Since I began teaching at EnCompass Academy in East Oakland three and a half months ago, I have been warned many times not to stay too late at school, to be sure to go with a colleague if I wanted to work at school on the weekend, not to hang around the neighborhood past dark.

I was even told by one person who had just moved from the Bay Area from out of state that his parents warned him not to drive through Oakland at all, with the surge of violence the city has been experiencing. These warnings have come from many different people, from family members, to fellow teachers, to people who have never been to Oakland, to staff members at my school.

I never feel like my safety is at risk when I am on the campus of our beautiful new school site that we share with Acorn Woodland Elementary on 81st Ave. near International Blvd. We have bright stucco buildings, garden-lined walkways, walls adorned with student work, an outgoing and positive staff, and a bright and exuberant student body.

When I am within the four walls of my classroom, my first thoughts are not about my safety, but about raising my students' reading levels, seeing evidence that they are learning concepts in my math lessons, teaching students to be compassionate towards one another.

Nevertheless, violence reaches into the harmonic bubble of EnCompass just as it does to many other, if not all, schools in Oakland. Even in the first weeks of school, the families of several students and two colleagues experienced the death of a loved one as a result of violent crime. Last night three students were shot after a McClymonds High School basketball game. Read the rest of this entry »