Issue link: http://educator.cta.org/i/13098
LEFT: Andrew McClean and Judah Pittman work in class at Comptche School. BELOW: Mendocino Unified Teachers Association member Judy Stavely in front of the former Comptche School building. every day at 11:30 a.m., hatching baby chicks in c lass, creating publications about fictional characters or “Charlie Books,” and making a dinosaur museum out of boxes. The school has (MUTA). When she was hired at the site, then a K-5 school, Stavely shared the job with her former husband. Each taught three days a week while the other stayed home with the babies. Wednesday was an “overlap” day when they both taught and brought the babies to school. Eventually he went to teach at another one-room schoolhouse before retiring. “It was kind of like a family business,” says Stavely. “We lived, breathed, ate and slept Comptche School. We had an old- fashioned letterpress, and children wrote poems and set the type to make printed poetry books. We went backpacking with students. That was back when we didn’t have No Child Left Behind, state stan- dards and all of that.” one-room schoolhouses still in operation Other California > Death Valley Elementary School > Forks of Salmon Elementary School > Greenwood Elementary School, Elk > Kashia Elementary School, Stewarts Point > Rand Elementary School, Johannesburg > Santa Clara Elementary School, Santa Paula > Spencer Valley Elementary School, San Diego > Two Harbors, Santa Catalina Island > Washington School, North San Juan > Westport Village School, Westport Kathleen Murray, Westport Village School 20 California Educator | JUNE 2010 NCLB c aused the school to make changes. S tavely began using state- approved t ext- books and materi- als for teaching the state standards. This meant careful planning so there was time for field trips, art and music. “I had been at this long enough to look at the state standards and know whether children were learning them from the projects we did,” says Stavely. “I hit a compromise: I would use the grade- level textbooks three days a week, and two days a week I would do the kinds of things I used to do.” That includes singing, which happens had four incarna- tions. The school formerly operated in a li ttle w hite schoolhouse built in 1925, after the previous building burned down. It was s old a n d turned into a resi- dence after failing to meet seismic stan- dards. The current building was first a barn belonging to a neighboring farm. It was bought and turned into a bar called the Blue Rose, which became the school building when the bar was sold to the school district. “People always ask me, ‘Don’t you feel lonely and isolated?’” says Stavely. “But the answer is no. To me, teaching school is like painting a picture or making a piece of music. You need quiet to think about it and shouldn’t be distracted to do it. I c annot imagine teaching a single grade; I t hink it would be really dull. There’s never a dull moment here; I’m juggling all the time.” Stavely now teaches the children of former students; she fondly refers to them as her “grandstudents.” She will miss the community, but still has some plans to hang around Comptche occa- sionally, since she’s working with a lo- cal circus troupe, learning how to do aerial feats. “Comptche is my spiritual home,” she says. “I love the community, but it’s time now to let someone else have fun in this job.”