"And when they ask me about Harriet Tubman, I'm going to say, 'It was a great school,' " said the 11-year-old Harriet Tubman Elementary student, less than an hour before the school ended the academic year by closing its doors for good yesterday.
The school in West Baltimore was among six designated in April to be shut down as part of the reorganization of city schools.
Yesterday's closing meant many teachers spent the day loading trunks with boxes and carting away memories of the school.
"The teachers and staff put a lot into these kids," said substitute teacher Leroy Campbell. "There were a lot of emotions on Thursday at our awards ceremony. Teachers cried. The kids cried. This school was great for the community."
PTO president Linda Williams spent yesterday helping students end the year without a hitch. She's been a fixture at the school since her son, Donayae Weaver, now a rising sixth-grader, enrolled in prekindergarten.
Yet after immersing herself so much into Harriet Tubman, Williams said she won't get that involved again.
"These kids were a part of me," she said, as tears streamed down her face. "I'm not going to another school. It's not going to be the same."
For third-grade teacher Jayme Myles, it seemed like d?j? vu. She came to Harriet Tubman from Cleveland, where her former school there shut down. Yet she said neither ordeal has dampened her commitment to education.
"At times I get discouraged, but it's all about" the students, she said. "You keep moving, hope you do the best you can and wait for those high school and college graduation tickets."
- Joe Burris
At age 13, Terrell Kellam has already discovered the very real pleasure that can come from doing meaningful work.
That lesson is one that some grown-ups never learn. But this newly minted eighth-grader at Margaret Brent Elementary School in Charles Village is looking forward to summer vacation because it will give him more time to work on the huge fantasy novel he's been writing for the past year.
On the last day of school Friday, he was looking forward to polishing his prose with the editing skills he gained this past year in class. "Writing can be enjoyable and relaxing, and writing can be good for venting," Terrell says. "I can focus and have a well-concentrated mind. Sometimes, when I do it, I can go into my happy place."
