On the News Again
Nolan & Henry speaking to Ryan Connors from WBIR
When I wrote about Granga last summer, I was anxious to talk with anyone who would have me because I had something so precious about my beloved grandmother that I wanted to share. But over the past two weeks, I quite unexpectedly found myself pushed back into the public eye somewhat over something very different. While I gladly granted interviews to our local NBC affiliate, WBIR, I certainly didn’t seek it out. I just happened to write a few posts on Facebook that people took notice of and shared a handful of times.
My youngest, twin 8 year old boys, fell on opposite sides of their state test results this year due to a new 3rd grade retention law in Tennessee. One “passed” and was granted the green light to go on to 4th grade; the other did not, and we were given a handful of options for him. I won’t go into it all here, but it was frustrating, and I jumped at the opportinty to appeal the results. And, hallelujah, we won the appeal!
As I mentioned, I wrote a series of posts on Facebook about all of this, and unlike the majority of what I post there, I made these posts public so that hopefully other parents being affected would be able to see that they weren’t alone in their frustrations. I didn’t anticipate that too many people would care or take notice, but when a friend who works at the television station shared our story with her producer, I was contacted about being interviewed. I’ve been overwhelmed by the encouragement from my own friends and family, and it has been great to see that so many people have been as frustrated as I am over the problems in this law.
However, I made the conscious decision to not read the comments from strangers online because I knew that plenty of people who don’t know us or our story were going to share their opinions that might frustrate or upset me. Despite anyone else’s opinion, my public discussion of this was not at all about anything other than brining attention to what I personally see as a glaring problem in the way we asses and implement change in the education of our children. I really do believe that Tennessee lawmakers have heard enough voices to warrant their attentions. I just sincerely hope that they will do something about it and not let this year’s frustrations and hiccups be in vain.
