The Education of an Angel, part five:
Parents Sign On
Tracie Holiday-Robinson knows the desks, stairwells, and purple lockers of T.T. Minor as well as she knows the decor of her own home. And in a way, enrolling her youngest child here last year felt like a homecoming. This is the school Holiday-Robinson and her siblings attended as children. It’s a neighborhood landmark, where Central District families have been sending their kids for generations. But until last year, T.T. Minor was a place Holiday-Robinson worked hard to avoid, even though she lives only seven blocks away.
"I fought to keep my sons from going here," she says. "I didn’t think it was a place where young Black males had a good chance to be successful. Nobody seemed to care about this school," she says, explaining why — at least from a parent’s perspective — enrollment at T.T. Minor had been in decline before Sloan’s program was launched. Her older boys, now 10 and 13, still attend other public schools in Seattle. But when she heard about the new direction T.T. Minor was taking, Holiday-Robinson decided to look into enrolling her daughter in their neighborhood school.
After attending her first parent meeting, Holiday-Robinson admits she was confused by what she heard. "They were talking about child-centered learning. I wondered, what was that?" Although she has a college degree and the experience of ushering three older children through public schools, she wasn’t familiar with that approach to teaching young children. The early-childhood classrooms, divided into color-coded activity centers, sounded more like elaborate play spaces than traditional, orderly school rooms. Holiday-Robinson signed her daughter up for the pre-K class, but she also decided to keep a close eye on her progress. And ever since, this mother has been a fixture at the school. "I started out rubbing backs at naptime," she says, laughing. "I wanted to stick around and see what was happening at my baby’s school." Staff members — eager to involve parents in their children’s learning — were thrilled to have her.
Before long, Holiday-Robinson’s phone was ringing with an unexpected job announcement. Since last year, she and a co-worker named Stephanie Hunnicutt have been operating the school’s new Family Support Center, another service made possible because of the expanded budget. The center is housed in a comfortably furnished room, complete with sofas and a rocking chair, just down the hall from the main office. Parents can duck in for a cup of coffee, have an informal chat with teachers, or connect with resources ranging from a food bank to a clothing exchange to mentorships for their children.
"We’re here to connect families with information they can use as a stepping stone," Holiday-Robinson explains, "to bridge the gap between school and home." She’s eager to spread the word, for instance, about college courses being offered at a nearby community center, complete with child care and transportation.
Her close-up view has convinced Holiday-Robinson that the new approach to learning will benefit all children in the school. "I hear my baby use her problem-solving skills with her big brother at home. She’ll say, ‘OK, you use this toy first. Then I’ll use it. Then we’ll share and create something together.’ She learned to do that here," she beams. Similarly, Holiday-Robinson has been sold on the wisdom of putting children at the center of learning and engaging them in purposeful activities. "I hear my daughter make elaborate plans for what she’s going to accomplish in class. Imagine, being that young and knowing you have a purpose, and that it’s connected to the whole world. That’s wonderful!"
Parents, too, are learning that they have an important purpose in the world of T.T. Minor Elementary School. For the first time in at least three years, a PTSA chapter has been formed this year. Parents have opened their doors to teachers making home visits at the start of the school year. Last year, turnout was near perfect for parent-teacher conferences.
