Where We Are:

Across America, we have great schools. We have great teachers. We have great kids. We do. But the fact is that our schools, our teachers, our kids, and our communities are greatly lacking what they need to just to keep their heads above water. It’s hard to put a finger on the reason(s) for the steady decline; but the proof is in the pudding so to speak. In equitable testing against other countries, for the first time in history our students are behind not one, but several countries…and so far, it is a continual downhill slide. That, is a fact. Admittedly, we are not the leading educational force as a progressive country that we used to be.

The confusion of “more money for more resources = better learning performance”  quickly sets in however, when we learn that twice as much money is spent per student in public schools than in private schools…and that the public schools that have been funded at the highest average per student, like in Washington, D.C., still score the lowest on performance exams.

How can this be?   

Education effectiveness is in direct proportion to brain receptiveness.

What we must understand is this…The single most influential thing that shapes and molds a child’s mind very, very early is what that child sees and hears in his or her home and in his or her community. Family and community mold a mind early and quickly. So then for those first 5-6 years of their life before they even start school, in a large portion of low income families and neighborhoods where parents never graduated HS, a child’s mind is not being encouraged to seek education as a “way out” of their despair. If we do not first understand the realistic hurdles before us in overcoming the deeply ingrained psychological influences that is as strong as those influences are on a child that comes from an often negative, hopeless-feeling environment that has (at least in that child’s mind) nursed, protected, and clothed that child from birth, then we are not acknowledging the reality of the fight that we face in order to reach these children. We also do not understand the reality of their world.

So when we see public schools in D.C. performing so poorly even though the funding per student is way above that of other higher scoring yet lesser funded public schools, we have to acknowledge that until the mental perception of school changes in the poor households, more money will simply be ricocheted off of underprivileged brains…wasted. The highest rates of parents that are not involved in their child’s learning are, understandably, in these low-income communities. So how can we as a concerned society even begin to think we can help turn the tide on generational, deeply-set parental and cultural negativity that shapes children in such a way so that learning and the child’s future is not a top priority for parent or child?

You can’t change schools until you FIRST self-empower the communities that send them their children.

How do we even begin to change, or reform a community that is so different and unrelatable to that of our own? Simply put…WE don’t. Philanthropy so often empowers only the giver unfortunately. We can empower individuals by empowering the community to be hands-on. It is only through a community being directly involved, that those parents can begin to feel like the school is there for them and their child and that THEY are why their child and their school is now doing better when that begins to happen. Parents who have always felt hopeless MUST be able to feel and see empowerment through the personal reward of seeing their money now make a difference. That’s right, their money. Empower the parent and you empower the child. And self-empowerment is what must happen to make perpetual, generational change, and not just continual random acts of well-meaning gifting by those so fortunate to be able to do so.

It’s a mind thing…

All cultures, all parents, and all children must become empowered together nationally, to make good schools great and to bring struggling schools and communities up to a higher level. The feeling that comes when one feels empowered is that of a great sense of accomplishment, of self-worth. It brings with it a positive attitude and of hope. And positiveness and hope breed success. If you feel you have nothing, then you feel like you have nothing to offer. You feel poor, you feel somehow left out, and you may feel blameful and angry. When entire communities feel this way, their children are the beneficiaries and it becomes a generational way of life…a cultural identity. Hopelessness yields children who are as disinterested in school as their parents once were. More and more in today’s world, it is yielding angry children, sometimes very psychologically troubled children who come out of our schools, their problems undefined, feeling angry, unknown, and with nothing to lose. Currently, with our hemorrhaging school resources and underpaid teachers, we certainly cannot afford the teachers and in-school psychological professionals that can identify and help these kids before they go through their school years troubled and undetected. More and more we see these undiagnosed kids committing horrible acts upon humanity and upon themselves. And this particular problem, like most school issues, seems only to be escalating.

Picture this…

What kind of mental and emotional impact would it make on any parent in a low income community, who has little to no education, never felt much of a sense of worth, to now see and feel firsthand that “THEY are the donors because THEY are the owners,” that THEY are the reason that their child’s or grandchild’s school now has new buildings, newer class rooms, the smell of fresh paint, high-tech resources? Each parent, student, non-parent community member, and all people, could then proudly say and feel that this is MY store. I, we, own it.

“It's not that our high school system was not designed well, but that it was designed in 1906 when the country was just out of the industrial era. There hasn't been a substantial systemic change the way we do high school since then. Broken institutions are an opportunity rather than a time to go home.” ~ Lauren Powell

If parents begin to feel empowered and display that positive energy, what do you think the child will begin to feel, and what interest in the schools might the parents begin to take once hope moves in? And what expectations might the parents start to place on their children? That parent, that mentor’s expectations, is what will be most influential to any given child. And what then, economically, might new consumer confidence do for communities?

Schools below the poverty line do not have to stay there. Poor kid’s parents want more for their kids just like any parent. To think differently is ignorant. Provide consumer goods stores where their dollars go for education and to the future of their children and watch what happens. The community support will be overwhelming.  And for all of those who challenge that so many poor Americans and immigrants are “playing” the system by getting undeserved government assistance... remember what I said. The upside to that is that when all their dollars are spent in MY School Store, those dollars at least go back into our schools to benefit all of our children, even yours.

If you have read all the above, then you surely can see a vision of what can be. Don’t be intimidated by the scope of it all. Sure, it is logistically challenging; but once the concept catches on we believe the help and support will be there to turn this vision into a reality.

Painting the BIG picture…Look deep.

Remember the kind of dollars we are potentially talking about here. So now picture schools where unlimited resources are now a reality. Technological resources are in abundance. Healthy, nutritious school meals are offered for free on an unlimited basis including breakfast, lunch, and even a meal before you leave if you know you will be going to a home where food is scarce. No child goes home hungry. As a child, you are now a part of a school community that takes care of you, that nurtures you. Just imagine the new mentality that would give students and parents. Quality educators are in abundance and teaching is now a much more popular college major because teachers now get paid well. Well educated behavioral specialists are also now in abundance and are a part of school staffs starting at the elementary levels to identify and help those kids that are abused at home or at school, those who are psychologically troubled, or at risk to themselves or others. School is now a place kids want to be because now they too can see the big picture of what an education will mean for their future in the world. And with community mega-funding, you can possibly picture schools that are not open from just 8-3. What if schools could serve the poorer communities in the evening by providing classes and job tutoring to adult community members that feel success has passed them by? The design possibilities are unlimited when the resources are unlimited.

Implementation… What is needed from me?

Simply recognition skills in helping get the message to those mega-philanthropists searching for a solution as desperately as we are. “Build it and we will come.” It’s that simple. Society’s co-dependence on others (the philanthropists) to fix a problem that is our responsibility is not the solution. It is of the utmost importance that our communities and our children learn to do for themselves, and they learn that by watching their parents. The very definition of My Stores is that it would be a partnership between the people and educational American philanthropists. If the masses say to these educational philanthropists that we want to purchase our family’s goods at the entity that we are asking them to build here, then that entity will surely come to be. That is the power that the people, united, have over corporate America. We choose what to support, where to spend our incomes.

We believe MY stores to be the only thing in sight that even has a chance to provide adequately for our schools and our communities. We have also seen and heard enough to now know that MY would be an unbelievably mass supported, self-empowering movement. This could be the game changer. We believe this concept may just be the best idea you have never heard of, and now is the time to act.

Thank you so much for your time and patience. While trying to be concise, brevity was tough to achieve with so much in need of explanation, yet the surface has barely been scratched.

We all have a resource to offer.

What is yours?

You have read what we do.

Now, what can you do?

We anxiously await to hear from you.

Contact:

email: mss@myschoolstores.com link: www.myschoolstores.com

Or please feel free to contact me personally at:

email: rmj@epoxsci.com

Sincerely,

R.M. Johnson