Extraordinary School

 I just had the most amazing school visit at Hamlin School in San Francisco. It's an all girls' school, begun by Sara Dix Hamlin in 1896. The school is in an old mansion full of amazing rooms. That built-in cabinet in the upper left corner of my collage is part of the school secretary's room! Full-on fake bamboo ceiling, too. And the horse? A huge student mural, hanging right in the main hall.

 The Head, Wanda Holland Greene, is incredible. When she was six years old, her father and mother decided she should be one of several children to integrate a school in the New York. Everyday she climbed on a bus and went to an all-white, Jewish neighborhood from her home in Brooklyn. She's energetic, direct, and determined to pass on to the girls the values of being an engaged citizen.

Ms. Greene wanted me to especially talk about Marching for Freedom. Here's what the girls were studying when I came: sixth graders were discussing freedom and personal rights, and the challenges of migrant farm worker families. Seventh grade: social class and identity, and will soon discuss Jim Crow era. Eighth graders: about to do a long unit on race and identity, and look at Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.

These students will have such a rich understanding of history and social justice.