"If there’s a world here in a hundred years, it’s going to be saved by tens of millions of little things. The powers-that-be can break up any big thing they want. They can corrupt it or co-opt it from the inside, or they can attack it from the outside. But what are they going to do about 10 million little things? They break up two of them, and three more like them spring up!"
- Pete Seeger, in YES! Magazine

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Cheer on Coaches and Teams

The project:
Cheer on swimmers at the local high school championship meet; commiserate with another outstanding coach fired this week from the same school for which I used to coach.

Time:
An hour at the meet; an hour on the phone.

Why bother?
Cheering the team - because most of these kids are really great kids who I missed on deck this year. This was the season culmination for most of them.

The coach - because I was in a similar position about 6 months ago. I wanted him to know he wasn't alone, and that the pattern used to displace him (and ANOTHER successful coach at this school) was the same used on me.

Worth it?
Cheering - Yes. It's always nice to share time with wonderful young people.
Commiserating - Yes. I hope he didn't feel quite so singled out, quite so alone, quite so disappointed. I know it helped ME to know this is a school administration trend more than about ME.

Photo courtesy Gabyu under Creative Commons license.
Posted by JenPB at 5:27 PM

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