Reply to How can parents help high risk classmates at child’s school?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP, our school (about 40% FARMS, and maybe 20% UMC, with everyone else in the middle class) has a low-key but very effective uniform swap, and our school admin has a discreet stash of donated clothes that she passes on to families who could use it. Good on you to want to be involved. Agree with everyone that once you are in the community your perspective broadens a bit... it increased my desire to help without taking away someone dignity, and also seeing the basic equality of all the kids on a human level made me much more senstive about how to do it. My advice if you want to join a school like this is to listen a lot for the first year, learn about the communtiy and what the school does. so many people jump in with a "colonizer" mentality and it can be very counterproductive.[/quote]

+1.  Listen.  Turn your listening way, way up.  The information is available if you are able to hear it.  But you have to be a discreet and perceptive observer to notice where help is needed without diminishing anyone's dignity.  Don't ask too many questions about where the donations end up.  The school staff is used to high-needs kids and they have their own ways figured out.

Just ask your classroom teacher if there's anything she needs.  Offer to bring in extra granola bars for snack, knowing full well that it may end up in someone's backpack because that's their breakfast, lunch, and dinner on the weekend.  When it's your child's birthday, find out if anyone else has a birthday around that time, and don't get your child's name on the cake so that you can pretend it's for both kids if needed.  If you listen, observe, and reflect, you will see the needs as they appear.

Another thing you can do is be a vocal advocate for the upper grades at your school.  PTOs in gentrifying schools tend to have a lot of preschool parents and they lack familiarity with upper elementary issues generally.  Make sure that PTO funding is equitably distributed across the grades, and that the PTO is solicitous of those teachers, parents, and kids priorities.  It may take a few years to really build this out but you can do it.  
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