April

RALLYING

12 CEA ADVISOR APRIL 2018

TEACHERS ORGANIZE WALK-INS FOR SCHOOL SAFETY CEA unites educators in support of students and meaningful action to protect them

Before classes started on March 14, teachers and school staff in Amity, Darien, East Haddam, Manchester, Marlborough, Stamford, West Hartford, and elsewhere throughout the state gathered in their schools’ parking lots and snowy courtyards in a show of support and solidarity for communities ravaged by school gun violence. CEA helped coordinate the statewide early-morning Walk-Ins for School Safety as a way of reflecting on tragedies as close as Sandy Hook and as recent as Parkland—and calling on Congress to help stem the tide of gun violence. Through their walk-ins, educators lent their support for student activists, many of whom participated in mid-morning walkouts to honor the victims of school violence and press for change. “We are proud to unite with our local chapter of the United Public Service Employees Union as we join in this national movement pushing for legislation that will keep children safe in every school across the country,” said middle school band teacher and East Haddam Education Association (EHEA) President Zach Blain. “We take our role as teachers seriously: sacrificing, advocating, and fighting for our students on a daily basis. We will continue to do that until we are able to put an end to gun violence in schools.” Blain remembers a moment years ago when two of his students, who have since graduated, came into his band room for their flute lesson. They found their young teacher crying. “I had just learned of the shooting at Sandy Hook,” he recalls. Blain explained that East Haddam teachers, with the full support of school administrators, participated in the walk-in as a way of showing students and colleagues here and across the country that they are just as committed to school safety now as they were in the aftermath of Sandy Hook. Show of solidarity “We stand in solidarity with the communities of Parkland, Sandy Hook, and others that have been affected by gun violence,” said Blain. “We are uniting together to create safe schools; to call on Congress to pass commonsense gun and school safety regulations, similar to those in Connecticut, that will help keep children safe in every state; and to ensure adequate funding for school

EHEA President Zach Blain, pictured with teacher Bridget Erlandson, remembers being in his classroom when the news of Sandy Hook hit. Both teachers have said, Enough.

East Haddam teachers are champions for change in an era of rising school violence.

resources and mental health services. Everything we do as teachers and school employees is done to provide our students with the brightest possible future, and we will not stand for national policies that make it so easy for that future to be instantly taken away.” The 17-minute program, timed to commemorate Parkland’s 17 slain students and teachers, opened with high school language arts teacher Bridget Erlandson telling her colleagues, through tears, “It is evident that we are a team of upstanders. Today we stand up; we engage; we call for action.”

East Haddam special education teacher Sheila Delaney describes the sense of responsibility that comes with being a teacher.

are things she learned from teachers—teachers like us. Somewhere out there is her first- grade teacher listening to her speak and write so eloquently and thinking, ‘I had a part in that.’ Somewhere out there is her fifth- grade teacher listening to her find her writer’s voice, thinking, teacher listening to her say, ‘You must study, or you will fail,’ and listening and looking on with pride at her words and actions. How powerful to be in a profession where we literally teach students how to stand up and be heard, and how to write with passion and persuasion. This is our job, and we celebrate when our students show the courage to stand up for what is right. We support them, as we are doing today, for taking a stand for what they believe in. We encourage them to find their voice, speak up, and speak out in order to bring change. This is our job. This is our profession.” Here for students Cahill went on, “We must become involved in any way we can to show our students that even if no one else is listening, we are there for them. We must act together; we are so many strong. We must join together and use the power of our union to push Congress for commonsense laws that protect our students and our colleagues. We must use the power or our numbers. The NRA has so many members, but so does the NEA.” Special education teacher Sheila Delaney added that school massacres such as Parkland have been carried out by young people with access to firearms who “used those weapons to kill other children and adults at their own school—a place in a ‘I had a part in that.’ And somewhere is an AP Gov

and others for their persistence and outspokenness and pointed to the fact that similar demands for change resulted in Connecticut lawmakers enacting strict changes to our own state’s gun laws, dramatically reducing the number of deaths attributed to gun violence. Third-grade teacher Lisa Cahill also praised Emma’s courage and observed, “In her speech were the underpinnings of things she learned about being a good writer. These are things she learned in school. These

Fellow language arts teachers Paula Stevens, Meg Dedman, and Jaime McNamara read from selected poems that included William Ernest Henley’s “Invictus,” Shel Silverstein’s “Where the Sidewalk Ends,” and Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise.” “We will rise from this,” McNamara pledged. Elementary school library media specialist Lisa Chlebowski praised Parkland student Emma Gonzalez

Left to right, West Hartford Mayor Sheri Cantor, Senator Beth Bye, and West Hartford Education Association Vice President Dave Simon address teachers at Hall High School.

Tricia Conduah, Newfield Elementary School, addresses her colleagues in Stamford.