The First (sort of) Negative Encounter...

I'm in a new building with a new staff, doing a completely new job.

I am a Literacy Coach 1/2-time and the ELL Instructory for the other 1/2!

I love it!

One staff member, today, however, turned her back on me a stomped away.

See...

The story goes like this...

She came to talk with me last week regarding an 8th grader at the school who is having trouble getting transportation. This school is a "school of choice" school with a lottery system for getting in. If a family chooses to enter this school, they are passing up on the free transportation to and from their neighborhood schools. Makes sense to me!

However, this child's family lives way out of town but only the father drives...the mother cannot drive...

This staff member came and asked for my help. She wants someone to find out if there are other families from the school living in the same area as this child, so he can "catch a ride" each day. Well, it's not my job to do that. See, I used to do that sort of stuff. I used to go all-out for families like this, but I made a commitment to sanity.

I did make a few calls around the district to see if there are any funds available or any folks who can help out with this situation. Of course, the answer is: "Well, his family signed him up for this program. They can get free transportation if they would transfer him to his neighborhood school." Duh...

But, when I talked with the staff member mentioned earlier, and told her the district's viewpoint, she threw her arms up and said, "Gawd!" as she stomped away from me.

The old me would have gotten upset. The new me just blogs about it.