[Rhodes22-list] Captain Haslett, thank you with sincere appreciation

[Tootle]

Brad:

Thank you for posting that story.  There are many on this forum who fail to
underestand how our freedom was earned and is maintained.


Brad Haslett-2 wrote:
> 
> A long time ago I lived just around the corner from this school.  I never
> met Ms. Cothren but I'd like to.  Brad
> 
> 
> ---------------------
> 
> Back in September of 2005, on the first day of school, Martha
> Cothren, a social studies school teacher at Robinson High School in
> Little Rock, did something not to be forgotten. On the first day of
> school, with permission of the school superintendent and the
> principal, she took all of the desks out of the classroom.
> 
> The students came into first period and discovered there were no
> desks.
> 
> They looked around and asked, "Ms. Cothren, where are our desks?"
> 
> She replied, "You can't have a desk until you tell me how you earn
> them."
> 
> They thought, "Well, maybe it's our grades."
> 
> "No," she answered.
> 
> "Maybe it's our behavior."
> 
> She told them, "No, it's not your behavior."
> 
> And so they came and went in the first period, still no desks in the
> classroom.
> 
> Second period, same thing and third period-no desks. By early
> afternoon, television news crews had gathered in Ms. Cothren's class
> to find out about this crazy teacher who had taken all the desks out
> of the classroom. The last period of the day, Martha Cothren
> gathered her class. They were at this time sitting on the floor
> around the sides of the room.
> 
> She stated to her students, "Throughout the day no one has really
> understood how you earn the desks that ordinarily sit in this
> classroom."
> 
> She added, "Now I'm going to show you."
> 
> Martha Cothren went over to the door of her classroom and opened it.
> 
> 27 U.S. veterans, wearing their uniforms, walked into that classroom,
> each one carrying a school desk. And they placed those school desks
> in rows, and then they stood along the walls. By the time they had
> finished placing those desks, those kids for the first time
> understood how they earned those desks. FREEDOM!
> 
> Martha said, "You don't have to earn those desks. These guys did it
> for you. They put them out there for you, but it's up to you to sit
> here responsibly to learn, to be good students and good citizens,
> because they paid a price for you to have that desk to sit in and to
> learn and don't ever forget it."
> 
> *I received this yesterday and wanted to share it with everyone. I wish
> that
> every school in this great Nation had teachers like Martha Cothren
> teaching
> in them. Teaching our children the true price of the freedoms that we as
> US
> citizens enjoy. When I first read this, I was a bit skeptical and wasn't
> sure that it was true, so I did some checking and found that indeed,
> Martha
> Cothren did this to teach her history class. Martha Cothren is the
> daughter
> of a World War II POW and regularly has Veterans visit her classroom, when
> teaching her students about World War II and the Vietnam War. *
> 
> *This isn't all that Martha Cothren has done to impart to her students the
> true meaning of selfless service and sacrifice. In May 2005, she and her
> students organized a Vietnam Veterans Appreciation Week, holding an
> official
> Thank You ceremony in the gymnasium of their school. The event was
> attended
> by not only Vietnam Veterans, but also veterans from World War II and the
> Korean War. During that week, as veterans told their stories, the students
> videotaped these stories in order to preserve them for future generations
> to
> hear. Cothren and her students are also active in sending letters and care
> packages to the troops deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2006, the VFW
> honored Martha Cothren as the 2006 Teacher of the Year, an award she so
> richly deserves. *
> 
> *I hope that the story of Martha Cothren's lesson about how freedom is
> earned will inspire each of us to strive to follow her example. Thank You
> Martha Cothren for imparting to your students the true meaning of how
> freedom is earned.*
> 
> The story can be verified at
> Snopes<http://www.snopes.com/glurge/nodesks.asp>
> __________________________________________________
> Use Rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org, Help? www.rhodes22.org/list
> 
> 

-- 
View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/History--Politics--School-Days--tf4276904.html#a12179695
Sent from the Rhodes 22 mailing list archive at Nabble.com.