Kara's Message to Congress

"Dear Representative Marshall,

My name is Kara Thomas and I'm a high school student. I am writing to you to ask you to support a constitutional right to quality education for all children (HJ 29).

As a child, I, like most children, did not like going to school. I dreaded getting up in the morning and spending my time stuck in a classroom where a boring teacher talked all day about things I did not care about or understand. I went to a public elementary school, and in the first grade I tested for and was accepted into the gifted program.

One day a week, a few other first graders and I would get out of class and spend the day learning about things that other first graders did not know about. I loved it because I was being challenged.

In second grade I had a teacher that did not teach. We watched unrelated movies all day. When she did try to teach, she would teach us things a second grader should not be learning, like long division. She would yell at us if we did not do our homework. My class mates and I cried on a regular basis. Half way through the school year she did not come to school. We had a substitute, but after two weeks people started asking questions. My mother called the school to ask where my lack luster teacher had gone. "To jail," was the response we got. She was arrested for possession with intent to sell crack cocaine.

We had the substitute for the rest of the year.

The next year I was in third grade. That was the year the school finally realized that I could not read. Most students had started learning to read in kindergarten. Not me. So, on Tuesdays and Thursdays I would spend a few hours with a group of my peers who were likewise troubled. And Wednesdays I would spend the day in my gifted class. Ironic, isn't it? I finally learned to read in fourth grade.

Also in fourth grade I had a teacher that was new to the school. Supposedly she was quite good. I do not really remember. What I do remember is that I was being physically abused by a classmate. The teacher noticed and both of us were called to the principal's office separately. I told her everything. She did nothing. She continued to do nothing even when I told her that this student had threatened to shoot some of my friends and me. Nothing ever happened to this principal, besides being given the job of being principal at a new school in Macon that was recently built. That school has a horrible reputation.

After graduating from elementary school in sixth grade I started at Mount de Sales. For the most part Mount de Sales proved to be a decent environment for me. In seventh grade I took the SAT through the Duke Talent Identification Program (TIP) and scored a 1000. That qualified me for state recognition and to be able to participate in the summer programs. I went to the University of Kansas the summer of 2006 to take a writing workshop through Duke TIP. We wrote for almost forty hours a week and I loved every second of it.

In tenth grade I confronted the Mount de Sales administration on the use of the Accelerated Reader program. My argument was that it was weighted too heavily and that the books I read were not on the list. I am an avid reader and have been since I learned to read in fourth grade. I
was being penalized because I read new releases or relatively unknown books. At the beginning of the second semester of the principal announced that high school students would no longer be required to do the Accelerated Reader program.

In my junior and senior years of high school I hope to do joint enrollment with Wesleyan College. After I graduate I want to get my bachelor's degree in psychology and literature from Guilford College and my master's in psychology from Boston College. I want to be an addiction therapist in a nonprofit rehab clinic.

Through all of my problems with the schools and teachers, one would think that my dislike of education would just grow. It has been quite the opposite, though. I continue to look for more things to learn and new ways I can challenge myself. But I would have never gotten to this point had I not had a few great teachers along the way, and parents that simply would't take any
grades below a B.

Some children, though, are't lucky enough to have that outside support from their families or teachers. Those students usually end up dropping out and turning to minimum wage jobs or a life on the streets. The next great mind could have been in that group of students that dropped out, but now we'll never know. Education should be one of, if not the top priority to the State and Country leaders. Children are our future, and without adequate education, that future grows bleaker everyday.

Please, Representative Marshall, support HJ 29 and make it possible for all children to get a good education. Just think, without education, where would you be today? Thank-you for your time. "

--Kara Thomas

Tell Congress to help people like Kara: http://capwiz.com/mobilize/issues/alert/?alertID=9513626