StgCoach – Page 56 – Oh, Contrarian!

Leadership Matters

Election Day for Ohio Issue 2, the taxpayer veto of Senate Bill 5, will finally arrive on Tuesday. Once the results are in, many smart analysts for media, political parties, unions, and think tanks will be studying the entrails to determine what we’ve learned from Senate Bill 5.

But we don’t need to wait that long to note three critical lessons that public educators should take away from these past nine months. And maybe we shouldn’t: by identifying them now, they won’t be contaminated by our reactions to Election Night.

So regardless of the outcome on November 8, I would suggest that our future survival as a profession–not just here but across the country–may depend on the intelligence with which we understand these lessons and the speed with which we apply them.

I call these the “three things that matter”:

leadership matters;
elections matter;
ideas matter.

I. Leadership matters.

This campaign reminds us once again of the overwhelming importance of leadership. We’ve seen over and over again that strong local leadership can make the difference between a proactive and a reactive membership. We have seen this consistently over relatively peaceful years–in negotiations, in professional development, in legislative awareness, and in member protection. If we find it to be true in calmer times, we shouldn’t be surprised that we find it during a crisis.

Among our locals, the ones that most readily influenced this campaign were the ones that were already positioned to do so. During years of relative peace, they had organized themselves so that when war came, they were ready to fight.

Let me be clear: I don’t mean to imply that many previously sleepy locals didn’t eventually do heroic things. What I do mean to say is that locals that got a crash course in local leadership would be unwise to forget those lessons now. We will need that leadership in the years ahead, no matter what happens on Election Day.

When I talk about leadership here, I am not speaking only of the actions of elected or appointed local leaders. Voicing an opinion or asking a question at a membership meeting is leadership. So is volunteering for a task that needs to be done. So is refusing to go along with an injustice. Crises have a way of bringing rank-and-file members into both formal and informal leadership roles. We must not waste this crisis. We must find ways for members who have just now become motivated and involved to stay that way. And that is the role of elected and appointed local leaders, and it will be their unique challenge in the months and years ahead.

This crisis brought the importance of leadership into sharp focus. It might never have happened in so spectacular a fashion if we hadn’t lost an election in 2010. Which brings us to my next point: elections matter. I’ll have more on that tomorrow.

Next: Elections matter.

Thomas I. Lavezzi, 1946-2011

My brother Tom died today. He had been suffering from the effects of COPD for some time, and while a move from Colorado to the lower altitude of Las Vegas last fall made him more comfortable for a while, it couldn’t prevent the disease from progressing. Surgery performed last week to reduce pressure on his lungs gave some hope of prolonging his life, but the disease, a staph infection, and pneumonia had compromised his fragile lungs too much. In recent days, many members of the family had gathered in Las Vegas to say their goodbyes, and many of us were present at the hospital as he passed away peacefully.

Tom and I were born a little over three years apart, and I followed him through our elementary and high schools. The death of our father when Tom was nine and I was five left our mother as the family breadwinner. At a time when women’s roles were exemplified by the fictional June Cleaver, our mother raised four children even as she took over and continued ownership of the furniture manufacturing business that our father had owned and operated.

That meant making some hard decisions about her children, especially her two young sons. Tom had been active in the Paulist Choristers of Chicago, and he continued singing with the group for several years after our father’s death. He spent summers at choir camp and a relative’s farm in Michigan, while I spent summers in several camps, especially Camp St. Francis in Libertyville, Illinois.

The result was that we didn’t spend a great deal of time together during the summers as we were growing up. In school, each of us had our own agemates to relate to; I don’t recall having much interest in hanging out with his friends, even if they would have tolerated a kid brother hanging around. Ironically, it was years later that we became close, after I had moved to Cleveland and he had moved to Colorado. Later still, after I started a second career that has me in the car a lot, we were able to enjoy many long conversations while I would be driving home from meetings (always using a hands-free device, of course).

My, how I admired him! As an older brother, he was indisputably cool, good-looking, and popular. He was courageous and could be outrageous. He was one of the funniest people I knew. Throughout his life, he was a risk-taker. Gambling was more than a hobby: it was also a part of his style, characterizing his business dealings and many of his decisions in life. He rolled the dice when he left the city of his ancestors and his birth and struck out for the West; he rolled them when he started the company that remains his business legacy today; and he rolled the dice last year, when he and his wife Linda left their beloved mountain in an effort to reduce the strain on his lungs. His surgery was a gamble too, one whose terms he understood and accepted. He knew better than most that life deals some hands that are better than others and that you have to play the hand you’re dealt.

It was a blessing that so many of his children, grandchildren, nephews, and nieces joined Linda, his sisters, and me at his bedside for his final hours. It seems that everyone had a memory to share, and it was impressive to see how many younger persons who weren’t his biological children saw him as a father figure, a source of wisdom, and a role model.

His death at too early an age (as judged by human wisdom at least) reminds us that life is a gift not to be taken for granted. Tom was not a conventionally religious man, but I think he knew that the people we love are the sign of God in our lives, and we need to hold them close while we can.

In paradisum deducant te Angeli, Tom. May the angels lead you into paradise.

2011 NEA delegate Mass

I’ll take a few moments here to write a brief account of the NEA Delegate Mass that we held in Chicago on July 3. A fair number of my music colleagues have expressed some curiosity about this annual liturgy. A few years ago I blogged about the 2008 NEA Delegate Mass in Washington, DC, and an article based on that blog appeared in The Liturgical Singer, an NPM publication for cantors.

NEA’s Annual Meeting is an eight-day gathering of leaders from the largest professional association in the United States, and it incorporates a four-day meeting of NEA’s governing body, the Representative Assembly. The RA is the largest deliberative body in the world, with between 8,000 and 10,000 elected delegates.

The four RA days are grueling: state caucuses begin at 7:00 AM, and the RA meets from 10 AM to about 6 PM each day. The RA meets right through Independence Day (and holds its own celebration during the assembly) and whatever Sunday falls within the four days scheduled for its meeting.

Obviously, this schedule creates problems for those who wish to hold Sunday worship. For decades, some delegates have gathered for Mass and an interdenominational prayer service. Since 1996, I’ve been the music minister for the delegate Mass.

Thanks to the connections of a long-time delegate who is a lay Dominican, our celebrants have included a number of Dominican priests. They have included film director Dominic DeLay, composer James Marchionda, now-archbishop DeNoia, and Emiliano Zapata, a former president of an NEA local in Texas. This year’s celebrant was Father Richard LaPata, a former principal of Fenwick HS in Oak Park, Illinois.

The delegate Mass has a number of unique challenges.

We never know just when the Mass will start. NEA provides us a room in the convention center, but only after the RA has adjourned for the day. Delegates have to hoof it there quickly, and this year we started the entrance hymn while they were still arriving. At this Mass, the “processional” is frequently for the congregation, not the priest.
The time available for Mass is limited by the transportation schedule. NEA uses a system of chartered buses to transport delegates back and forth between the convention center and their hotels. Those shuttles run only for a limited time, and cabs are expensive, so the Mass needs to be “expeditious” while also being reverent.
The room is frequently arranged however it was left by the last session. We can usually set an altar up on a speaker’s platform, but typically delegates sit at tables for the Mass. This year we had a unique configuration: round tables–no aisles!
We were fortunate this year that NEA had left directions for the microphone and speakers to be left on..

Other than that, what is the Mass like? Most members of this annual congregation say that it is very moving. We do our best to make it like other Masses.

We have a cadre of Eucharistic ministers from all over the country. Usually the first six who arrive are the ones who distribute Communion.
Similarly, the first several lectors who arrive are put to work with copies of the readings for the day. This year’s Mass was the 14th Sunday of Ordinary Time, and that’s about where the NEA delegate Mass typically falls in the liturgical calendar.
We never have any problem finding a hospitality and ushering ministry: these people are educators, and they’re used to taking over their space, whether it’s a classroom, bus, library, or in this case, makeshift chapel. Collections are put into whatever convention bags we can commandeer.
I’ve scheduled pretty similar music for the past few years: entrance hymn “Here I Am, Lord,” “I Am the Bread of Life” and/or “Pan de Vida” for Communion, and “America, the Beautiful” for the recessional.
When the convention is driveable, as it was this year, I bring my electronic keyboard and associated gear; when I have to fly to the convention city, I lead with just my voice.
We have a worship aid.
We have an emailing list to provide announcements and updates.

We typically have a congregation of a few hundred for this Mass, and delegates report that they look forward to it each year. We’ll be in DC again next year, and my guess is that we’ll be celebrating again in a room at the Washington Convention Center on Sunday, July 1.