Health & Fitness
The Virtues of a Fort Lee Education
Cultural diversity is such a tremendous asset when people can work together, have honest conversations, and have fun. How can we capitalize on this resource in our town?
My older daughter is a product of Fort Lee schools: School 1, the Middle School, and FLHS. She had good teachers, and she made good friends whose parents had come from all over the world (though we struggled with too many changes in the FLHS administration). At School 1 one year, the yearbook editors found 67 different languages spoken by school families! In high school there were lots of good-natured jokes about each other’s ethnicities and serious conversations about how ethnicity affected their friendships, study habits, plans for college and careers, and religion. Her experiences here are a real asset as she deals with issues of racism, tolerance and cooperation in college.
Diversity is the norm for her.
My younger daughter just moved from School 1 to a middle school in northern New Jersey, where her father now lives. The facilities are modern and spacious; there are 18, rather than 28 students in her classes, and the work seems significantly more challenging. And the student body significantly less so.
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“Everyone dresses the same, speaks the same, is the same height, makes the same jokes—they have no personality!” says my daughter after a month or so of school. I’m aware of economic homogeneity among parents too, and a community focus on school spirit as an extension of town pride.
Here’s the question: Does the very diversity that creates such a rich social life in Fort Lee make it harder for borough residents to come together to support our schools? Is it only in our schools that people work and play and talk across ethnic and class lines? Adult groups around town are often far more homogeneous than youth. I invited a Korean friend to a church event, and she remarked that she hadn’t been among so many Caucasians in a long time—and we think of ourselves as a diverse congregation! The combination of strong schools, greater genuine dialogue among diverse adults and increasing cooperation as people work on some common goals would be a huge asset for everyone. Fort Lee has lots of amazing resources—let’s look for ways to do the hard but rewarding work of sharing them together.
