The Sandra Seeley Column

Pokai Bay Waianae, HI Landing at Honolulu International Airport after midnight in the summer of 1969 was a quiet experience. No lei greetings. No girls dancing the hula. No ukulele music. No principal's wife to meet me and drive me to my new home. Just a tired 22 year old 5th grade teacher who due to an air traffic controllers' strike had been stranded in San Francisco for 12 hours, thereby arriving on Oahu long after my arranged meeting time. The skies of United Airlines were rather unfriendly that day. Morning One opened with the promise of tropical sensory delights. The smell of the Pacific Ocean reached me on a primal level. It surrounded me as it surrounded the island, enveloping both of us in rhythmic hugs. The northeast Trade Winds lifted my hair with a lover's touch. The exotic flowers of plumeria, hibiscus, birds of paradise, orchids, bougainvillea and my personal favorite, anthuriums dazzled my eyes and spritzed my pulse points with their blended ...

After one and one half years of retirement from the Pittsburgh Public School District, I'm calling an end to my self-imposed (possibly district-imposed) vow of silence. There are some truths that need to be told. Perhaps administrators and law makers will take heed, and the children just may benefit. I wrote my article, " Future Champions " in 2007. What I didn't disclose to my readers was after that amazing breakthrough and connection with my students, I was forbidden, yes forbidden, to do anything like that ever again.Why? Because it was not part of the curriculum. Had I been allowed to continue motivating and challenging the students in my own way, I would not have had the discipline issues and low test scores that were so prevalent. I was told by Principal X that the coloring portion of the lesson was totally pointless. However, I knew in my heart that this would keep my students calm while meditating on the passage they had just heard. My thinking was valid...

 A Modern Day Fairy Tale Once upon a time, back in the day and in the hood, there were two principals, one male and one female. They wore their fancy clothes, lofty ideals and arrogance like a cloak of immunity. Meanwhile, the teachers of the realm toiled in the fields of despair, extended day after extended day. They wept with deep sorrow over their dangerous classroom conditions. They skipped lunch. And the principals profited from their labor. Out of the masses, arose a small group of old-timers who remembered a long ago time when children did not run the schools. They actually remained seated. They did not hurl expletives and desks with equal force. This little weary group of rebels longed for the time to come when they could speak freely without repercussions. They believed in Martin Luther King's Dream and had some visions of their own. Many years and tears later, their brightest moment came. It was decreed that they were RETIRED! Whether retirement was forced ...

After watching Dr. Robert H. Lustig's 1 hour 29 minute 36 second lecture titled: Sugar: The Bitter Truth , I learned 2 bitter truths. Truth Number 1: Dr. Lustig pronounces the "fruc" in fructose to rhyme with "truck". Therefore we are consuming copious amounts of fruck-tose. Truth Number 2: Stop eating it today! I knew fructose was bad for humans, but was mesmerized by Dr. Lustig's presentation, even the biochemistry segment. My brain was able to metabolize all of his information. (Unlike our bodies which metabolize fructose as fat. Fructose's fraternal twin brother is Ethanol. So if you want to know what happens to fructose in your body, just think about how your body reacts to several of your favorite alcoholic beverages with only minor differences. Only the liver can metabolize fructose, therefore it's a toxin. To quote the good doctor, "Fructose is ethanol without the buzz." I want to read every food label now before purchasing pack...

We All Need Inspirational Stories, Even Humor Columnists I thought I would tell a story that is near and dear to my heart. A while back, my older brother Patrick, wise in years of experience, gave me a small digital voice recorder for my personal note taking. While sitting around the table, reading the instructions and figuring out which buttons to push, he decided to give me an example of how the new technology works. So Patrick searched for something that he could read into the mic. It was at this time that he was reading a motivational book titled, What to Say When You Talk to Your Self , by Shad Helmstetter , PH.D. Skimming through the pages, he settled on a section of the book that begins with, "I can do anything I believe I can do!" and ends with, "I am an exceptional human being." Talk about killing two birds with one stone, oops, no killing birds here. But it was great to be able to see and hear how the voice recorder functioned as well as hearing the ve...