Something About Maxine

"I'm a talker," she said.

"Okay, I'm listening," I thought. And I am glad I did.

Now folks, you know that it doesn't take an advanced academic degree to appreciate that the world is full of people who don't mind speaking their mind. And Maxine did. Less prevalent, however, are people who have something worth saying. And Maxine did.

Today I had the privilege of facilitating a session on Developing Your School's Organizational Identity at Wilburn Elementary School in Raleigh, North Carolina.  It is there that I met Maxine Weakly.

Although I find it increasingly redundant to differentiate, Maxine is a teacher and a leader. Our after-the-session conversation convinced me that Maxine is someone who both talks the walk and walks the talk. I expect that she looks for the same thing in others, including her students.

Admittedly I enticed Maxine to share more about herself with me because of comments she made in her Kiva activity. In a re-enactment of an ancient Native American ritual, Maxine joined her Kiva colleagues in a circle of representing teams of teachers and teacher assistants. There in the circle they talked about the values they identified important to their work at Wilburn.

As staff talked, words like "creativity, integrity, and respect" naturally surfaced. Just when the conversation started to subside, Maxine, who had already more than adequately represented the thoughts of her team, asked the group if she may tell us a story. Permission more assumed than actually granted, Maxine regaled the room with an account of a friend's nieces visiting from her country of origin, Jamaica. No one regretted it.

"I had to bring the little girls to school," Maxine said.

And oh, Maxine continued, how these pint-sized scholars fell in love with what they saw--computers, books in the library, bright lights, washrooms--things we all take for granted. The value Maxine most wanted to remind her colleagues of was "gratitude." She suggested, too, that it was also worth teaching students. What a revolutionary!

Maxine, I learned, is a hoarder of all things useful for Jamaican schools. Reportedly, her classroom is laden with boxes of paper, pencils, markers, spiral-bound notebooks and other supplies bound for that Caribbean island nation known more as an importer of honeymooners than as an exporter of high-performance learning organizations.

Anyway, I told Maxine that I might be able to "hook her up" with potential donors. So here is my two-part ask: Part one, if you can help some very needy kids in Jamaica, let me know, and I'll have Maxine get in touch with you.

Part two, if you are an educator or a parent, do yourself and our nation a favor and remind your children that, at worst, they have things better than 90 percent of the rest of the world. Gratitude is an always-appropriate value. Something about Maxine reminds me to tell you.