Kentucky bus driver buys 1st grader PJs for Pajama Day

[pinball]

I saw this story this AM. I tried to find a local news story so if the link doesn’t work for you, you can search for it using keywords like bus drivers buys pajamas.

There have been a few threads about this topic recently (wear/bring something special days)

I think this man is awesome…such a great, caring person. The pictures are heartwarming…their big smiles are so great to see

https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/education/2024/02/16/jcps-bus-driver-recognized-for-kindhearted-gift-to-student/72626885007/

[Ottakee]

Bus drivers are such important people in kids lives.  They set the tone for the start and end of the day and most take an interest in each and every one of them.

[MercyA]

Love this so much. ❤️

[Hilltopmom]

This is sweet.
And  now how about public schools stop othering poor kids with a ton of stupid dress up days each year?! 

signed- public school teacher who doesn’t participate in dress up days and every single time reminds my students that it’s ok if they choose not to (or can’t, etc)

Edited February 17 by Hilltopmom
Changed but to and

[pinball]

50 minutes ago, Hilltopmom said:

This is sweet, but how about public schools stop othering poor kids with a ton of stupid dress up days each year?! 

signed- public school teacher who doesn’t participate in dress up days and every single time reminds my students that it’s ok if they choose not to (or can’t, etc)

Anything before the “but” is negated bc of everything after the “but”

[Terabith]

49 minutes ago, Hilltopmom said:

This is sweet, but how about public schools stop othering poor kids with a ton of stupid dress up days each year?! 

signed- public school teacher who doesn’t participate in dress up days and every single time reminds my students that it’s ok if they choose not to (or can’t, etc)

SO MUCH THIS!!!

It is heartwarming and sweet of this bus driver, but the real dystopian nightmare is a school system that has eight million dress up days where kids feel uncomfortable and out of place if they can’t participate, but that cause massive stress and expense to parents in the guise of fun.  It’s not fun, and we shouldn’t be relying on people who make poverty wages to fix it.  

[pinball]

1 minute ago, Terabith said:

SO MUCH THIS!!!

It is heartwarming and sweet of this bus driver, but the real dystopian nightmare is a school system that has eight million dress up days where kids feel uncomfortable and out of place if they can’t participate, but that cause massive stress and expense to parents in the guise of fun.  It’s not fun, and we shouldn’t be relying on people who make poverty wages to fix it.  

Anything before the “but” is negated by everything after the “but”

[Terabith]

1 minute ago, pinball said:

Anything before the “but” is negated by everything after the “but”

No. That is simply not true.  You’re being a jerk. Individuals can of course do kind and heartwarming things to help people survive a messed up system, and that doesn’t negate the fact that the system is a mess. 

[pinball]

6 minutes ago, Terabith said:

No. That is simply not true.  You’re being a jerk. Individuals can of course do kind and heartwarming things to help people survive a messed up system, and that doesn’t negate the fact that the system is a mess. 

Tsk tsk tsk!

No name calling!!!!

[barnwife]

23 minutes ago, pinball said:

Anything before the “but” is negated bc of everything after the “but”

Umm...what? No, absolutely not. Two things can be true here. It was sweet of the bus driver. (I don't think anyone here has claimed otherwise). It is also true that the situation that caused the driver to perform the sweet action is not good. 

As other have pointed out, the dress days can cause students to be othered. And that's not good. Is it sweet of someone to prevent that for a student? Absolutely! 

Now, I need to bow out of this thread because I know how the poster I just responded to is...

[pinball]

Just now, barnwife said:

Umm...what? No, absolutely not. Two things can be true here. It was sweet of the bus driver. (I don't think anyone here has claimed otherwise). It is also true that the situation that caused the driver to perform the sweet action is not good. 

As other have pointed out, the dress days can cause students to be othered. And that's not good. Is it sweet of someone to prevent that for a student? Absolutely! 

Now, I need to bow out of this thread because I know how the poster I just responded to is...

Bye!

[pinball]

https://medium.com/@mcpflug/using-the-word-but-a-brief-guide-to-sincerity-clarity-ab311a2af6a6
 

[pinball]

https://nlp-now.co.uk/be-careful-with-but/?doing_wp_cron=1708192784.1308939456939697265625

[pinball]

https://ala-apa.org/newsletter/2010/11/01/the-dreadful-but/

[Hilltopmom]

Ok, I’ll reword.

the story is sweet. And it’s too bad that the bus driver had to do it because schools insist on continuing these dress up days that make kids feel bad about themselves and make people barely earning enough money feel like they need to spend it to make kids not feel bad.

This happens every single day in every single school. Not necessarily dress up days- teachers, aides, bus drivers, recess monitors, etc spending their own money to provide students with: snow pants, coats, socks, boots, sneakers, back packs, snacks, hygiene products, food for dinner, etc. 

our aides, bus drivers, monitors, etc make minimum wage with no benefits or insurance and yet still but coats and other gear for students at least weekly

 

 

Edited February 17 by Hilltopmom

[Halftime Hope]

50 minutes ago, pinball said:

Anything before the “but” is negated by everything after the “but”

We are capable of having two thoughts at the same time. These two thoughts are the opposite ends of a Venn diagram, and the need for pajamas is the center overlap.

[Terabith]

Do you really not see a difference between a statement to a person about them (“I like your hairstyle, but you are really gaining weight,” for example) and using the conjunction but in an abstract discussion of a current event, @pinball?  

[KungFuPanda]

Eliminating events won’t help. There are zero events that don’t bother someone. Dress up days aren’t the problem. Homework isn’t the problem when some kids don’t have responsible adults to help. Mothers’ Day isn’t the problem when people have experienced profound loss. People having fun isn’t the problem. Hiding the symptoms of pain or poverty or abuse isn’t really a kindness. Dressing up for spirit days is never mandatory and for every poor kid who hates them there’s another who loves them and sees them as a creative outlet.  Even school uniforms don’t trick disadvantaged kids into thinking they’re privileged. 

[Elizabeth86]

4 hours ago, Hilltopmom said:

This is sweet.
And  now how about public schools stop othering poor kids with a ton of stupid dress up days each year?! 

signed- public school teacher who doesn’t participate in dress up days and every single time reminds my students that it’s ok if they choose not to (or can’t, etc)

This. I feel for kids whose parents can’t/ don’t help their kids participate. I also just loathe doing personally.

[Terabith]

We are in no way poverty stricken. We are wealthy for the school district. But when every day of December has a different theme (pajamas, Grinch Day, reindeer days, jingle bells, tacky sweaters, etc), and any random month has at least four dress up days ( wear neon to scare away bullies, red for heart health, 100 days of school so dress like you’re 100, etc), it is both incredibly stressful for executive functioning and even being clever, is very expensive and becomes a hardship.  Add in incentives (the class with the most participants gets a pizza party or something), so there’s major peer and adult pressure to participate, and it’s ridiculous.  It’s not really very fun for many people.  Nobody is going to be fooled about who is privileged and who isn’t but at least when you’re just wearing your regular clothes you aren’t subjected to adult sanctioned bullying for forgetting crazy hair day or dress like a twin (social nightmare when you don’t have a friend who wants to be your twin).  

[Catwoman]

I don't know what's going on with this forum lately.

I thought I was going to read a thread about how sweet the bus driver was, but it had to turn into complaints about special dress days at school. Lately, it seems like things on this forum turn negative so quickly, even in a thread like this, which was apparently started as something kind of warm and fuzzy. 😞 

I don't know about anyone else, but I could really use more sweet and positive threads right now. 

(Uh oh. I said, "but." TWICE. Now I've done it. I'm probably banned for life from this thread now! 😉)

[Heartstrings]

43 minutes ago, Terabith said:

We are in no way poverty stricken. We are wealthy for the school district. But when every day of December has a different theme (pajamas, Grinch Day, reindeer days, jingle bells, tacky sweaters, etc), and any random month has at least four dress up days ( wear neon to scare away bullies, red for heart health, 100 days of school so dress like you’re 100, etc), it is both incredibly stressful for executive functioning and even being clever, is very expensive and becomes a hardship.  Add in incentives (the class with the most participants gets a pizza party or something), so there’s major peer and adult pressure to participate, and it’s ridiculous.  It’s not really very fun for many people.  Nobody is going to be fooled about who is privileged and who isn’t but at least when you’re just wearing your regular clothes you aren’t subjected to adult sanctioned bullying for forgetting crazy hair day or dress like a twin (social nightmare when you don’t have a friend who wants to be your twin).  

I’m not really sure what the point is anymore.  Are teachers bored? Is it admin, are they bored?   Are the Pinterest moms pushing for it? Where is this coming push from?  Is there research showing it helps  engagement or test scores or mental health or something? My local school is like yours and it makes me tired just thinking about it. 

Edited February 17 by Heartstrings

[Terabith]

13 minutes ago, Heartstrings said:

I’m not really sure what the point is anymore.  Are teachers bored? Is it admin, are they bored?   Are the Pinterest moms pushing for it? Where is this coming push from?  Is there research showing it helps  engagement or test scores or mental health or something? My local school is like yours and it makes me tired just thinking about it. 

I think it’s driven by the Pinterest moms and the sense by someone that it’s fun. (The Pinterest moms are a very small but very vocal group.) I think the intent is to be fun and whimsical, but it’s really just exhausting and leads to SO MUCH DRAMA. 

[KungFuPanda]

1 hour ago, Terabith said:

We are in no way poverty stricken. We are wealthy for the school district. But when every day of December has a different theme (pajamas, Grinch Day, reindeer days, jingle bells, tacky sweaters, etc), and any random month has at least four dress up days ( wear neon to scare away bullies, red for heart health, 100 days of school so dress like you’re 100, etc), it is both incredibly stressful for executive functioning and even being clever, is very expensive and becomes a hardship.  Add in incentives (the class with the most participants gets a pizza party or something), so there’s major peer and adult pressure to participate, and it’s ridiculous.  It’s not really very fun for many people.  Nobody is going to be fooled about who is privileged and who isn’t but at least when you’re just wearing your regular clothes you aren’t subjected to adult sanctioned bullying for forgetting crazy hair day or dress like a twin (social nightmare when you don’t have a friend who wants to be your twin).  

Ok. I’ll admit that I never imagined a single classroom would attempt to do ALL the things. I thought we were talking about 2 or 3 optional themed days a year. 

[Heartstrings]

3 minutes ago, KungFuPanda said:

Ok. I’ll admit that I never imagined a single classroom would attempt to do ALL the things. I thought we were talking about 2 or 3 optional themed days a year. 

Our local school does so much, but it changes by grade, so you can’t really plan or reuse.  Kindy doesn’t do 100 days of school, they do Dr. Suess Day.   Then first grade does Bring 100 things and 2nd grade dresses old.  But next year they might all rotate or add in something new so you can’t anticipate from year to year or reuse with siblings. You also have to do multiple things on the same day depending on grade, or msybe 4th grade’s day is Thursday, but 2nd’s day is Monday.   It’s a LOT for parents to deal with every week.  

[Rosie_0801]

1 hour ago, Catwoman said:

I don't know what's going on with this forum lately.

It's February.

[quote] (Uh oh. I said, "but." TWICE. Now I've done it. I'm probably banned for life from this thread now! 😉) [/quote]

Not by me.

[Catwoman]

4 minutes ago, Rosie_0801 said:

It's February.

[quote] (Uh oh. I said, "but." TWICE. Now I've done it. I'm probably banned for life from this thread now! 😉) [/quote]

Not by me.

Hopefully March will be better! 😀

[*****]

I have had several thoughts on this topic over the years as it really isn't on my list of 'let's do this'!  

First of all, the bus driver was a life saver to that kid that day, and if he gets paid anything near what our drivers get, it's about minimum wage.   It is so true, so many can't afford PJ's or even sheets on their beds for that matter.  I had a similar experience when I asked one of my students in a friendly way why she didn't dress up for PJ day (I hadn't either).    Anyway, when I asked, this little girl sweetly said, "I don't have any payamas."  (She couldn't pronounce it correctly.)   And it hit me, she was right, I knew so many in that school who couldn't afford many of the basics, even 'payamas'.    I have detested dress up days since then.  Because it is true, so many staff and community members are already contributing to boots, shoes, snow pants, coats, hats, school supplies and food...already.  Really, dress-up days can be hard for some because it's one more thing that they don't readily have.  

Second, I remember detesting a 2nd type of spirit week at the high school in February.  January is usually the first full month when you begin to see progress in students and boom, you lose the momentum because some mom thought it would be 'a great idea'.  At this time of the year when you finally feel you are seeing progress, then there are more holidays off and you also have to begin to prep them for year-end testing. Another interruption like this is just so frustrating and needless. 

 

3 hours ago, Terabith said:

I think the intent is to be fun and whimsical, but it’s really just exhausting

I would like to be one of those fun, whimsical people too, but the preparation is just exhausting to me, thus another reason I would rather skip it. I can see why some parents would feel this way also.  

 

[pinball]

https://www.fastcompany.com/40546185/this-common-word-makes-you-sound-more-negative-than-you-want-to#:~:text=In many cases%2C “but”,and confusion for your listeners.

[pinball]

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/living-well-when-your-body-doesnt-cooperate/202306/why-you-should-say-and-not-but#:~:text=“But” can discount%2C exclude,and dichotomy in your experience.

[Kanin]

17 hours ago, Terabith said:

We are in no way poverty stricken. We are wealthy for the school district. But when every day of December has a different theme (pajamas, Grinch Day, reindeer days, jingle bells, tacky sweaters, etc), and any random month has at least four dress up days ( wear neon to scare away bullies, red for heart health, 100 days of school so dress like you’re 100, etc), it is both incredibly stressful for executive functioning and even being clever, is very expensive and becomes a hardship.  Add in incentives (the class with the most participants gets a pizza party or something), so there’s major peer and adult pressure to participate, and it’s ridiculous.  It’s not really very fun for many people.  Nobody is going to be fooled about who is privileged and who isn’t but at least when you’re just wearing your regular clothes you aren’t subjected to adult sanctioned bullying for forgetting crazy hair day or dress like a twin (social nightmare when you don’t have a friend who wants to be your twin).  

Wow! That's an excessive number of dress-up days.

Thankfully my school doesn't do this, but don't forget the many schools were kids can buy carnations for Valentine's day, or candy-grams, or whatever that also make other kids feel left out when they don't get one.  

[Kanin]

I have a lot of thoughts about this matter, and I'm not sure if any of them are a "but." I think they're "ands" because I'm thinking all of them at the same time.

- It's really sweet of the bus driver to help that kid. 

AND - It's unfortunate that dress-up days make some kids feel left out and sad. 

AND - Dress-up days are a lot of fun for some people

AND - Dress-up days are no fun for a some people

AND - I personally enjoyed some dress-up days at our spirit week last week (Western day was surprisingly fun, also 60s day because I could wear my Beatles t-shirt, and sports day because it's the one day a year I can wear a hat), but some were not fun and I felt left out, even as an adult (example, twin day).

AND - I'm not sure if I'd eliminate spirit week because it does bring joy to many students. As someone else posted, every "special" day has the potential to make someone feel left out. I'd just keep the amount of days reasonable, unlike Terabith's district!