It’s resolution-making time, of course. Why not consider adding the cause of education to your list of things to help improve this year?  There is still time to include your Top 3 Educational Resolutions for this year!  The good news is there are many opportunities, and this will be easy, because YOU are going to pick your own Top Three!! 

Here are ten quick ways for you to help further education, either in general, or in your home (or both) in 2023.   Some of these are about schools/classrooms/teachers, some about your own child(ren) and/or you, some are mixed.  Some are concrete, some are rather more nebulous.  Some of them are ‘easy’, some require time/effort.  What suits you?It turns out there are 120 different ways to pick a group of 3 from the list, so surely we can each find a good, comfortable set of educational resolutions for ourselves.  Use them for the whole year, OR, if your resolutions tend to go the way of most, rotate in 3 new ones each month or quarter.  Or mix and match them regularly.  Or invent you own.  Doesn’t matter.  ALL of them will help, and in the aggregate, we can together make a significant difference!

Here are the suggestions. Add your own items, as well!  Have fun making your choices! 

1. 1. Give teachers more credit and overall appreciation. especially following a pandemic, but in all situations. Period.   They deserve it.  Especially now. [See #10.]
   2.  Express that appreciation. Thank a teacher or two, personally or by sending a card.  Do this every so often.
   3. Take an interest (especially if your children are in school). Don’t skip parent/teacher conferences, ask your child(ren) how school’s going and continue to keep up with their work.  As/when it becomes appropriate, volunteer in classes, be a chaperon, etc.  Ask how you can help. 
   4. If you’re not a DO-ing person, or even if you are . . .Send a check to a local school for a teacher’s (or teachers’) use or for general materials, or for pandemic supplies, etc. Be sure to check school rules and send it through the main office.
   5. Go to one or more board meetings. Perhaps you’re not interested in a thing they discuss that night, but you’ll definitely learn more about the school’s workings and you’ll gain a better appreciation of the work the board and its members are doing. 
   6. Along those lines, have or develop a first impulse to vote FOR school-requested levies. This is NOT a blank check.  Absolutely DO your due diligence.  But, unless there’s a good reason otherwise, vote FOR.
   7. Look for ways to get your own child(ren) to think and learn. Play more ‘thinking games’ with the kids.  Ask questions, read age-appropriate books that include things they can see, that they are interested in, and can learn from.  (National Geographic Kids’ books and even magazines are GREAT for these things, among others.)  [And see #10.]
   8. Make sure your kids know how important you think education is and encourage their learning. If they ask a question you don’t know, look it up together (easy to do these days!)
   9. Similarly, show that you are still modeling learning (and eager to learn) yourself. Read a book, take an online course, etc.
   10. Finally – if you are disgusted by politicians’ efforts to drag us back to the Middle Ages with book bannings and forbidden topics, fight back!!  Tell a teacher you support them, complain to your local school board, write your representatives!!  Real, meaningful education is too important for this partisan nonsense!!

Thanks for making a difference with your educational resolutions in 2023!  Happy New Year!