Hi Harry

My mentor in education, Harry Gardner, passed away last week.

The Boss

My boss, my mentor, my friend, Harry Gardner passed away last week.  There are a lot of stories to tell about Mr. Gardner, even some that I can write about here.  One of those is that Harry was an inveterate obituary reader.  He kept up in the Columbus Dispatch, and was always aware of who passed away and when.  Harry knew the obits, so much so that our inside joke was that, should one of us pass, our obituary would look like this: 

“____________ (fill in) passed away.  One of his last requests was to say, ‘Hi Harry’ in the obituary”.  

So, I’m certain that he will read everything said and written about him after his own death.

Watkins Middle

Harry was the first and only principal at Watkins Middle School from its founding in 1974 until he retired in 1995.  I first knew him when I started at the High School in 1978.  Harry was a  fierce advocate for his coaches and teams.  As a young, (very young) coach, I found that out the hard way when I decided to criticize his track coach, and demanded that the over one hundred eighth graders (only) do more to share the track with the high school teams.  After that dust-up, I figured Harry and I weren’t going to get along.

But just a couple of years later, I found I was working at the Middle School.  I stayed there, with Harry, from 1982 until he retired.  It was the best teaching staff I ever worked with.  In teachers meetings we talked about kids.  It wasn’t the teacher’s lounge gossip about this “bad” kid or that one; it was about how we could get kids to do better, in school, in sports, and in life.  And that was our focus at Watkins Middle in the 1980’s:  how could we create a better environment for kids to thrive.

Public School in the 80’s

Harry led the way, and he did it by creating that same kind of environment for teachers to thrive.  Yes, it was public school teaching in the 1980’s.  My class sizes sometimes approached forty, and we taught seven classes a day.  “Class size limits” seemed like a pipe-dream, and woe to the social studies teacher who assigned essays (it takes a while to grade over 200 of them) rather than “Scantron” tests.

There was lots of stuff to complain about.  But Harry did everything he could to empower teachers, and to make them feel that their job was the most important work they could do.  When we were faced with the first round of “State Tests”, Harry let us develop our own plan to prepare our kids.  We already taught the subjects, but now it all had to be done by March.  We wanted to help the kids be successful on the test, but not at the expense of what they learned.  Harry not only had our “backs”, but found ways to help us achieve.  Our kids did really well on the tests, and still got all of the traditional learning expected from our classes.  We did it – and Harry got us there.

His Team

The closest teaching staff I ever worked on was at Watkins Middle, and it was all because of Harry.  He wanted us to be part of the kids’ lives; to show up at the games, matches and events.  Most of us went, to the roller skating rink in Whitehall, and the track meet (later named the Gardner Relays) and the middle school football games.  And after, we stayed together to eat and drink, and hear stories of the “old days” from Harry and the “original Watkins” guys on staff.  Many of those gatherings were at Olde Summit Towne, where Harry seemed to know everyone.  

Harry built an impressive teaching staff, and he did it by making all of us a part of his team.   Sure, he had a bunch of twenty and thirty-something teachers, but he made us willing to sacrifice our time and pour out our efforts into Watkins Middle School.  He taught me a lot about how to treat those you work with, and how to win their loyalty not from fear, but from belonging.

See Me

Not that there wasn’t some fear associated with Mr. Gardner.  It was all “fun and games” until you got the dreaded “See Me” note (as opposed to the less feared, “Please See Me”). “See Me” meant that you screwed up, and you’d better be ready to fix it.  Or, you got a phone call from Gail, Ann or Liz (the secretaries) who would say something like:  “Mr. Gardner said that if you have chicken pox and can’t teach, you can’t go to high school track practice either, even if you try to hide up in the stands”.  Harry knew everything that was going on.

And Harry showed me that kids needed not just “black and white” consequences, but some gray as well.  In my first years the Watkins Middle School, we still paddled kids.  One of the standard consequences for failing to serve after-school detentions was to get a “whack”.  I didn’t paddle many, but there were a couple of eighth grade boys who cemented my reputation as a “hard hitter”.  The best was supposedly the “toughest kid in school”, who ran away rather than get paddled by me. My goal was to not have to paddle kids at all:  that kid’s reaction helped.

But then there was that little blonde girl who didn’t serve a detention.  After multiple chances, I sent her down to the office to “borrow” Mr. Gardner’s paddle.  She didn’t come back, but there was a note from HG that said I really didn’t want to go through with this.  He was right, I didn’t.  She served some alternate punishment.  It was the right “gray” decision to make, even if it wasn’t “fair” to the boys.

Watkins Products

Harry cared.  He cared about Watkins.  He cared about his staff. But most of all, he cared about the kids who walked the halls, from the tough one to the meekest, from the “cool kids” to the ones that might be “ciphers in the snow”.  And, Harry always had a soft spot for the “track kids”, something  that I could definitely relate to.

When I somehow ended up as Dean of Students at the High School, I looked back a lot to what Mr. Gardner did.  He was my template for how I should deal with kids.  That wasn’t always popular with the staff, but I hoped it was usually right for the kids.  I tried to live up to Harry’s example, to be, like the sign he gave Dean Bulmer, a “Dealer in Watkins Products”.   I hoped to emulate him, Mr. Gardner of Watkins Middle School.  That was the highest standard.

I retired from teaching (at the high school) is 2014,  but I’m still involved in track. Unfortunately I  am unable to be at the memorial with our old Watkins Middle School team, because I’m at the State Track Meet.  I know Harry understands.  

So, “Hi Harry”.  Thank you for everything you taught us, all that you shared with us, and all of the “Watkins Products” that you influenced in your career.  

You made a difference then, and your legacy continues to make a difference today.