids were constantly screaming or being screamed at.
While the main focus of this entry has been on things that the schools or students lack, it is simply because we were so involved that we couldn't help but notice what the schools need. It's hard to know what kind of an impact our being there made on the kids, from the kids hugging us, remembering our names after only 30 minutes of class, and making us pictures, I think it is safe to say that even if we only helped for a few minnutes, it was a few more minutes of attention than most of the kids normally get in school.