Saturday Morning reMIX Interrupted – Happy 6 Months Volume and Light!

We interrupt our weekly Saturday Morning reMIX to celebrate Volume and Light’s six month anniversary. Yes, I’m celebrating six months. No April Fool’s here.

Nashville is a beautiful city teeming with a robust creative scene and a healthy economic infrastructure. We know we have a good thing because the 100 newcomers per day and clogged streets serve as confirmation. But underneath the cranes and welcome banner is another Nashville best represented by our school system. Don’t get me wrong, I love our district but that affection doesn’t obscure the issues from my view.

Very simply, our school system doesn’t match the newest Nashville where you can find beauty and growth throughout most of the 525 square miles it encompasses. Instead, our district, though filled with capable, loving teachers and principals and rockstar students, is dotted with many rough patches and too often slow to no growth. Incidentally, we tend to lay blame on any number of things — communities, families, housing, criminal justice, inferior teacher prep programs, leadership deficits, poverty, but the fact remains, our most vulnerable children and families are not reaping the benefits of an economically vital city.

What’s more troubling is that the decisions made on behalf of these families almost never include them (see post below “they planning for our future…”). In my twenty years involved in education advocacy as a parent and employee, I’ve witnessed the squeakiest wheels rolling from the middle class and white families even as our district has been majority poverty and minority for many years.

So six months ago today I set out on a journey to provide a platform to amplify the historically silent and spotlight the missing hearts and minds. And even though Volume and Light is a work in progress, I know this is absolutely the thing I’m supposed to be doing. I’m grateful to Education Post for providing a platform for my platform allowing me to extend my blog’s reach.

I’m excited about plans for the future and where Volume and Light will go. Thank you for hanging with me and offering words of support. It means the world to me.

OK! Back to your regularly scheduled program: the reMIX of last week’s education stories.