I graduated with honors from Oak Park River Forest High School in Oak Park, Illinois, and earned a B.A. with honors in elementary education from the University of Illinois, Champaign. I was called to teach elementary students - to share my gift for preparing children to succeed as students and citizens- goals that require talented teachers to be fully realized. When teaching jobs were scarce, I became a marketing director for educational films. The job was glamorous - sold the series Roots and had dinner with LeVar Burton - and the salary was far more than any teacher earns. The people I hired asked if I would ever return to teaching and were shocked when I said I would if I ever could. Teaching was my first love. I eagerly returned to elementary teaching in 1992 after earning an M.Ed in Reading at National Louis University in Evanston, Illinois, only to discover White Chalk Crime.™ As a tenured teacher, I blew the whistle on the harm being done to children. My district concocted charges against me and terminated me for what I was doing to raise awareness about what they were doing.
I was not an ordinary teacher. I could help children find their gifts in ways that often even surprised me. I had noted this ability as a young girl. I would babysit for children and surprise their parents with my ability to get the best from the most challenging children. I remember taming a boy known as impossible. (I found out that later in life, this boy murdered someone. He was a terror.) I was indeed a kid whisperer until I returned to teaching in 1992 and discovered that my gifts were a red flag to the administration; they had to drive me out of their school!
Since 1995, I have made exposing the crime in our schools my life's work. In 2002, I cofounded an organization, the National Association for the Prevention of Teacher Abuse, NAPTA, to locate other dedicated teachers who would testify to the outrageous wrongdoing, which included abusing any teacher who did not "fit" in this fraudulent system. I knew that the teachers who make a difference no longer could survive in teaching, and that this meant our democracy would surely implode. A society without dedicated teachers produces uncivilized rage, a perfect description of why so many accepted an indecent con man like Trump. In addition, I knew that the rage that created school shooters directly evolved from White Chalk Crime,™ the name I gave to the crime in schools as well as the abuse of teachers needed for the fraud to remain hidden. I knew I had to do what it took to get this known, knowing it would take years. I knew the priest abuse issue took thirty years, and I hoped I had enough years left to see this through, knowing the powers that be had such absolute, tax-subsidized power that it would be tough to be heard.
So, in 2008, I wrote a 648-page book detailing this crime with so much proof that no one who read it could dispute the truth of what I said. My intended audience was investigative reporters, such as Obama or Oprah. I didn't care if it sold more than one copy as long as that copy was in the hands of one of the above. (I got a copy to Maya Angelou since one of our members worked with her, and I have a thank you note from her I treasure. But it did not scale the mountain of propaganda in place to be heard. The media refused to take this on. What needs to be known isn't believed.)
I knew that book was just a start. I had to write a mass market book since few have time or interest to read anything that reads like a college text, and it needed to be lighter to carry around! And I knew if parents read this, a grassroots movement would start since their children are incredibly unsafe both psychologically and physically. I kept promising myself I would write that abridged book, but each year, my disgust for all the people in power who ignored this blocked me from wanting to spend my time on this.
When Trump was elected, I almost gave up on that promise, thinking, who would care if our schools are corrupt with a president like him running our country? Soon, I realized Trump proves my point - corrupt schools = loss of democracy - and this nation needed the biggest lesson I was ever to teach: we elected a mayhem man because crooks had hollowed out our schools or the foundation of our democracy. I realized that not only was there a hunger to learn how he happened to us, but this truth could enlighten a sincere candidate for president, and that person could be the leader we have needed for years. We need someone who has entered government with the same sincerity I entered teaching. We have a public that is disgusted with politicians who dodge issues like education, and rightly so. Trump was not the answer, but he was the spiritual enema we needed to get someone for the people. (Calling him an enema does not justice; he's so much worse, but you'll get my point.) And whoever that someone is, if they won't investigate and end this hideous fraud in our schools, they are not for the people.
In 2019, right before COVID-19, I published an abridged version of my 2008 book, hoping to widen the audience as my prior book was more suited for an investigative reporter. I realized it was hard enough to get people to read about education, and during COVID-19, it would be much more challenging, so I did not bother to market that book. In 2024, rather than republishing that book, I wrote a memoir about my teaching days and a comprehensive plan for top-notch schools that I could publish with the 2019 book. The new book is available in paperback and soon in audio. The ebook is both the new book and the 2019 book.
I raised three children. My four grandchildren and my new great-grandson inspire me to expose the truth about education; I believe that they and all children deserve better - much better. I will never stop blowing the whistle on White Chalk Crime.™ Read my latest book, and you will understand why. Even if you do not have children, you are subsidizing this crime. But most of all, if you would like to see our democracy last, you need to be part of a movement to end what brought us Trump and the deplorable divisiveness he engenders.
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