Note from the Publisher | Back to School-Back to Community.
- Yanice Y. Carter
- 2 hours ago
- 3 min read
There is something about August that feels like a new beginning. Fresh notebooks are stacked on store shelves, backpacks are being filled, and parents are checking school calendars. Children are wondering who their teachers will be while families squeeze the last little bit of summer out of these warm Michigan days. But going back to school has never been only about going back to a building.
It is about going back to possibility, and that is why we chose “Back to School. Back to Community.” as the theme of this edition of The Chronicle. Long before a child walks through the doors of a classroom, there is a community helping prepare that child to succeed. Parents, educators, neighbors, businesses and community organizations all play a role in creating the environment children need to thrive. Education may happen in a classroom, but success is nurtured everywhere.
We see it in the parent stretching a budget to make sure there are new shoes for the first day and the organization giving away backpacks and school supplies. We see it in the barber offering free haircuts so children can walk into school feeling confident and in teachers who spend their own money to make classrooms welcoming. We see it in mentors, coaches, neighbors, churches, nonprofits and businesses that decide somebody else’s child matters, too. That is community.
Throughout Michigan, we are seeing that spirit in action through backpack giveaways, resource fairs, festivals, family events and programs designed to help families start the school year strong. In this edition, we wanted to tell you about some of those resources while also reminding ourselves why they matter. A backpack may seem like a small thing until you are the parent who cannot afford one, and a free haircut can mean much more when you see the confidence on a child’s face afterward. What looks like a simple community event can become the place where a family finds the resource, connection or helping hand they desperately needed.
Small acts become bridges, and sometimes those bridges change lives. That is something generations of Black educators have understood deeply, often teaching children while simultaneously fighting to create opportunities for their families and communities. People like Mary McLeod Bethune, Carter G. Woodson, Septima Poinsette Clark and Lucy Craft Laney understood that education could be an instrument of empowerment and transformation. Their legacy reminds us that teaching has never simply been about what happens between the first and last bell of the school day.
That legacy continues in today’s educators who recognize brilliance in children who may have been underestimated. It lives in counselors helping students imagine college or careers they never considered and principals who know that knowing a child’s name can sometimes make all the difference. It also lives in families who continue showing up, advocating and believing even when showing up is difficult. Every generation has a responsibility to make the road a little wider for the generation coming behind it.
As we begin another school year, I hope we broaden our definition of what it means to support education. Ask a teacher what they need, donate the extra box of pencils, volunteer, attend the school meeting and support organizations investing in young people. Introduce a child to a career they have never considered, encourage a teenager who seems to have lost their way and celebrate academic achievement with the same enthusiasm we give athletic achievement. Most importantly, remind our children that their present circumstances do not determine the size of their future.
For 40 years, The Chronicle has had the privilege of telling the stories of this community. We have watched generations grow up, raise families, build businesses, lead organizations and pour back into the communities that helped raise them. As we prepare our children for another year of learning, may we remember that their success is a shared investment and a shared responsibility. Back to school must also mean back to community.
When the school bell rings, our responsibility does not end at the classroom door. The children walking through those doors are watching what we value, what we support and what we are willing to build for them. They deserve communities that see their potential before they can fully see it for themselves. When our children succeed, our communities succeed with them.
Yanice Y. Carter, MBA
Publisher-The Chronicle News
Serving Communities Since 1986
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