Best. School. Ever.
This year’s birthday party has been a major source of anxiety for me. You all remember the awful party-that-wasn’t that happened when I tried to invite her kindergarten class to My Gym. But then there was the triumph of last year’s party when we got three kids to show up and they all had a good time.
This year, I had no idea what to do. Em’s going to Sunday school now but we don’t really know those kids well enough to think that they’d come to a party. And she’s in a new Girl Scout troop now, and I don’t think those kids would come either. I’ve had zero luck with the schoolkids, but in fairness I haven’t tried to contact them this year for an outside event, either.
Em really wanted a party, but I was stumped. My husband made the excellent suggestion that I write to her teacher and ask for ideas.
The teacher (best teacher ever) just wrote back. She talked to the principal (best principal ever) and they’re on board with me giving them the names of the girls Em wants to come and having their parent advocate (best parent advocate ever), who does a lot of Spanish translation for them, call the parents and explain the invitation since English is not the first language in those girls’ homes and my Spanish stinks. The principal said it was fine for them to RSVP to the advocate so they’d be more comfortable speaking in Spanish. Em has five girls that she wants to come, and the teacher says “I know with parent permission those students would love to come and be a part of her birthday.” Furthermore, the teacher is willing to help with transportation on that day if it’s an issue for the parents.
I’m going to have invitations to send with Em tomorrow so we can get this show on the road.
I swear, this school is the best kept secret in Charlotte. Take your high-falutin’ rich kid schools, I’ll keep mine, where the teachers work extra hard in the face of great obstacles to improve the lives of their students.
This would seem to be a good time to mention again that Em’s school has a proposal up on Donors Choose called “Help us improve our reading comprehension!” I say again that if you ever find yourself with spare money burning a hole in your pocket, you could do a lot worse than to help out this school and those teachers.
Did I mention that we have the best school and best teacher ever?
Oh, and on another high note – remember how the playground got torched last year? Well, the burned section was finally replaced this moth. Em and her friends can race on side by side slides again. Yay!