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Listening to her gut led to...
Helping kids thrive in school
Vielka McFarlane, 45, Los Angeles
"I know that every mom wants the best for her child, but what if the only education available is in a failing school that has a crime rate higher than some U.S. suburbs? I worked in the Los Angeles school system for 15 years — I started out as a teacher, got promoted to principal, and eventually became an administrator. The whole reason I got into education was to change children's lives, but in every job I had, I was never quite sure if I was making a difference, and I had a deep feeling inside me that I could do something more. That feeling got even stronger when I'd think about my 13-year-old son, who's a special-needs kid, and the fact that even with my connections it was hard to get him into the best classrooms — so I couldn't imagine what it might be like for other parents. I began daydreaming about starting my own school, and once I started thinking about it, I couldn't stop. Within a month after the thought first entered my mind, I had written a 180-page application to open a charter school.
"I mentioned it to my supervisors at work, but they all discouraged me, saying that with 60 percent of kids dropping out of schools in our community, it was too large a project, too expensive, and a 'catastrophe waiting to happen.' I looked for grants and investors, but no one would touch me. But I knew in my gut that I couldn't keep working in a failing school system, so I made a drastic move that nobody thought would work: I took out a second mortgage on my home to get the money to build the school! Then I went to two friends in the community and convinced them to do the same! I hired a core staff, and less than a year later, in September 2005, we opened our doors to 120 eager students, grades kindergarten through 8. Within a month, we had 330 kids.
"In that first year, supervisors taught, teachers supervised, and we all acted as custodians, but I somehow knew that we would succeed, in part because I had acted on instinct before in my life: I emigrated from Panama when I was 20, but I went back for a visit after I found out that a friend's sister, who was dying of AIDS, had put her infant son in an orphanage. My intention was just to visit them, but that 'feeling' came over me when I saw the boy, and for absolutely no other reason than a sense that I should, I adopted him right on the spot. He is the light of my life, and every single time I look at him, I know that I can always trust my intuition.
"Since 2005, we've opened two additional schools, serving more than 700 kids in our community, over 90 percent of whom are poor. These parents used to have no choice but to send their kids to bad schools, and I'm so proud that we've given them another option. Our schools outperform all of the other schools in the area on academic tests, and average attendance is 98 percent, something that's unheard of here. Imagine how things would be if I didn't believe that I could make a difference! What do I know in my gut? That the world turns because people do good things every day, for no other reason than that they have a feeling that they can."
