I’ve written before about my neighborhood, the community, and how amazing this place I call home truly is. None of that has changed. But in being elected to the school board about eight months ago, I have seen a side of this community I never could have anticipated.

I’ve mentioned how our school faced devastating flooding in July that rendered an entire building unusable, displacing 550+ students. We’ve made do. We’ve shuffled everyone and everything and turned education on its head. We’ve found creative ways to keep kids in the classrooms and learning. Our teachers, faculty, and administration are actual magicians. There’s no other word for what they’ve done. It’s sheer magic. (And we’re so grateful for the partnership we’ve had with a local church and an area college.)

Now, as we consider long-term options, the cretins have begun to emerge. The people who would hate on our kids, judge them by state test score averages alone, believe them to be violent like no other generation, and think all they’re good for is sucking taxpayer money from the community (while ignoring the fact that someone else once paid for their schooling, too) – they’re screaming that every option we have available to us is the wrong one. All the while, they provide no alternatives of their own.

Paranoid and panicked, these people are stuck in endless loops, parroting one another, creating an echo chamber of anger and hatred. Everything they can do to make progress more difficult, they will do. Everything they can say to tear down board members, parents, teachers, and children, they will say.

“Merge with another district!” they scream. (We’ve been actively looking into all options, so this is already something we’re examining.) “Wait, not THAT district!” they yell. (“We don’t want our property values to drop!”) “The state should force a merger!” (Not legal according to the Pennsylvania constitution, but okay.) “Why don’t you let the Pennsylvania Department of Education step in?” they demand. (That’s not their job, nor do they want the burden of figuring out what the district is going to do moving forward.) “We can’t buy a building! Why don’t we fix what we already have?!” (Because fixing the flooded building and updating it to code is far more expensive than buying and utilizing another building already built within the district.)

It’s been like this since mid-July. And the questions? They circle around and around. And around. I have answered the same fifteen to twenty questions a dozen times each since the disaster. As has every other school board director.

But with the bad also comes the good. And those are my people. The ones who step forward and plan a music festival in less than 2 months’ time, those who create dozens of small fundraisers, who partner with other districts’ sports teams for help, and other community members who create and sell their art for the good of the school. The people who volunteer at the endless school events – teachers and parents and kids who show up and put in the time and effort because they love this community, this district.

Those times when the critics and naysayers wear me down are washed away when I see the number of people who pull together to make a difference, the number of people who feel about this community the way I feel about this community. Can we raise $60 million for a new school building? No. But can we each play just a small part in making things better? Yes. Yes, we can.

So, my friends, remember as you play your part in your own community, we have a choice. Every single day, we have a choice. We can be part of the problem, or we can be part of the solution.

I know what part I want to play.