By Ingrid McCleary
Sometimes you just don't know where something's going to take you when you begin your journey. Many times, you can see where you're heading because the trip is short, and the light at the end of the tunnel is bright and promising.
But other times you discover that the light is attached to an end-wall, revealing another tunnel off to your right.
So you take that right turn (what other choice do you have?), but now you're not sure if that light you see dimly in the distance is, in fact, the end or just another right turn. This changes the way you approach this part of the journey; you're cautious because you don't know if you'll have the energy to go the distance, whatever that distance may prove to be.
Such is the feeling I've had since getting involved with Fremont High School's Trip 2000. My husband attended the first meetings last summer and passed the information on to me. I attended other meetings and recently agreed to take on the task of communications chairwoman for the Executive Planning Committee.
Trip 2000 is an ambitious undertaking, but its goals are admirable: to graduate the largest percentage of incoming Fremont freshmen for this century with, at minimum, a 2.0 GPA and to provide an incentive that will result in a hands-on experience showing the relevance of education in their lives.
The Trip 2000 task? To raise enough money to send the entire Class of 2000 to the East for two weeks. They'll visit Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., and explore places like the Empire State Building, Rockefeller Center, the Guggenheim Museum, Congress Hall, the White House and Times Square on New Year's Eve, 1999.
We have a Parent Committee, which meets monthly, and a Student Committee, which meets weekly. To raise nearly half a million dollars may well prove impossible because it is a daunting task. We are attempting a lot, but if more parents, students, and teachers got involved, we could attempt even more.
There is power in numbers.
We're not handing freshmen this trip on a platter, either. In addition to maintaining a minimum GPA, they must also complete a sophomore project. They cannot be expelled or thrown out of the classroom. They must volunteer their time to help with fundraisers and attend school functions. So, no, we're not giving them a trip; they must earn it. It's a matter of ways and means; freshmen earn their way, the committee provides the means--with help from the community.
I think parents tend to get less involved with school activities as their children mature. In many ways, this is expected, even encouraged, as we strive to allow them to grow into independent adults. But it also creates a distance, a separation of worlds which doesn't come back into alignment until they're well into their 20s.
One of the major reasons I agreed to become communications chairwoman was that it created a line of communication between these two worlds. Trip 2000 will take my daughter and me through her entire high school experience. It is a shared interest, and it is built on mutual respect (we both know the other is working hard on the project; we both know what effort is required to see things put into action).
I hope, from this shared base, other lines of communication will remain open, lines that all too often falter during the teen years. Thus, to me, Trip 2000 is a project that generates a rewarding byproduct. It is not so much reaching the end of the tunnel as it is the tunnel itself. And for that I'll find the energy somehow.
Ingrid McCleary is a Sunnyvale resident.
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This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, May 7, 1997.
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