Passageway of Creativity

A memory popped into my head the other day, for no apparent reason.  The more I thought about it, the more I tried to figure out what was so important about it that I had intentionally filed it away in my brain.

I was 11 years old, in 6th grade, when our new age teacher, Miss Berlinger, invited us to help remodel a passageway closet between our classroom and Miss Butler's.  The space was basically a storage room, but I believe it had windows on one side, which is odd.

Anyway, we were encouraged to help paint the space as well as help place colorful carpet squares on the floor.  The remodeled closet looked like a hippie hideout and I remember thinking we had created something really hip and cool.

This however is not where the memory ends.  It seems that our principal was not informed in advance of the changes we had made and he did not approve.  One day, we came into class and the door to the passageway had been shut and locked, for good.

Us kids were dumbfounded and our teacher was reprimanded and nearly lost her job.  All of this fuss because she encouraged her students to express themselves in a seemingly innocent fashion.  I never forgot that big brown wooden door being locked for good, preventing us from continuing our journey of creativity through this passageway.

The principal's authoritarian actions had been stewing in his head since our teacher had tested the system by letting us students create our own workspaces on our desks.  I remember bringing in a large cardboard box and placing it on my desk.  I even decorated it with a nice holiday scene on the outside to spruce it up a bit.  The principal then toured the classroom and expressed apprehension that the kids were merely playing, not really learning anything.

I for one used my space to focus and concentrate on completing our week's worth of assignments in a couple of days.  I received good marks for my efforts and then was able to goof off the remainder of the school week.  This fact of excelling never surfaced to the principal and we were eventually forced to abandon this new way of learning.

The whole thing now reminds me of the movie "Dead Poets Society" starring the late Robin Williams.  His character attempted to teach his students in a non-conventional manner and he was eventually dismissed for doing so.  

Well, Miss Berlinger, I am standing on my chair now in a tribute to you so that you may know that your efforts to really teach us something valuable didn't go unnoticed, in spite of what the principal had to say about it.