The growth that both my child and I have experienced from being part of McAuliffe has been incredible. I have seen my child blossom and grow in confidence in more ways than I can count, specifically in the areas of independence, self-advocacy and risk-taking. We have found true community here and whenever I have needed help, I have always received multiple offers of kindness and assistance. McAuliffe is a place that does ask you to invest but for a multitude of returns! At McAuliffe, I learned by experience a most valuable life lesson: “The more one gives, the more one gets back.”
“I hope we don’t like it.” That was my main thought going into the McAuliffe info night and tour.
My wife and I both work full time, and we live about as far away from the school as one possibly can and still be allowed to send our kids there. Our neighborhood school, walkable from our house, is well-regarded. Nonetheless, after learning about the philosophy of the school—and after seeing this philosophy being put into action by a passionate community—we felt we had to join…lottery results permitting.
But the aiding commitment! How would we find the time given our existing responsibilities? And who even says that we’d be suitable to lead students in a classroom?
In my opinion, the most worthwhile situations, be they jobs, personal relationships, projects, etc., have a key characteristic: you get back what you put into them. In my experience contributing to the McAuliffe community, I’ve consistently gotten back more. And aiding is at the core of this experience. Here are some key aspects that make aiding valuable to me:
* Leadership training. Working with groups of students, some as young as five years old, can be challenging. Learning to navigate these situations constructively is a journey of self-understanding as well as interpersonal dexterity. The journey begins with aiding training provided by the school, and continues through hands-on experience in the classroom. As a mid-career professional, I can confidently say that the skills developed in aiding are directly translatable both to my workplace and to other settings such as coaching youth athletics. For me, this benefit alone would make the experience worthwhile.
* Community. It’s one thing to strike up conversation with a parent at a school event, or while waiting to pick up or drop off the kids. It’s yet another thing to work with one or more other parents to develop and implement a gardening plan for 24 kindergarteners. Or to work with several chaperones to coordinate key aspects of an overnight field trip, then share campfire time with them at the end of the evening. The experiences shared by aiding parents builds community that extends well beyond the walls of the school, much to the benefit of students and parents alike.
* The Gift of Giving. In our broader community, we are faced with competitive challenges every day: at work, in housing, even on our commute. It is only natural for our outlook to become more focused on the advancement of ourselves and our immediate friends and family. In doing so we can “drive by” many opportunities for enriching experience. Having a built-in opportunity to share our gifts of knowledge and caring with a broader community of students and like-minded parents and staff is like having a dedicated infrastructure for making direct, immediate and positive contributions to those around us, and to ourselves in turn.
There are more reasons I could list, though for me the ones above are compelling enough. Yet they don’t change the basic fact that the aiding commitment requires a sacrifice of time and a pledge of real effort and attention. This, at the end of the day, is what makes the whole thing work. It’s not for everyone, and that’s OK. We are fortunate to live in a community that has many excellent educational alternatives, most of which don’t involve such commitments of time. And for some, existing obligations and priorities simply rule out such an arrangement. For those who are willing and able to make the commitment, and who value the specific rewards that McAuliffe provides, I can only say “good luck in the lottery!”
Being raised in eastern Asia, our experiences of education and discipline were dramatically different from what we’ve seen in the classroom at McAuliffe. McAuliffe teachers serve as role models and showed us how to effectively communicate with students, set up expectations, encourage positive behavior, motivate young minds to explore without the fear of failure, and care about people’s feelings and emotional needs. Classrooms at McAuliffe are not only our children’s, but also ours. We have learned valuable lessons of being better parents, and it has benefited our family life immensely.
Spending time in classrooms and around campus also forges strong bindings between aiding parents and brings us a strong sense of belonging towards McAuliffe community. In the first three years of our six years in McAuliffe, we merely fulfilled our commitment of classroom aiding. From the fourth year, we started to walk out of our own classroom and engaged into school wide activities. This became a turning point. It offered many new opportunities to interact with other parents around the campus. Interactions brought people together. To the end, we’ve made so many friends with such a diverse background. It opened our eyes and mind wide, and enriched our life experience to a level that had been unimaginable from the beginning.
I have absolutely LOVED aiding in the classroom. Both my husband and I work full-time, but we have divvied it up (sharing a slot every other week, for instance) such that we can cover the 6 hours, and both of us have found it so enriching. For me, I have enjoyed building relationships with my daughter and son’s classmates.
I’ve also had the great fortune of seeing how the teachers interact with the children. They are such pros; I always walk away with a new idea for how I can talk to my own kids.
Seeing what goes on in the classroom, or during field trips, brings me so much closer to my kids as well. I have a window into what and especially how they are learning, and I am continuously learning along with them. Instead of the usual “How was school today?” we can ask better questions at the dinner table, e.g., “How are those herbs growing in the garden? Have you used them for cooking yet?” And because we see them in their environment we can understand and better support them when they struggle, whether academically or interpersonally
Of all the chances I’ve had to work with students at McAuliffe, though, the most fulfilling one of all was having worked on the Variety Show. This gave me the chance to interact with students from all grades and support them in putting on an amazing production. I’ve witnessed at this school the most amazing displays of resilience and empathy I thought could never be expected of children, and I only got to do this because I was there. Parents are part of the magic of McAuliffe and aiding is a gift we are given when we join this community. The more you embrace it, the more it will change you.
