Thirty-five Teaching Years in Elementary Schools: Chapter 2

By Calvin Trampleasure

• Chapter 1: New Ways and Big Days
• Chapter 2: RUSD Becomes WCCUSD
• Chapter 3: 4 Cs Adventure in Physical Education
• Chapter 4: The 4 Cs and 101 Ways to Praise
• Chapter 5: Washington Elementary, Richmond
• Chapter 6: Kindergarten Fire and Love
• Chapter 7: Kindergarten Years, Extended Day K
• Afterword: Something Unpredictable

RUSD Becomes WCCUSD

Bankruptcy, Burnout and Break Time, 1989-1993

The same year I started teaching in RUSD, a new superintendent was hired. Walter Marks’ grand visionary plan was the “System for Choice” elementary schools throughout the district. Schools had different themes like “Future’s School” or “Gifted and Talented School.”

Harding School

By the end of my second year teaching, in May 1989, Harding Elementary School near the El Cerrito BART station was a “Gifted and Talented” school. The structure included two core-class periods math/science and language arts. Students were required to take the core classes. Then they chose elective classes of their interests. Thus K-6^th grade students could explore their personal “gifts and talents” and got to pick electives that fit their interests.

I was interviewed by Barbara Whitaker at Harding in May of 1989. I decided to leave Madera, Lincoln and Castro schools and be part of the new Harding program. After two years of physical education teaching, it was time to move along. The chance to create electives for kids from my own loves and knowledge was irresistible.

Of course there would be a cycling class! I also wanted to teach a newscast class, as my major at Humboldt State was journalism. I created an “Everyone’s a Winner” class of physical education to build camaraderie, and finally a tennis class (on two tennis courts next to Harding). Being young and energetic, I also had a Nature Nuts class after school once a week.

Teachers created classes from their personal interests. Students K-6 got to pick electives from their personal interests. Thus, this “System for Choice” school encouraged both student and teacher-centered curriculum where “gifts and talents” were discovered.

There were just 12 students in my tennis class, 12 students in my cycling class, 15 students in Newscast and 40 students in Everyone’s a Winner. My core two classes of math/science had 33 sixth graders. Those 6th graders almost drove me to quit teaching. I taught one core group of math/science in the morning, then taught 3 elective classes and got prep time for myself, then finished the day with a second core group of 6^th graders.

I never realized just how manipulative and hurtful 12-year-olds could be. While my elective classes went well with 2^nd-5^th grades, my 6^th grade core classes became increasingly unruly and disruptive. It was those groups of kids that teachers often referred to as “the class from hell.” The consensus from K-5^th grade Harding teachers was that this group of kids was the hardest of their careers. I was ready to quit by June 1990.

Bayview School

Instead, after problems with parents, students, the principal and the union, I decided to leave Harding after just one year. I was hired to start teaching at Bayview in August of 1990 by Rosalyn Upshaw (mother of UCB Cal football star Regan, and brother of ex-Oakland Raider Gene Upshaw). Bayview was a Future’s School, with a computer lab (remember that in 1990 computer labs were rare in schools!). I would teach a 5^th/6^th grade class in room 21. I taught two years at Bayview, and those two classes literally saved my career.

The real problem with Walter Marks’ vision was not how educationally innovative the programs were, but how they would be funded. Marks promised the money would arrive from local corporations like Chevron and special California state funds. It never did. IBM “donated” hundreds of computers for the Future’s Schools of RUSD, but there were hidden costs there.

So, just a few years after rolling out the visionary program, RUSD was in a big financial hole. RUSD schools were set to close on May 1, 1991 because the district declared bankruptcy. Students looked forward to an early summer vacation. However, just days before May 1, a local court judge ruled all schools must stay open, and RUSD would get a $19 million loan from the state to stay open through mid-June.

Jesse Jackson came to Kennedy High in Richmond for a rally before the judge made her ruling. He spoke right after Jerry Brown, but he was late due to a delayed flight from L.A. It was days after the “Rodney King beating.” Jackson entered the Kennedy High gym full of parents, teachers, students and others to enormous cheers! As the cheers subsided, Jesse Jackson launched into a version of “I Am Somebody.” The audience of a thousand echoed back his words: “I am Somebody, My mind is a pearl strong and bold…I am SOMEBODY!” The air in the room became electrified with positive energy that unified everyone and, for a few minutes at least, cleared our minds, and collectively let us rise!

I went home that night and wrote my own version of an I Am Somebody poem! (See it at the chapter’s end.)

The next day, I tried it with my Bayview class.

“What do you think? I asked the 33 fifth-sixth graders.

“I like it,” was the unanimous response! We agreed to start each school day with the call and response I Am Somebody chant. We created hand signs that went with each line of the poem.

“Mr. Trampleasure, there might be one part we need to change,” said one student, James Pye.

Always interested in student ideas, I asked James what he meant.

“Well, instead of ‘I can always do my best’ it might be better ‘I can always TRY to do my best,” James explained.

“What if your uncle just went to jail, or grandma is really sick at home, or your dog just died, or your momma got back on drugs?” James explained. “You really can’t do your best with some bad or sad things going on in your life, but you can still TRY to do your best.”

James was full of this kind of thinking, and the class loved him for it, he was tall and athletic and respected by everyone.

He once told Mary, who lived in the Imani House for homeless girls, “You got some book sense but you need more common sense!”

It was this Bayview class that almost got an early summer vacation. However, the judge made the ruling in the final days of April and the state of California sent $19 million dollars to the RUSD bank account.

“Hi William,” I said to one of my 6^th grade students walking across the Bayview yard after school on that fateful April day. “Guess what?, a judge ruled that we will NOT close schools, but school will go on until June 10 as usual!”

William did not miss a beat, “Why don’t they just let the schools close and save all that money (the $19 million loan).

William Perkins had some sound and economical good sense!

Walter Marks was given severance pay to leave the district and RUSD entered into California “state receivership.” State appointed Herb Cole was to manage the district financially, including how the $19 million was spent. Teachers got a nine percent pay cut at the end of the school year. Morale sagged to a new low.

I taught my second year at Bayview in room 21, with a nine-percent pay cut. Thirteen of the 33 students from the combo class of 1990-91 were 5^th graders. They asked to stay in my class for their 6^th grade year. I now had a “straight 6^th grade” class of 33.

This class called themselves “Kidz ‘n the Hood.” The hit movie Boyz N the Hood with Ice Cube, Cuba Gooding Jr., and Laurence Fishburne was a smash hit. The movie ends with “Increase the Peace” just before the credits. We made a large banner and hung it over the classroom door.

Even then, a gut feeling told me “experience was the best teacher.” Since I had worked since my Berkeley High School days as a vendor at University of California football and basketball games, I had connections with the Western Sports vending company at Cal. I set up Cal football game work experience for the Kidz n’ the Hood at Memorial Stadium. We worked in Stand One selling hot dogs, nachos, peanuts and sodas to the Cal fans in the “cheap seats.”

Bayview parents would drive six students into Berkeley each Cal game. The parents would help sell the products to customers, as the 6^th graders would wrap hot dogs, pour sodas, and make nacho trays. It was 20 percent commission on all sales, so at a “sold out” UCLA/Cal Bears games we would sell $7,000 in product. That left us with $1,400 in take-home pay. The parents would make about $100 each, and the rest went to the class bank account.

The Kidz ‘n the Hood went on about 10 field trips that year on AC Transit buses and BART. They travelled to the Oakland Museum, Crab Cove in Alameda, Tilden Park, Lake Merritt to meet the musician Pete Escovedo and the Berkeley Marina for Adventure Park and to go sailing on small Cal sail boats. My friends Gavin Chilcott and Mickey Caldwell provided the boats and showed us how to sail.

Some of our earnings went to publish stories from the Writing Workshop classroom program. The cover of the books said Kidz ‘n the Hood, True Stories and Poetry from Bayview Elementary, or other appropriate titles.

Honestly, what 12-year-old would not love the chance to go to Cal games on Saturday, make money and then travel around the east bay on public transportation to interesting places with the profits?

Some years later, I would hear about these students. James Pye attended Sacramento State and played basketball there, Christina went to Florida State University, Brooke went to University of Florida, Su attended Sacramento State, Gerald and Lisa went to U.C. Berkeley, Andre went into the Marines, a couple went to Junior College and a couple got bogged down in gang life.

Bayview teachers were assigned a “buddy class.” With some cosmic luck that I could never have forecast, our class was paired with Ms. Lee’s 3^rd grade class. We did activities with our buddies all year. Each week, six students who won the “Autonomy Award” the previous week, would go from 9-9:30 AM each day to tutor Ms. Lee’s 3^rd graders.

Little did I know that some 30 years later, after many life lessons, Cindy Lee and I would be married! Another source of love and satisfaction in my life.

However, by the end of the second year at Bayview, something was really wrong. I was exhausted mentally, physiologically and physically. I felt drained spiritually. I would stop and have to catch my breath on my bike riding over hills I usually breezed over.

I went to a Kaiser therapist for the first time in my life. That didn’t seem to help much. I saw three of my students in the waiting room one day waiting for their therapist. The next day at Bayview was interesting.

“Mr. Trampleasure, are we driving you crazy?” Laniesha asked me, as she arrived at school, she was one of the three students in the Kaiser waiting room as I left my appointment.

“No Laniesha, that isn’t it,” I replied, “I have just been feeling really tired lately.” We left it at that.

My doctor had blood work done to see if anything might be off chemically. Nothing showed up out of the ordinary, but he suggested more iron.

For another Kaiser visit, Maxine the nurse greeted me to weigh me and sign me in. I explained to her about my deep fatigue, after completing five years of teaching.

“Same thing happened to my daughter after five years,” she told me. “Let me tell you what to do.”

“First take a break,” Maxine told me. “Then figure out where your true place is in the teaching world. My daughter moved to Oregon and became an administrator, and she loves it,” she continued. “She needed to get out of the classroom and out of the big city.”

“Next, practice looking in the mirror and saying ‘No!’” Then say “no” to people at your school when you return to teaching. Say it so you can leave some time for yourself. Too many teachers try to do it all,” Maxine said. “And don’t take your work home!”

Today the trending word is “balance.” That was what Maxine was talking about back in June of 1992.

“You are just burned out, it happens to everyone,” Maxine said. “Take a break.”

A year of leave and a Masters Degree

So, I submitted the paperwork for a year leave. I knew how to live frugally from my years as a bike bum. Francesca, who got me into the teaching world, saw me one day on an Oakland street and said, “Wow, what happened to you, you don’t look so good.”

I told her about the fatigue and year leave and she suggested going back to Cal-State Hayward and getting a masters in something that interested me. She said I needed a break from the classroom, but doing some reading and writing about teaching might be really healthy. Plus it would move me along on the RUSD pay scale with more professional development units.

Francesca was right! I took many interesting classes and completed a “Student-Centered Curriculum” M.A. project. The thesis was inspired by John Gatto, three-time NYC Teacher of the Year, and NY State Teacher of the Year in 1985.

“Primary experience is the best teacher,” was the heart of his approach. “There are as many learning styles as there are fingerprints,” was another of his core beliefs. I intuitively agreed with those two ideas.

As a child my middle name might have been “Recess.” Now, as an adult, I took a year-long recess from classroom teaching.

I returned to interview students at Bayview and other schools to see just what brought joy to learning for elementary students, and added this to my thesis. I read books by Jonathan Kozol, Alfie Kohn and others.

My mother gave me the book Revolution from Within, by Gloria Steinem. “Remember the flip side of the golden rule,” Steinem wrote, “treat yourself as well as you treat others.” Today that is called “self-care.”

Maxine’s words blew in my mind that year, like wind moving various leaves and making the air much more clear. Steinem helped me understand more and keep a balance.

By the time I earned the Cal State Hayward M.S., I knew I wanted a physical education prep teacher job. Don Novak had been right, it was perfect for me. Those four walls of classrooms made me claustrophobic and the big sky and sunshine and trees and grass everywhere was best for my soul. Playing with a purpose and freedom to create was going to restore my soul. Maxine told me to “figure out your true place in the teaching world” and I had figured it out.

WCCUSD, West Contra Costa Unified School District, (renamed after the bankruptcy) posted elementary physical education prep positions. In the summer of 1993 Susie van der Veer hired me for this position. In August of 1993 I was assigned to Dover, King, Castro and Sheldon schools. I was back to teaching with renewed energy and purpose.

I Am Somebody!

I am somebody!
My heart is a diamond shining bright
My spirit is an eagle taking flight
My mind is a pearl strong and bold
My body can travel the roughest road
I am somebody!
I can be what I want to be
I can learn what I need to know
I can always try to do my best
I am somebody! I am somebody! I am somebody!

by Calvin Trampleasure (1991)
Inspired by civil rights history and written during district bankruptcy crisis
West Contra Costa Unified School District