When I arrived home recently to discover a large red-headed man in a Santa hat writing Grynch in my driveway with a charcoal briquette, I choked up a little bit because every year, my lifelong friend and childhood hero, Toby Dawn McIntyre, castigates me about canceling Christmas. It’s our sweet little Christmas tradition, and it always makes me a bit sentimental. The holidays just aren’t official until someone puts a lump of coal in my stocking about the whole Christmas versus Winter Break issue, so I am glad it was jolly old Toby Dawn. This mean superintendent’s heart grew two sizes just at the sight of his charcoal smudged face. 

“Well, Mister Superintendent,” he sneered like the duly trademarked Grinch. “I won’t let you steal Christmas from these kids!”  Other than Toby, I hadn’t heard much this year about school Christmas observances being controversial, but I suspect that’s because everyone’s focused on finding that cool new Omicron Transformer Robot to put under the tree. I hear they will be everywhere soon, but not necessarily in time for Christmas, which is clearly a supply-chain issue. Nevertheless, all this Winter Break stuff is very serious stuff to Mr. McIntyre, so I cannot blame him for being upset. 

To be sure, Toby can spell Grinch correctly, but he has developed a fear of copyright infringement ever since a famous country singer shut down his Toby Dawn’s I Love This Bar BQ food truck. “The lawyers told me he could trademark Toby, if I didn’t settle,” he lamented. “They threatened to take away my name, Tommy Boy, my name!  And you know I can’t stand to be called Tobias!” Clearly, Mr. Keith doesn’t play, and Toby did have an especially rough 4^th grade after a substitute teacher accidentally used his full name. No one wants to experience that drama again.

The day before Christmas Break is my most favorite day of the year to visit schools, and for years I have invited Tobias to come sing Christmas carols, decorate Christmas trees, and to eat Christmas cookies at any of our numerous public-school Christmas parties. I think he would see parents and educators agreeing rationally regarding the difficult issues of ribbon candy and handmade ornaments at the kid-level. I wonder if Tobias Dawn McIntyre might be wearing his Cable News Goggles when looking at this issue, because no matter how often I tell him that schools can celebrate Christmas, he just won’t let up. 

First, Christmas is a federal holiday, so kids are technically forced to wear ugly sweaters whether they like it or not. Banks close. Schools close. Even Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar and Grill is closed (yes, I checked), so no Okie comfort food on Christmas Day or pondering the ageless philosophical question, How do you like me now?  I think everyone can agree that our kids deserve a few cookies and a chance to dance like Charlie Brown before facing another dismal Christmas Day without dinner at Toby Keith’s. So, schools can definitely recognize Christmas. They can even sing “Away in a Manger” during the classic stage version of Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer. Apparently, all of this is required by federal law. (Disclaimer, I am not a real doctor or a pretend attorney.) 

But before this gets out of hand, let’s clear up this whole Winter Break versus Christmas Break issue. Calling it Christmas Break makes no sense because no one needs a break from Christmas, but everyone needs a break from winter, at least while global warming drags its feet. Seriously, nothing captures the true spirit of Winter Break better than keeping Tobias Dawn McIntyre fired up. So keep an eye out for Toby, but whatever you do, be sure to call him Tobias when you wish him a Merry Winter Break and Happy New Year!

Tom Deighan is superintendent of Duncan Public Schools. You may email him at  deighantom@gmail.com and read past articles at www.mostlyeducational.com

This time of year, I am struck by the sheer volume of Christmas gadgets that appear on the shelves, and I am fascinated how Santa’s Workshop can produce all that stuff. I have always thought of schools as factories, too, but instead of gadgets, we make graduates, and during my career, I have congratulated literally thousands as they exited our assembly line. Some were destined for college, some for work, and some had no plan whatsoever, but this is often the time of year when many realize that graduation is just a semester away, and many of them wonder if they are ready to exit the assembly line. 

I don’t know much about factories, but I once toured a tire plant. To a layperson like me, a tire is a tire is a tire, but the tires they produce are myriad. All tires are road-ready, but high-performance tires must be supple enough to provide excellent traction yet tough enough to survive corners at high speeds. Tractor tires carry weights that would crush normal tires, and everyday car tires fall somewhere in between. The same factory creates all these tires with absolute fidelity and zero waste. I bet Christmas gadgets are less complicated to make.

Unfortunately, making graduates is not so predictable. Factories can produce perfect products, but nothing enters them that might alter the final outcome. Public Schools, however, Welcome All, Serve All, and Love All who walk through their doors. We may manufacture graduates, but we do not exclude anyone from our assembly line. Our students may live in mansions or be homeless. They may have genius IQs, or they may have a severe intellectual disability. They may be star athletes, or they may be quadriplegics. Nevertheless, public schools face the highest expectations to produce perfect, road ready tires with virtually no waste. Every parent wants their child to graduate as ready as possible for the world ahead, and the ramifications are eternal. 

To a lay person, a student is a student is a student, but students are not easy to classify and much more complex to manufacture than tires or gadgets. Critics of public education often point to the imperfect product exiting our assembly line, but they rarely acknowledge the enormous challenge of advancing all children, regardless of status or ability, toward graduation. When a tire exits a factory it can never be anything but the tire that “graduated”. Our students, on the other hand, may graduate as a tractor tire or a replacement donut, but they have the freedom and potential to transform themselves into a Formula One racing tire. Many other countries predetermine how they will exit the school assembly line. Americans, however, know that the students that we manufacture get to pick whichever road they choose and to go as fast as they wish. It’s the American Dream, and it is why public educators do what they do. 

Christmas might be on our minds right now, but our seniors are worrying about things like FASFA’s, finding jobs, and completing their classes on time. They may not show it, but they care deeply. Some are on track to be high-performance, and others don’t know what type of gadget they will be, but please reassure them few of us were ready at this point in our lives, but somehow, we managed to exit the factory road-ready, and few of us are now what we planned to become. If you have a senior in high school this Christmas season, you know it’s not about the Christmas gadgets, and so do they. Fill their stockings with more love than stuff this year, and let them know how you felt back in the day. Somehow, we made it, and so will they, no matter how ready they feel to exit this graduate factory in the months ahead. And if you have no children in school, say a prayer of thanks for your local graduate factories, for they are producing your future neighbors. They are even more amazing than Santa’s Workshop.

Tom Deighan is superintendent of Duncan Public Schools. You may email him at  deighantom@gmail.com and read past articles at www.mostlyeducational.com

Somewhere around the age of 2 or 3, children try to leverage pressure on their parents in public. I call those the Wal-Mart years, when children test us with fits, tantrums, and other tactics whenever they have an audience.  The goal is to get what they want, be it a toy or candy, but the larger goal is determining who’s boss, and it doesn’t just happen among toddlers.  I have a friend who admits to losing it in the cereal aisle when her child threw a tantrum during one hectic trip to the store.  She raised her voice, grabbed her child by the arm, and corrected him sternly right there in the store.  She never hurt her child, but it was enough of a scene that a concerned bystander scolded the mom and told her just to give the kid the cereal he wanted. Before the mom could respond to the stranger, her kid popped off, “Mind your own business, lady, or my mom will kick your butt!”  

The lady in this story is a great Mom, but everyone loses it in Wal-Mart eventually.  It does not make someone a bad parent, and kids rarely lose love for parents who correct them.  This is even true when the relationship is not perfect.    Even more remarkable, when the parent is derelict or abusive, however, children will still often defend them with a loyalty that defies logic.  That’s the power of the parent-child bond, and educators know that anyone who dares get between a child and a parent does so at extreme peril.  And when I say parents, I am referring to the caring adults in children’s lives who nurture their education. That role is often filled by someone who is not the biological father or mother.  Every child who has such an adult parenting their education is generally ready for school.    

Educators whom I respect hold the parent-child relationship as sacrosanct, for we know that it is an unbreakable bond. Parents are the preeminent influence in children’s lives.  Teachers know that their jobs are infinitely easier when the parent supports their child’s education, even in the smallest measures.  An educator can never replace the parent as the most important influencer or educator. We can often only enhance and support.  If a parent resists or devalues education or holds hostile feelings toward the teacher, educators struggle, often in vain, to overcome that child’s resistance to learning. On the other hand, when a parent participates or even tacitly supports in the simplest of ways like checking on their children’s grades online, that child enters the classroom with a tremendous advantage.  

Educators assist the parents, but we can never usurp, override, undermine, or replace the roles or responsibilities of a parent.  Contrary to the extreme examples we may see in the news, virtually all educators know that the power of a parent is unparalleled.  It is first biological, which is almost impossible to overcome, and then it is based on simple time and relationship. Think about it, children spend about 15% of their time each year in school, and they get new teachers every year.  The remainder is under parent or guardian supervision, year after year. (There are 8760 hours in a year, and children only spend 1260 hours in school, which is about 15% of their lives: 7 hours each day X 180 days = 1260 hours.) 

Educators assist parents, and I know educators who can help children overcome overwhelming obstacles, even those children who are unsupported in their education, but no educator can completely replace a caring, attentive, and invested adult in the home.  That’s why parents will always be the most important educators, and nearly all educators honor this parental role in a child’s life, especially during the challenging years!  Wal-Mart parents unafraid to correct their children in public are our heroes, for they are making our jobs much easier. Thank you for being the most important educators.

Tom Deighan is currently the superintendent of Duncan Public Schools. You may email him at  deighantom@gmail.com and read past articles at www.mostlyeducational.com