looking back, kind of squinting
Oct. 9th, 2007 11:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
adrian_turtleWhen I heard about SixApart arranging their charity gimmick with DonorsChoose, it seemed like a great idea. I sent email asking for the "gift certificate," and did a quick search through the schools that are asking for money to fund their projects.
I found one proposal from the district where I went to secondary school. http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/proposal.html?id=109422&zone=0
My first thought was pity that so many students can't see and can't afford glasses. (More than 20%, in what used to be a fairly prosperous suburb.) I wanted to help, of course. If SixApart is going to give $30 in my name to an educational charity, fighting myopia seems a lot more worthwhile than all the phys ed teachers asking for money to help with the war on obesity. Or even a project like buying musical instruments sized for 5-year-olds, which seems more like a nice extra than a critical need.
Then I thought I might remember the teacher. I thought she was crazy, when I was in middle school. (She was the one devoting an entire 10-week course to studying the metric system as if it were a foreign language, or perhaps an alien artifact.) White boards don't help kids who need glasses. Replacing very old blackboards with a new whiteboard might help with the problem of not being able to read light gray chalk marks on an old blackboard that is now medium-gray instead of black, and it would mean the classroom has less dust and more solvent fumes. It's still not a bad idea. I'm tempted to look for another project proposal, in the interests of not supporting a crazy teacher. But the students don't have a choice in who their teacher is. They are just straining to see the board, for whatever reason.
I found one proposal from the district where I went to secondary school. http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/proposal.html?id=109422&zone=0
My first thought was pity that so many students can't see and can't afford glasses. (More than 20%, in what used to be a fairly prosperous suburb.) I wanted to help, of course. If SixApart is going to give $30 in my name to an educational charity, fighting myopia seems a lot more worthwhile than all the phys ed teachers asking for money to help with the war on obesity. Or even a project like buying musical instruments sized for 5-year-olds, which seems more like a nice extra than a critical need.
Then I thought I might remember the teacher. I thought she was crazy, when I was in middle school. (She was the one devoting an entire 10-week course to studying the metric system as if it were a foreign language, or perhaps an alien artifact.) White boards don't help kids who need glasses. Replacing very old blackboards with a new whiteboard might help with the problem of not being able to read light gray chalk marks on an old blackboard that is now medium-gray instead of black, and it would mean the classroom has less dust and more solvent fumes. It's still not a bad idea. I'm tempted to look for another project proposal, in the interests of not supporting a crazy teacher. But the students don't have a choice in who their teacher is. They are just straining to see the board, for whatever reason.
