It’s been a quiet first month here at SLV charter, as classes slowly start-up and students make their way onto campus. When I worked for the Charter from 2015-2018, the programs were spread across the entire district - now I can walk to everyone in the span of 15 minutes! I’ve enjoyed exploring the new setup, especially all of the nooks and crannies outside of the classrooms that have been filled with life through art, gathering spaces, and gardens. It makes me feel creative and hopeful after our more recent struggles.
I’m happy to be back.
I believe that all of us choose to be here at the SLV Charter program because we want something different than the usual experience. Whether your primary motivation is being able to do more educating at home, the opportunity for project-based learning & field trips, or incorporating art into education; a secondary gain here is the intrinsic social-emotional experience that comes with being a part of a small, flexible community.
We all need to feel safe to grow. All of us. The teachers & staff at the Charter have many responsibilities to our students & families, but building safe relationships is our most important task. Safe, positive, consistent, boundaried relationships are the most grounding, connecting, healing things that we can do for our children, each other, and ourselves. While this is an inherent aspect of the charter culture, this year we will be focusing on this social-emotional theme in a very intentional manner.
In the past few years, we have all experienced betrayal. There were the external threats, like the pandemic and the CZU fires, and then there were the resulting relational betrayals: disagreements and arguments, familial cutoffs, feeling let down by people who were supposed to help. Having spent nearly every day of the past 8 years providing mental health care to children, I can see the impact. Already at a young age, many kids can’t un-know that certain realities exist. I’m not saying this to be alarmist - and I’m not afraid. I fully believe in the resilience and healing of their human spirit. I know that if all we do as adults is focus on being safe, honest, and authentic in our relationships with children, they will be okay (and so will we).
When relationships have been tested, connection can feel risky. Pandemics can end (kind of) and things can be rebuilt (eventually), but the felt memory of relational betrayal stays with humans the longest. The good news is that rupture in relationships can be repaired. Sometimes that can happen within the original relationship, but not always. When it can’t, other people and communities must act as stand-ins for the healing experience. This year with time, modeling and teaching, we will have the courage to be that place for others. Because right now, we need each other more than ever.
I am grateful for the opportunity to learn and grow alongside the Charter community and looking forward to our year together.
Jennifer Sims, MA, LPCC
(she/they)
Mental Health Counselor