I began teaching 25 years ago, inspired by the notion that all students could learn and each and every one was entitled to be welcomed.
I began teaching 25 years ago, inspired by the notion that all students could learn and that each and every one was entitled to be welcomed into the environment where they were to spend six hours a day for 12 years. My idealistic view of learning has been rewarded a million times by students who respond to my genuine interest and share their thoughts and ideas with me.
During those years I have climbed a thousand steps in Blarney Castle in Ireland with students who had only ever seen a castle in a book of fairy tales, adopted donkeys with tender hearted young people, explored Manhattan with the hundreds of young people who join the One World Club at the high school. These open minded young people have a vision of a society where we all care for each other and where we understand that to trample on one person’s rights tramples on all. We have celebrated the cultures of the world represented in our school, and used the lessons of the Irish Famine to learn about immigration. I have wept at too many funerals of our young people and taken pride in the achievements of my students and embraced their families. Over the past several years, my students have built gardens, helped to look after abandoned animals, taught cultural classes in the Island’s elementary schools and raised money for people in need. I am in awe of these smart, compassionate young people. I have great faith that the world will be a better place with them in it. This has been my job and it is one in which I take great pride. It is a joyful privilege.
Not all students have equal opportunities and it is our job as educators to be constantly aware of that. A simple rule that I adopted many years ago is that everyone matters and our public schools are one place where that rule should always be observed. Regardless of learning style, socio-economic status, ethnic origins and perceived abilities, all of the young people who attend our schools are entitled to the best education that we can give. Every student should be educated as if they plan to go on to Harvard. There is no one who does not deserve stimulation, acceptance, safety and respect.
A school is a large environment and can be anonymous and impersonal but every student should have a place in the school where they can go for advice or just to feel welcomed. These are the years of their lives that will shape their entire future. We do not know, and cannot know, the details of their lives outside of school, but for the six hours a day that we have them in our care, they are our responsibility. They are future musicians, academics, artists, social activists, athletes, mechanics, entrepreneurs and carpenters. They all have dreams. They are our future citizens and they need strategies to express their views, to develop their world view and to learn the value of kindness and compassion. They will inherit a complex and often frightening world, and they need to learn to build community based on respect and on mutual need.
Unfortunately, standing up for others rarely comes without a price. I recall that a few years ago, I stood up for some students who had made a perfectly reasonable request that had been refused. For the following three years, I was the target of bullying and I was not a vulnerable adolescent, but that experience was a valuable one because I use it in class to help students strategize when they are in similar situations.
Now we are living in turbulent times and prejudicial statements are used by those in our government. Stereotyping of all kinds has become the norm and our students have never needed more help in guiding their moral compasses. Anti-Semitic slurs are used frequently by those in positions that the students have been taught to respect. There have incidents of anti-Semitism in 27 states since January and slurs against Latinos and Muslims are commonplace. This is not an issue just for the communities being assaulted. It is one for all of us who hope to build a compassionate, inclusive world that will value the safety of all. We owe it to our students to prepare them for a diverse world and that begins by affirming their own personal value and the importance of understanding that racism is just another form of scapegoating and bullying.
The U.S. has been a beacon over many years for people from all over the world who came here seeking a better life, a safer life. It has been a promise that for so many has been kept. The starving Irish, the persecuted Jews, and refugees running from unjust regimes all came here and created meaning. They built their churches, their restaurants, played their music and contributed words to the language that we all speak. In more recent years, that immigration has been from Africa, the Middle East, South East Asia and Latin America. Everyone is seeking the same sanctuary and opportunity.
In our schools we have many young people whose families have taken that same brave journey and risked everything for a better life. Those young people are our students and, like all other students, deserve our care and protection. There are so many ways that their presence has enriched all our lives and has been a cause for celebration, not concern. They have endured great difficulties to get here and have embraced the American Dream with passionate sincerity. It is incredibly painful to be insulted for one’s family history or ethnic origins and surely in 2017, we can be responsive enough to reach out to all of our students and to model for all of them joyful acceptance of the fact that this is a diverse world and all our stories enrich it. Let’s open our hearts and our doors and speak out against the bullies and remember that when we tolerate the bullying of one group we just buy time until our turn comes.
Elaine Cawley Weintraub is history department chairman at the Martha's Vineyard Regional High School. She serves on the Massachusetts State Bias and Sensitivity Committee, and the advisory board for Facing History and Ourselves.
Comments
Thank you, Elaine, for your
Thomas Hodgson WTThank you, Elaine, for your eloquent and loving words.
The Martha's Vineyard
Dan Waters West TisburyThe Martha's Vineyard Regional High School is lucky to have Elaine Weintraub on its faculty. She is a tireless and outspoken champion of the disenfranchised, the marginalized, and the underprivileged. I'm proud to live on an Island where she has made such a huge difference!
Elaine, Thank you for your
June Manning AquinnahElaine, Thank you for your beautiful words. You have been a mentor to many students in your career and you have certainly made a difference in the lives of many. Even on a local level, you brought in Wampanoag historians to teach your class about our tribe. That was never part of the curriculum when we attended in the early 1960s. You have been a trailblazer. Keep up your great work. THANK YOU !
Elaine Cawley Weintraub is
Maureen Kenney West TisburyElaine Cawley Weintraub is yet again "walking the walk" of commitment to the students at MVRHS as the One World Club students join the Business Club Students and Josh Burgoyne for their annual cultural exchange with inner city students from the Islands of Tolerance program. They will be leaving on Weds. 3/15/17 in the wake of a snowstorm and braving the elements to learn about how other students, who are mostly from urban Immigrant families, live and strive and survive in NYC. This is dedication beyond the call of duty. Elaine and Josh and their students graciously
host the NYC high schoolers on the island every June. Thanks Elaine.
Thanks for taking the time to
Sean Boston, MaThanks for taking the time to write this, Elaine. Very heartfelt. You mentioned kids having to deal with "anti-semitic" comments and other racial slurs coming from those in our government. I have a suggestion for you to help your children understand what this all means in order to better cope and move foreward.
As I'm sure you are well aware, there is a great deal of "fake-news" out there that portrays certain people to be anti-semitic, racist, sexist, xenaphobic, islamaphopic, etc. This fake news is very hateful, accusatory, and militant. If I were a teacher I would explain to my students that they should not worry what those people on the "news" stations say because they are all paid to lie. They are all part of a propogandist wing of the establishment Democratic Party, bought and paid for by billionaires to undermine the will of the people and subvert the representative government we have so cherished. These students deserve to be dignified with the truth. They deserve to be shown the corruption in our government and in our media that distorts things to fit a certain agenda. They deserve to be taught the truth about being a legal immigrant vs being an illegal alien and about the families that have immigranted here legally who are completely insulted and degraded when they see other families who live here illegally and are being handed everything they need from money to protection from the law (sanctuary cities) to paid college tuition. They deserve to be taught actuall full statements from people and not 2 second clips taken out of context. Dont they deserve the dignity to get all the facts and not just certain ones that the media cherry-picks and spoon-feeds to them?
The hard working men and woman of this country have voted to finally be represented and to finally get that swamp drained! Which is long over due as our representative form of government has been spit on, cheated, corrupted, and subverted. They are tired of being seen as no more than a taxpayer, a shlub with no other purpose than to bow to the will of the morbidly obese federal fat cats. Your student deserve to know the truth. The truth will help them cope. Lies are spread so easy, the truth is much harder to spread. Help them learn more.
Thanks for your service.
-Sean
Sean- the "propogandist wing
David Jordan Worcester and EdgartownSean- the "propogandist wing of the establishment Democratic party". Really ? The alt right Republican party billionaires have - like the many despots before them over epoches of world history- have honed the skills of creating untruths to such a degree that it is difficult fornour youth to know what is real and what isn't. President Obama wasn't born in the US- there is no such thing as human influenced global warming- President Trump had the largest attended inauguration of all time- Muslim immigrants are all terrorists- PResident Obama wiretapped Trump Tower- the Republican healthcare plan tonreplace the ACA would better serve Americans in need ( oops, the CBO reported yesterday 20 million poor Americans may lose their healthcare under the Trump plan) - and what about all of those billionaires with no experience whatsoever the "Republican establishment" has esconsed as Cabinet officials running the Depts of Education , Homeland Security, the State Dept, & EPA. How can you with any degree of honesty attempt to align your values with an educator of the quality and dedication of Elaine. You sir, are the antithesis of the integrity which Elaine has exemplified throughout her teaching career. Those who are self centered with unbounded hubris wrap themselves up in the American flag and claim to be the fount of truth when they only seek to divide and create false enemies of the least advantaged. Ask any refugee fleeing thier homes for their lives to the percieved open arms of America only to be met with hate filled rebukes from this new American president who rules by dividing and fanning the fires of bigotry. In terms of immigrants- any school child knows our country was on the backs of Irish, Italian, Jew, Afican, Asian, Central and South American and now Middle Eastern families who have come to our great melting pot to find a better life and to make us a better nation- you do recall that which is written in your dollar bill - e. Pluribus unum ; out of many, one. Elaine has given her life to inspire, uplift, and bring hope to generations of students. You attempt to highjack her selfless ontributiins to others as your own in your self serving response. We need more Elaines in our world so that they can continue to shine the light of honesty, empathy, and compassion where darkness attempts to overwhelm us. Light will eventually prevail over the dark ; it always does.
Sean from Boston....These
Cheryll OBMVSean from Boston....These students are much smarter than you give them credit for and I have every confidence they can cope as they are no longer children.
It is a blessing you are not in the teaching field because a really good teacher would not point fingers. "Fake news" comes from a multitude of places
By the basis of Ms Weintraub's words alone, it is hypocritical of you to suggest one particular entity for its origin. Students are taught to be independent thinkers. Independent thinking and "the better angels of our nature " will secure a bright future for for all people.
Thank you Sean,for explaining
Tisbury voter Vineyard haven massThank you Sean,for explaining what a few of us feel.I've been called every name in the book over years on island from well educated teachers for question or trying to have a conversation on different topics,on now do not discuss any topic with anyone but I am a voter and think a lot of Americans spoke up finally,lets teach a little more American history and the goodness we provide to others in this world and the wonderful democracy we have.so pleased that states and school commuters will now have more input on our education in this country and not mandated from Washington dc.back to local rule.thanks again Sean
Thank you, Vineyard Gazette,
Eileen Hamblin Melrose, MAThank you, Vineyard Gazette, for publishing conflicting points of view. It's so important for all of us to hear what "the other side" has to say. I am trying very hard to keep an open mind despite my self-acknowledged biases. Sean, I'm sure there have been incorrect stories from both sides but I don't have to listen to interpretations by commentators to know that anti-Semitic and other hateful comments and beliefs are being promoted by certain individuals and groups since I can hear them in the subjects' own voices or read them in their own publications. When you have the original source material you can't very well call it fake news, can you? Don't listen to the news anchors and reporters, just listen to the newsmakers. I respect and will defend your right to your own opinions but I cannot support your right to your own "facts" any more than you would want others to have their own "facts."
Bully for you Elaine! Well
Douglas Korves Always on island.Bully for you Elaine! Well said.
Thank you for speaking so
Marsha Winsryg West TisburyThank you for speaking so truly for those of us who are choked up with horror at what ignorance and intolerance at the highest levels has unleashed in this country.
Being educated on the island
Tisbury voter Vineyard haven massBeing educated on the island and raised I've had a conversation on the topics your writing on ,these conversations of bulling,and calling other kids names did not exist what changed over the years I continue ask myself.Is teaching students that our history is a big bully in the world,or is there to much conversation about it.A few things come to mind would be is there discussion in the classrooms on both sides on issues historically like civil war or the Irish famine.I really don't have any answers to this problem just know you can't regulate it by bully laws,hate crime laws,or by making others like each other in a classroom ,there will always be different cultures and religions who have no intention on getting along with each other.So bottom line what has changed?When playing sports I offen think that I didn't care who I passed the basketball, to,we were a team,color blind,freinds walked to school played at recess like brothers,
Unfortunately I am Irish and
J C Murphy West TisburyUnfortunately I am Irish and remember when my grandfather couldn’t get a client who had money to pay his inexpensive fee and yet he was brilliant, but he was Irish. Today, Ireland is the most literate country in the world. I am not saying brilliant. They now all read and write where before they were denied the privilege to learn. My brother as a corporate Attorney set up many companies in Ireland In the recent past simply because they were literate, and if you take the time to be factual you will perceive they no longer come here, because they have jobs in Ireland now. They are having some problems as all countries are today, because of the economics whereby our debt has gone from $9 trillion to $19 Trillian in a little over 8 years, but yet the US produce at the retail level of accounting in GDP about $19 trillion where the rest of the world in its entirety produces about half of that in total. Why? Because we are educated and we have the opportunity to work. There are three billion people in the world that make less than $2.00 per day. We in the US allow 1 million people a year from proportionately diverse countries. Incidentally, Arabs are Semites also. Abraham’s historical house is in Mecca. Regardless, bullying starts usually because of a lack of something such as proper mentoring. As a past economists, I have traveled the world in these countries you speak of, there is no middle class. The hidden anger in Chicago, Detroit, and etcetera has been not called bullying, but the reasons are perfectly imperfect as far as economics is examined with a small error factor, but it is caused by poor leadership, Poor education, and no jobs. There are no jobs and no middle class, in these culturally deprived countries: analogously are similar to us on this island. Therefore I would suggest you look at the source of bullying which is usually generated generally speaking by someone who has and someone who hasn’t as well as a few simply perversely deranged. I loved your article, but you don’t really get to the cause of bullying, as in, no place to live, where we could build a dormitory, but the Haves think it might detract from their asset value. I believe the leaders of the towns and the commission have no common sense. They simply skirt the issue and cause bullying from and economic point of view. It is very difficult to cover everything, but you should discuss the cause of bullying with the exception of the mentally perverse. If you look at the math Sanctuary cities cannot and will not work, as you I believe are being idealistically indiscreet. At the moment I am in the jungles of South America looking at the beginnings of the next war which will be caused by the lack of revenue from drugs coming into this country.
I am Irish too Mr.Murphy and
Elaine Cawley Weintraub West TisburyI am Irish too Mr.Murphy and an immigrant to the US and have a doctorate in history. My masters is in Irish History. Thank you for taking the time to respond to what I wrote. I appreciate your sharing your thoughts with me but Mr.Murphy it is not unfortunate to be Irish.... I consider it a blessing.
Dear Elaine:
J C Murphy West TisburyDear Elaine:
I wrote a response to your false rebuttal on a possibly dangling modifier on my being Irish. I have the same amount of Degrees as you only in Economics. Why don't you ask the Gazette Why they didn't print it for you?
Wow!! Mrs. Weintraub!! Nicely
Amelia Durawa EdgartownWow!! Mrs. Weintraub!! Nicely said.
Beautiful! You inspire us
Brianna De OliveiraBeautiful! You inspire us everyday, thank you for your hard work and dedication.
Thank you For such an
Sue Hruby West TisburyThank you For such an insightful and compassionate letter. I only wish there were a million of you out there and there may be). I so appreciate your words and wish they had been said when I was in high school a million years ago,
Thank you for this powerful
Dennis McAndrews Wayne, PennsylvaniaThank you for this powerful and insightful commentary. As a special education attorney in Pennsylvania and surrounding states, I witness the challenges faced by everyone in the educational system every day, and have profound respect for the educators, students, and families who work together within that system and confront these challenges every day.
Education should not be a
Abe Seiman Oak Bluffs, MAEducation should not be a political issue. Young people are the initiators od change. They are the hope for the future. It is time that we realize that education remains one of highest resource priorities, Just as important as the environment, agriculture, sustainable energy, etc. It is Not a resource whose funding can be cut. It should be increased that that every student gets an equal education.
Beautiful words from a
Barbara Ganey Pine BushBeautiful words from a wonderful teacher - Bravo!
I consider myself a fortunate
Lara O'Brien VHI consider myself a fortunate Irish person. Really, I couldn't be prouder. I'm also an immigrant. Elaine tirelessly holds the light forward for our children and our community with compassion, intellect, and empathy. If we don't have these qualities in our leadership, be it government, school, or home, we have very little.
I am listening and learning and am thankful my children will grow and flourish under Elaine's guidance and mentorship. Thanks to all caring teachers/guidance counselors at our schools who reach out everyday to understand our children. Nobody can know or guess what they are going through, few can imagine the life of another, but its comforting to know there are professionals who will always look out for our kids.
Seo Elaine. Ta si mo mhúinteoir.
(This is Elaine. She is my teacher.)
Lara O'Brien.
How beautifully said. The
Rita Moran Ft. EdwardHow beautifully said. The children and community of MV are so very fortunate to have such a wonderful teacher. The USA could use so many more of these wonderful compassionate teachers in this turbulent time. Love wins over hate every time.
Elaine, A beautifully written
Ann Graham EdgartownElaine, A beautifully written expression of values I value. You are the kind of beacon of service leadership that is inspiring for your students, your peers and now me. Thank you for your thoughtful and forthright words.
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