Silke Jasso
After taking his kids on a vacation to Boston, a Pennsylvania man got a letter from the principal of the Abington district school his kids are enrolled in, which informed him that he’d made a mistake.
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Rochelle Marbury wrote in the letter to Mike Rossi that the absences would not be excused.
Rossi posted the note on Facebook with his response.
This dad made sure to remind Marbury that some the best educational experiences happen outside of the classroom:
Dear Madam Principal,
While I appreciate your concern for our children’s education, I can promise you they learned as much in the five days we were in Boston as they would in an entire year in school.
Our children had a once-in-a-lifetime experience, one that can’t be duplicated in a classroom or read in a book.
In the 3 days of school they missed (which consisted of standardized testing that they could take any time) they learned about dedication, commitment, love, perseverance, overcoming adversity, civic pride, patriotism, American history culinary arts and physical education.
They watched their father overcome, injury, bad weather, the death of a loved one and many other obstacles to achieve an important personal goal.
They also experienced first-hand the love and support of thousands of others cheering on people with a common goal.
At the marathon, they watched blind runners, runners with prosthetic limbs and debilitating diseases and people running to raise money for great causes run in the most prestigious and historic marathon in the world.
They also paid tribute to the victims of a senseless act of terrorism and learned that no matter what evil may occur, terrorists can not deter the American spirit.
These are things they won’t ever truly learn in the classroom.
In addition our children walked the Freedom Trail, visited the site of the Boston Tea Party, the Boston Massacre and the graves of several signers of the Declaration of Independence.
These are things they WILL learn in school a year or more from now. So in actuality our children are ahead of the game.
They also visited an aquarium, sampled great cuisine and spent many hours of physical activity walking and swimming.
We appreciate the efforts of the wonderful teachers and staff and cherish the education they are receiving at Rydal Elementary School. We truly love our school.
But I wouldn’t hesitate to pull them out of school again for an experience like the one they had this past week.
Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
Michael Rossi
Father
Rossi posted a follow-up remark for more clarification. It read:
Just to clarify a few things:
I am not angry,
I don’t have any beef with the school, teachers or principal.
We did not ask for our kids to be “excused”.
We will take them out of class whenever we see fit.
I did not make this viral.
I don’t like coconut.
Thank you.
People on Twitter overwhelmingly approved of Rossi’s response.
https://twitter.com/rport16/status/593456495259492353
https://twitter.com/US3South/status/593436905716391936
https://twitter.com/SJDolbs/status/593379109515960320
This dad, Mike Rossi had the most brilliant response to this letter from an elementary school principal…. http://t.co/oHk9uQB6YF
— Kelly Moss (@stagemomlessons) April 28, 2015
