Dear Friends,
Today is my birthday. I am 78 years old. I was born at 12:05 a.m. in St. Joseph’s Hospital in Houston, Texas, to Walter and Ann Silvers. I was their third child. Five more would follow. Eventually we were five boys and three girls. My dad was born in Savannah and dropped out of high school. My mother was born in Bessarabia, came to the U.S. at age 9, and graduated from the Houston public schools, one of the proudest achievements of her life. She prided herself on her perfect English. She was an American and a Texan.
I went to the Houston public schools from kindergarten to high school graduation. None of the schools I attended still exists, at least not in the same form. I went to Montrose Elementary School (now the Houston High School of the Performing Arts), then my family moved to another part of Houston and I enrolled in fifth grade in Sutton Elementary School (not sure if it still exists). I went to the neighborhood junior high school, Albert Sidney Johnston Jr. High, named for a Confederate hero. Then to San Jacinto High School (now Houston Community College). I may have had a few great teachers. Mostly I had pretty good teachers or good teachers, who worked very hard to do their best. I don’t remember any “bad” teachers. The Houston public schools were segregated during my time there (I graduated in 1956). I thought that was wrong, I read about the Brown decision, and I spoke to our high school principal, Mr. Brandenburg about it. I asked him why we didn’t obey the court. He sympathized but said that if the schools desegregated, a lot of good black principals and teachers would lose their jobs. There was also the matter of the school board, which changed every two years; every other election produced a board dominated by Minute Women and John Birchers who thought the UN was a Communist organization and such groups as the NAACP and Urban League were pinkos. They totally opposed any desegregation.
My Houston public education was good enough to get me admitted to a wonderful Ivy League college: Wellesley. I was friends with Nora Ephron, later a celebrated screenwriter, and Madeline Korbel (later Albright); we worked on the college newspaper together. Class of 1960, nine years before Hillary graduated.
Many decades have passed. Now the body is giving out; the knees don’t work well. One was totally replaced, the other probably should have been. But mentally, I feel like 35 or 40.
For my daily efforts, blogging and writing, at no pay, I am regularly called a “shill” for the unions, they say I sold my soul for “union gold.” Ha! It happened this week on Twitter. This is nonsense. I am 78 years old, and I do and say what I believe. My views are the product of a lifetime of experience and study. No one can buy me. I don’t want a job, a grant, or money. The only good thing about growing old is that your ambitions are put into check. There is nothing that I want of a material nature. I have noticed that the folks in the corporate reform movement seem to think that everyone has a price, everyone is motivated by greed. I am not. I am financially independent. I am free to say what I want. And I do.
I won’t ramble on, but I want to ask you a favor. Since 2010, I have devoted my waking hours to fighting privatization and defending public schools, their students, and their teachers.
If you want to do something for me other than say “happy birthday” (which is also nice), please join and/or make a gift of any size to the Network for Public Education or the NPE Action Fund, which engages in political action. I co-founded these groups with Anthony Cody, and we hope NPE will be the meeting place for all those who are sick of attacks on public schools and teachers, for all those who want to sing the praises of a great democratic public education system that is required by law to provide equal opportunity for all students. We want a transformation, not the status quo. We want great schools for every child, not just for the few. And we won’t tolerate the naysayers who pick on the people, institutions, and values we hold dear.
And if you have the time and resources to join me, come to Washington on Friday, July 8, for the Save Our Schools March. Walk arm in arm with your friends and allies.
Together we will prevail. I will use my energy to make that happen, to win over public opinion. I can’t do it without you. That’s my goal for my next birthday.
Diane
Happy Birthday!
I hope you get your wish.
Happy birthday! What a great birthday wish. I hope you get your wish as well!
Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday. You are a woman of conscience. I applaud you and thank you endlessly. Your article in the Boston paper was excellent. I am going to share it widely. The comments I read in response on the paper’s website from those who still think judging teachers by test scores is the answer, are so ill-informed. Thank you for your dedication to education and to all the children in this country. I will be making a contribution in your honor to NPE as you request. It is the least those of us who admire all you do can do for you. As someone who spent her life in a classroom, I know you get it. So many do not. It is a tragedy, this “reform” movement. What happened to common sense?
I can’t make the march next week, but be assured I’ll be there in spirit. I’m late to the fight, but “better late than never” still applies. Felíz cumpleaños!
Happy birthday! You are a hero to all who value our public schools. Live long and keep fighting.
A very happy birthday to you, Diane! And may you celebrate many, many more! You are a example of hard work, dignity and perseverance! You are also an example of free speech, good listening, and intellectualism. All of the incredible work that you do for education serves not only as an example of all of the qualities listed above, but it also provides some much needed inspiration and a type of mentoring that many of us in the field desperately need to continue in this field that we love deeply. Wishing you so much joy today and always!
Happy birthday, Diane! Thank you for not walking away! See you this weekend.
On this day we are reminded that congratulations in the form of wisdom—topped off with a healthy dollop of humor—comes in many forms.
“Today you are you! That is truer than true! There is no one alive who is you-er than you!” [Dr. Seuss]
From the posting. 35 or 40? Hmmm…
“It takes a long time to become young.” [Pablo Picasso]
😎
KrazyTA,
My favorite Dr. Seuss book! As a young mother, I memorized the beginning about the Great Birthday Bird.
Happy birthday, Diane!
Happy Birthday to a fellow “Cancerian” (??). Mine is in two days.
Here’s (holding up a champagne glass) to many more for you!!
Duane Swacker:
As that famous Mexican superhero of yesteryear, El Chapulín Colorado, said (updating it, natcherly) the “thought” leaders among the rheephormistas that peddle their numerical chimeras and mathematical morasses aka high-stakes standardized tests—
”No contaban con tu astucia!” / [they didn’t count on your astuteness!]
¡Feliz cumpleaños!/Happy Birthday!Otanjoobi omedetoo gozaimasu! [Span/Eng/Jap]
😎
Wonderful post.
You’re absolutely right about greed. People who are driven by it feel no shame. They think everyone else is greedy, too. It’s a psychological problem right up there with narcissism and megalomania, traits that are hard to ascribe to public school teachers but easy to ascribe to those who want to control them—the technology and hedge fund billionaires who think they know better or just want to make a buck.
I don’t know how anyone could accuse you of being a shill for teacher unions. If only they were so powerful! At the grass roots level most teachers are ambivalent about supporting them. At the top, the leadership trips over itself trying to decide what course of action to follow. NEA and AFT have very little muscle, discipline, or control over the teaching profession. They are too hapless to have shills!
Happy Birthday, and keep up the excellent work. Those of us who value public education appreciate what you do.
DL,
In reformer speak, teachers are greedy, but hedge fund managers who create nothing and produce nothing, are selfless philanthropists
Diane…wishing you, in our tradition, 120 years of birthdays with health and satisfaction in all your days. Thank you for putting yourself on the line and riding point for all of us.
Happy Happy Birthday, Diane Ravitch!
I’m from Oklahoma, I’m sure you are watching us. I share many of your articles with our #OklaEd fellows. Long live Public Education!
Thanks for your daily research,
Anita
Thank you for your untiring perseverance in the long and sometimes dispiriting stuggle to keep our public schools safe from predators. You are an inspiration for so many who might have otherwise thrown in the towel.
That class of ’60 was kicking ass and taking numbers!* My daughter, Wellesley ’08, considers you one of her heroes and role models!
🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂🎂
*Apologies for the vulgarity; here’s the justification:
When you are so good at something, people are lining up to challenge you and you have to give them a number and they have to wait their turn.
“He had an awesome game of basketball today. He was kicking ass and taking numbers.”
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Kicking%20ass%20and%20taking%20numbers
Love it, Christine!
Happy Birthday!
I’m pro-union too and i’m not a member of a labor union nor am I paid by one. I think unions are good for working people, and since I have a lot of working people in my community, they’re good for me too.
I’m “self interested” in the sense that one of my sons is in a private sector union, the work he does is sometimes dangerous and I don’t believe state or federal regulators are looking out for peoples’ safety at work anymore. I’m glad he’s in an organization that helps fill that void.
You’re the top!
You’re the bees knees! I 🙂
Also, if you’re a union shill then are paid advocates for ed reform who go after unions “anti-union shills”? I’m pretty sure the Walton heirs aren’t big backers of labor unions.
Just wondering if there’s any consistency in this “union shill” analysis, or if ed reformers just exempt themselves due to the fact they “care about children” and everyone else is “self interested”.
Chiara,
You have touched on ine of the odd contradictions of reformer speak. People on their big payrolls are fighting for innovation and children. People who disagree with them, they think, must be paid-off shills. Bizarre projection.
I can think of nothing better to be called than a shill for the unions especially when those doing the name calling are shills for the Oligarchy. Perhaps Biden was wrong when he said :
“”Labor built the middle class. And there’s a reason why the middle class is shrinking. I know I got in trouble for saying this before, but I’m going to say it again. You guys are the only guys keeping the barbarians at the gate.”
He forgot to mention you .
Happy Birthday
Thanks, Joel. I can’t remember when so-called liberals decided that unions were obsolete. Even some progressive bloggers are anti-union. I don’t belong to any union but I think unions are a pathway to the middle class and an essential part of any democracy.
Happy Birthday lovely lady and, thank you for all you do! >
Happy birthday, and thank you for your voluntary service to your country and our children. You have never worn a military uniform and fought in one of America’s many wars, but you are a warrior and deserve credit for standing up to the crooks and frauds in power.
I want you to know that the community based, democratic, transparent, non-profit traditional public schools that you attended as a child and teen, are still doing a great job despite the autocrats and/or greedy power hungry frauds and liars out to destroy and profit from their destruction.
My evidence is our daughter, who is now 24. She went to those public schools K-12 just like you did decades earlier, and she made it to Stanford where she graduated in 2014.
After she was at Stanford for about two years, I asked her how many incompetent teachers she had K-12 in the five different public school districts she attended. She had between 30 – 50 teachers total. After some thought, she said 2, but those 2 did not stop her from making it to Stanford, because she was held responsible to learn regardless of the competency of her teachers.
A teacher’s job is to teach and according to our daughter most of her public school teachers did a good job, and she even learned from the 2 she said weren’t all that great, because she was the student responsible to learn. Teachers, no matter how good they are, can’t do the learning for the children they teach.
In addition, our daughter never did all that great on the useless high stakes tests, but that also didn’t stop her from learning even though her below average high stakes test scores did cause her some stress and lost sleep.
May you have many more birthdays and continue the good fight. If you don’t mind, I’m going to think of you as an honorary U.S. Marine who practices Semper Fi with her actions and written words. I learned on the battle field that the only thing to fear is fear itself.
I join the group.HAPPY BIRTHDAY. Thank you for all your tremendous service in education.
Another note. I am 87. I FULLY understand what you are saying about growing old.
Someone told me “growing old “ain’t” for sissies”. I FULLY understand that statement also. It is proving truer and truer every day.
God bless you for your dedication to quality education.
Diane, today you have my most esteemed adoration and another check for NPE. I would give you my knee, but since you only want a gift that will help others and not yourself… Being called a teacher shill by hedge fund managers and the like is the highest compliment. I can’t top that, so I’ll just say Happy Birthday! And thank you. A million times, thank you.
Happy birthday Diane Ravitch! I will be in Washington DC for the rally on July 8th. Join the Washington teachers on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to help us lead the singing. You have been public education’s best gift ever!
Sending a virtual HUG. Your birth and your life has been consequential for me personally and thousands of adults and school age children. Keep steady on your feet but have a large glass of wine! Thank you Diane, you are a gift to us all.
Happy birthday! Thanks for all that you have done and continue to do. I will definitely make a donation to your organization.
Happy Birthday, Diane. Thanks for being a great example of someone making a difference by boldly, intelligently and persuasively speaking out!
Happy Birthday!
Un Joyeux Anniversaire! Thank you for all your tireless efforts to support strong public schools. I feel the same way you do about your public education. I attended the integrated Philadelphia schools, and they have served me well. While I never had a “Mr. Chips,” I also had some very good, hard working teachers. I cannot recall having an incompetent one. As for the naysayers, a New Yorker would say, “Forget about it!” History will show that you are on the right side of things.
Happy, Happy….Birthday!
Loved reading about your successful PUBLIC SCHOOL years, your family and having been College & Career Ready, before non-educators derailed it.
🎂🍾🍸🎪🎉🎁….and a donation to NPE🎆
Happy birthday, Diane! As a teacher with 25 years in the profession, I appreciate your work to keep our public schools truly public! I’m one of your biggest fans…and will donate to NPE today! Keep on calling out the corporate reformers! 👍
There are two people I especially emulate. You and Pat Summitt.
Happy Birthday.
Many thanks for all you are doing to support public education …and for creating this blog with an “innovative” and lively peer review part of that.
I ordered 12 copies of your updated “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education” (paperback). I will give one copy to each member of our school board, plus the superintendent, and a couple of CEOs who are trying to enlist “any” operator to create any kind of school with “high quality seats.”
Consider that my birthday gift. I will be in at the July DC event in spirit.
Thank you, Laura. We will think of you on July 8
That’s a great idea, Laura.
Happy Birthday Diane! And thank you for today’s posting about your amazing and inspiring life and for all of what you’ve done and continue to do on behalf of our schools and the children who are enrolled there.
You were the one who raised my consciousness—made me aware of the existential crisis facing our schools and the grave threat that privatization (A.K.A. “education reform”) represented for all us who support the concept, vision and day to day existence of public education.
And yes, I do and will continue to, financially support NPE, on a monthly basis and will give more as I can. The work you do is so critical and I continue to do what I can to spread the word and let my fellow parents and taxpayers know what is going on and what we can do to change this for the better.
Have a great day and a great year, Diane. And we sincerely hope that NPE will be coming here, to Seattle, for the 2017 conference. We promise to work with you to produce the best event yet and one that will greatly boost the forces fighting against privatization in our state!
HAPPY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Diane. THANK YOU 4 all you do. May you have a peaceful and joyous weekend.
Happy birthday Diane. Hope to see you soon. Love Salty.
A very Happy Birthday, Diane, and many more!
We apreciate all you do.
Happy Birthday! We celebrate you today and every day because you have given us what no one else could –HOPE. May your day be celebratory and continue into the July 4th weekend. Thank you for all you do!
Enjoy the day. Wishing you many, many more!
Happy Birthday Diane, you are a national treasure ^0^
Hope to see you in DC on the 8th!
Happy Birthday, Diane! You are our fearless leader of our movement. You give us hope. Your courage, intelligence, and advocacy inspire us all. Thank you!
Happy Birthday! You inspire and empower us with your insight and leadership. Thank you. May you have a great birthday. Celebrate each day as if it’s your birthday! ^0^
Happy Birthday, Diane! Thank you for your service to and advocacy for children, teachers, and public education! ^0^
Happy Birthday crusader for children!
Happy Birthday, dear heart. Each year, we are one year closer. Thank you for sticking it out. Here’s to another trip around the sun. ^0^
Happy Birthday! ^0^
Happy birthday, Diane! I will gladly donate in your honor and as a 33 year veteran teacher in the trenches, I speak to anyone who will listen (and to many who do not want to listen!) about the issues you forcefully confront with eloquence and reason. I pray God blesses you (and us) with many more years of your voice crying out in the wilderness and courage for us all to take up your mantle.
Geraldine, as long as you and others are with me, I am not in the wilderness
I hope you have the happiest of birthdays and many, many more! You are a shinning ray of light in a dark room. Love ya!
Happy birthday, Diane. You inspire all of us to keep fighting for our schools, students, and our careers. ^0^
Happy Birthday! ^o^
Happy birthday! You’ve still got plenty of gas left in the tank to do what you want. Celebrate! Thank you for doing what you do to save public education. This public school teacher definitely appreciates you.
Happy Birthday!
^0^ happy Birthday Diane. I appreciate your support and activism for our public school children.
Happy Birthday!^0^
Have a wonderful birthday, Diane!
Happy Birthday Diane.
I seldom agree with you but I admire your persistence and your well reasoned thoughts.
Keep at it. I am 76 and I hope to be as active and brilliant as you in a couple of years.
Happiest of birthdays, Diane! Thank you for all you have done, and continue to do, for our children. Whenever I feel exhausted from our fight against the privatization of our public schools, I come here to be reenergized. Bless you!! ^0^
Happy Birthday, Diane! 🎶🎂🎉
Happy Joyous Birthday Diane! You have become one of my heroes over the years, joining the ranks of Grace Hopper, Ada Lovelace, Mary Colter, Eleanor Roosevelt, Willa Cather, Rachel Carson, Pearl Buck, Marian Anderson, Rosa Parks, and of course, Christa McAuliffe. May your love, courage, strength, and resolve continue to guide us towards a fair and equitable education for all.
Love in service,
Jack
Happy birthday, Diane. I wish you many more healthy and joyous ones!
Happy birthday to one of my education heroes! I hope you have a wonderful day! ^^0^^
Happy Birthday to you!
Aloha & happy birthday! From Hawaii BAT
Happy Birthday, Diane! Thank you for all your time and energy spent to save our schools, children, and teachers! You are such an inspiration to us all. Thank you for not giving up! You are our hero!
Dear Diane,
Happy Birthday and thank you for the work you have done to save our public schools. You have planted seeds that will live on for decades. We Found Defiance with your help.
Happy Birthday! TN ^0^
Happy birthday, Diane! The best is yet to come!
Happy birth anniversary!
Happy Birthday!
Happy Birthday, Diane
Like any good teacher, you get up each morning and do your job for others, building a greater community that we all benefit from.
Yours in gratitude and solidarity,
Geronimo
Happy 78th Diane ^o^
Happiest of birthdays to you. May you continue to feel 35! You certainly take a lot of burden off many people’s shoulders so they don’t feel alone. ^0^
Happy Birthday, Diane.
Happy Birthday Diane! Thanks for sharing your mind and voice! I’ll see you in D.C.!
Happy Birthday Diane. Thank you for all you do.
We have prevailed, Diane.
It is only a matter of time for it to become materially apparent.
Happy birthday. Enjoy your year. Just be you, and, of course, do what you have to do.
Happy Birthday, lovely Lady Diane. You are a legend, and we love you.
Happy birthday!! From a NYSAPE supporter, LI Opt Out member and a ^o^
Happy Birthday Diane!
Thanks providing me with insomnia assistance.
There is always either a new post, or a new comment somewhere for me to read when I can’t sleep.
Happy Birthday Diane, You continue to inspire!! Since speaking with you, June 2015. I have enjoyed the BEST school year. Amid the din, I found time to BREATHE with my students.
My gift to you is the beginning of our story below. Volume I – Joy of Being a Teacher
“I have spent my life in this field. I have toiled the soil, teaching over twenty years. Most recently, by day a high-school teacher, by night a college professor. I was experiencing significant stress. I was trying to figure out a way of ameliorating disharmonies in my life. I rationalized that my living situation and people in my life needed to change in order for me to heal. That day, in the ER, I realized that nothing was going to change. The pain would remain as long as I denied myself. I needed to reset.
At the Middle College National Consortium Conference in New Jersey (2015), I had the privilege of engaging with Diane Ravitch during her keynote address. Reminiscent of the tennis court oath, and inspired by the setting, and Ravitch’s courageous work Reign of Error (2013), I made a standing public proclamation to follow in her footsteps. As fate would have it, before nightfall, I had a chance encounter with a dear friend, Malgorzata, a very knowledgeable and experienced researcher. Malgorzata shared her experience researching mindfulness as part of the work conducted by Ken Tobin’s team at the Graduate Center in New York. The joy and serendipity in our friendship, rekindled after fifteen years, was exhilarating. Little did I realize, but, I had opened up a new chapter of my life. This is it. My path through mindfulness to self-awareness, compassion and understanding.
The day after the conference ended my plane touched down on vacation to my family in Ireland. Mandy, my sister drove me from the airport on her way to a weeklong session on mindfulness practice for teachers, hosted by the Limerick Education Center. A universal plan was unfolding. It seemed that all I needed was to be present, accept and not judge. Without much thought or reservation, I joined Mandy. The plot was thickening. In a small, mildewed classroom, with fifteen Irish women, I laughed and cried about the joys and sorrows of teaching. Soothed by the veil of Irish mist caressing the fair land, as she has over the centuries, we gently rubbed each other’s backs, inside the old schoolhouse. We sang songs, and lay on yoga mats with our toes wiggling in the air like mischievous, school girls. On days we ate mindfully, I was reminded of attending convent school over 40 years earlier. But, this time there was no fear. There was no judgement. We were taking risks and falling down energized by liberating the folly of our egos. Attending to the whispers of our breath, we were celebrating life. As in all revolution; Enlightenment, Scientific, Glorious or otherwise; we conspired and shared our dreams. Could we bear “mindfulness” as a gift to benefit our students, our children. My life or life’s purpose had not changed. My family and friends had not changed. But, something was very different. I could feel it in my spine!”
Yours in compassionate action, Linda Noble Brooklyn College Academy High School Brooklyn College
Sent from my iPhone
>
Thank you for being the voice of so many teachers and tirelessly advocating for public education. It is ludicrous that anyone would accuse you of doing this for personal gain. Stay strong and keep on blogging. Know that many people, including myself, admire you greatly. ^0^
Happy Birthday! Thank you for everything you do to fight for our kids and our schools!
^o^
Happy Birthday! I’ll see you at the march next weekend! ^0^
^0^
Your essay on multiculturalism was the first piece of methodological writing I read, and it influenced me tremendously in my selection of career. May you have the very best of birthdays, and never grow tired of the fight.
^0^
Happy Birthday, Diane! You continue to inspire us here in Washngton state–we are planning our fifth “History & Future of Piblic Education” session at the WSSDA Annual Conference, but none will ever top our first session, that wonderful conversation we had with you (and your cat!) from your Long Island home. I do believe we are starting to see the pendulum start to swing back toward sanity in our education system, and a lot of the credit goes to you and your tireless work! Elissa Dyson, Onion Creek School Board of Directors
Happy birthday!
Happy birthday from California. I am a kindergarten teacher at a school outside of L. A. Our school has had rooms given to a charter school. Thank you for getting the word out that non union charter schools are not a solution.
Happy Birthday Diane! ^o^
Happy Birthday, Diane!!
Many more!
^o^ A very happy birthday to you, Diane!
Happy Birthday to you, my dearest Dr. Ravitch.
Your wisdom in the way of your living should be the wake up call to all greedy and sinful people with authority and power over conscientious human beings on Earth.
I would love to repeat your wisdom.
[start paragraph]
I am 78 years old, and I do and say what I believe.
My views are the product of a lifetime of experience and study.
No one can buy me. I don’t want a job, a grant, or money.
The only good thing about growing old is that your ambitions are put into check.
There is nothing that I want of a material nature. I have noticed that the folks in the corporate reform movement seem to think that everyone has a price, everyone is motivated by greed. I am not.
I am financially independent. I am free to say what I want. And I do.
[end paragraph]
Words cannot express my admiration, appreciation and profound respect for your wisdom. Thanks God to bless us with your being on Earth as the beacon of hope for all conscientious educators who will unite to fight for all American children to be educated in the “whole child education” concept.
May God bless you with your wish so that it will come true sooner.
Very respectfully yours,
May King.
Well-wishes, birthday-blessings and many happy returns of the day!
Happy Birthday Diane! We love you and thank you for speaking truth to power. ^o^
Your continued truth-telling in defense of public schools is an inspiration. Happy Birthday, Ms. Ravitch. ^0^
Happy Birthday! (a day late…)
So grateful for your words and continued efforts to speak truth to power on behalf of thousands and millions of children and teachers you will never meet.
Your knees may be failing you, but your words spoken from the heart are strong and enduring and continue to guide us in our efforts to overcome those who seek to undo our public schools.
May you have many, many more trips around the sun!
Happy Birthday! You are impacting education in ways that are commnedable, groundbreaking, and transparent. Enjoy this day and be blessed with many more.
You have done an amazing amount of work for public schools! It is most definitely appreciated by us, the teachers in the trenches!
Have the happiest of Birthdays Diane!! ^0^
It is way past your birthday now, Diane Ravitch. I too attended Johnston Jr. High and San Jacinto. I went on to Rice. But what I would love right now, and imagine no one knows anymore, are the Albert Sydney Johnston fight song and its, you might say, anthem. Do you remember? I know way to many of the words . . . And no one to help with them! (I am a mere 76, happy, healthy, with several new-ish joints, and a life spent in very meaningful work, which I am still engaged in full-time.
Mimsy Sadofsky
Mimsy, here goes, from memory:
Albert Sidney Johnston Junior High,
Now our voices rise to thee in song,
Southern hero’s name we proudly bear,
We pledge our love and loyalty,
Our hearts to thee belong.
Fall in line,
O may we ever
Stand for the right!
Ready to fight!
For victory.
Fall in line
And raise a cheer with all of your might
Forever praise his glorious name
We sing now to thee!
I may be wrong on a few words but that’s the school song back when we went to a segregated junior high named for a confederate hero