Grinchy remark sends kids home in tears [i.e., there is no Santa Claus!]

LICKDALE — Jamey Schaeffer stretched her mouth open wide, showing off a pair of twin gaps in her smile. With a mouthful of fingers, she said she has no interest in two front teeth for Christmas.

But a substitute music teacher almost came between the 6-year-old and a Christmas Eve spent dancing cheek to cheek with sugar plums.

Theresa Farrisi stood in for Schaeffer’s regular music teacher one day last week. One of her assignments was to read Clement C. Moore’s famous poem, “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” to a first-grade class at Lickdale Elementary School.

“The poem has great literary value, but it goes against my conscience to teach something which I know to be false to children, who are impressionable,” said Farrisi, 43, of Myerstown. “It’s a story. I taught it as a story. There’s no real person called Santa Claus living at the North Pole.”

Farrisi doesn’t believe in Santa Claus, and she doesn’t think anyone else should, either. She made her feelings clear to the classroom full of 6- and 7-year-olds, some of whom went home crying.

Schaeffer got off the school bus later that day, dragging her backpack in the mud, tears in her angry little eyes.

“She yelled at me, ‘Why did you lie?’” recalled Jamey’s mother, Elizabeth. “‘Why didn’t you tell me Santa Claus died?’”

“I had to call the school,” said Schaeffer, a part-time custodial employee for the school district who is on temporary leave after complications from her last child’s birth. “I had to do something.”

Meanwhile, Farrisi, who is well versed on the history of “Santa Claus” — the traditional and literary figure — clarified her comments.

“I did not tell the students Santa Claus was dead,” she explained. “I said there was a man named Nickolas of Myrna who died in 343 A.D., upon whom the Santa Claus myth (is based).”

On Monday night, Jamey started to recite Moore’s famous poem while sitting on a couch next to a freshly cut tree, trimmed in tinsel and topped with a golden star: “’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house. No creatures stirred.”

She paused, looked up, and said that’s when the teacher interjected, just a few lines before the verse that announces the arrival of “a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.”

“The teacher stopped reading and told us no one comes down the chimney,” Jamey said, curling into a ball on the couch, bracing her chin on her knees, her voice shrinking away like melting ice cream. “She said our parents buy the presents, not Santa.”

Sharing in the belief of Santa Claus is a very special event in the Schaeffer home. Jamey’s the second youngest of five children. The three oldest have already grown up and left the family nest. Only Jamey and her 18-month-old sister, Amanda, remain.

Last year, Elizabeth Schaeffer recalled, Santa left a trail of boot prints in charred ashes from his feet-first landing in the fireplace. And this year, the family will continue their tradition of leaving him a plate of cookies, a tall glass of milk and a ripe, shaved carrot for Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer.

The Schaeffer family wasn’t the only one taken aback by Farrisi’s approach to Santa.

Tim and Beth Rittle said they found their 7-year-old daughter, Holly, in tears in the back seat of their car after they picked her up from school that day.

“All of a sudden, Holly just started crying,” Beth Rittle said. “She said she had a substitute in music class, and she told the class there’s no such thing as Santa Claus.”

Schaeffer and Rittle both called Northern Lebanon School District Superintendent Don L. Bell.

Since the issue involves personnel, Bell said Monday, there is little he can say about the incident, adding that it has not been determined if any disciplinary action is warranted against Farrisi.

Bell said he was aware that several parents have expressed concerns about the incident.

He also noted that the handling of Santa Claus isn’t covered in the school code.

“We do not have a Santa Claus policy,” he said. “It’s unfortunate, but I really can’t say anything about it.”

Farrisi said she considered approaching the school’s administration with her concerns about how to handle Santa Claus in class. Instead, she said, she decided to add a disclaimer to her lesson.

“Those same children are going to know someday that what their parents taught them is false,” she ex-plained. “There is no Santa Claus.”

Meanwhile, Elizabeth Schaeffer was carefully thinking about her next step. She decided to make a photocopy of editor Francis P. Church’s famous response to a little girl, who wrote to The New York Sun many decades ago, asking the same question Schaeffer’s daughter struggled with last week.

“I mailed (Farrisi) a copy of ‘Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,’” she said, giggling with satisfaction. “I wish I could be there when she opens it.”

As for Jamey, in an attempt to reaffirm her spot on Santa’s nice list, she drew up a new letter in bright red magic marker, a message destined for the Santa she refuses to abandon.

“Dear Santa ... How is the North Pole?” she said, reading her letter loudly and proudly. “How is Mrs. Claus? You are Great. From Jamey.”

For all the teacher bashing that goes on lately (much of it deserved and I have done my fair share of it towards those who abuse their authority), we must never forget that for every bad story out there there are countless untold stories of the marvelous impact that a teacher/mentor can have on a child.

I am acutely aware of that lately, as my Sophomore daughter shares the insights of her basketball coaches. Sometimes their team makes the "Bad News Bears" seem like olympians, and I know she is disappointed by that because she always puts 110% into her efforts. But even after the most crushing of defeats, she's at peace with it. And it's all due to the perspective she's been given by her coaches. They get things across to her that I know if they came from me would fall on deaf ears. And they're lessons she'll not only use on the court, but through her entire life.

So you might not ever know it, but you have the power to impact MANY children in a way that a parent never could, and I'm sure you do. I thank you for that, and extend that thanks to all who are in your position and use it wisely. (And when you someday know the joys of parenting, you'll no doubt see your position as teacher in a new way, because you'll see it happen to your child too.)

Wishing you the Blessings of a Merry Christmas and a wonderful 2006.

WOW!!! What nice comments. Someone is in the Christmas spirit:). I'll put in a good word for you with Santa. I REALLY appreciate it.

Yes, there are lots of good stories out there and that's why I try to share some of my own--not to toot my own horn, but to give a different perspective than the negative one we get from things like the MSM all the time. I'm not any better than the next person.

I've had my own bad experiences with fellow teachers. One time a group of them accused me of doing something really bad that I did not do. Luckily, the principal found out what was really going on. It took me a whole year to be able to forgive those teachers. But now I have learned that I need to do that more often.

There are bad teachers, but there are many good ones out there too, but it's too convenient and newsworthy to hear about the former rather than the latter. I appreciate the community newspaper here that is full of stories of students and teachers excelling.

I appreciate good teachers too. I had many of them. I had a teacher as a coach one time in baseball. He knew just who to pick at the tryouts. I did terrible, but he picked me. Our team went undefeated that whole year. Sometimes, half the team was on vacation or we had even just 8 players and we still won every time. We learned the value of winning and hard work, but also how to be gracious in doing so. It helped me later as I only played on one winning baseball team for the rest of my career. :)

I know I have some impact, but it still doesn't beat anything that a parent can give. I had my students write something about heroes. Out of 23 who did the assignment, 13 listed dads, 7 listed moms, and 3 listed cops as heroes. I thought that was pretty good. I sure love the dads who support their kids (some have to work extra hours too but are good dads as well).

We teachers, though, love seeing kids succeed, especially later in life. I had one who didn't catch onto reading until late in the year when she took off. Now she's just thriving in junior high and is a great athlete too. I am proud as punch of her.

I live in the neighborhood I teach in. I try to always tell someone, either parent or teacher when I have heard a good comment from someone about them. But I can't compete with wagging tongues. Yes, there is deserved gossip, I do know that, but there is also undeserved and untrue gossip. It's the latter I detest.

But I sure can't complain, that's for sure. A year ago a mom went around to parents of students I had had and had and a bunch of them wrote up stories on how I had supposedly impacted their child's lives. I still think they overdid it a bit:). But I was SO grateful. You can't imagine what it meant to me. It was worth a whole year's pay to me.

My approach to things is that I deal with and acknowledge the bad and that I also acknowledge and emphasize the good. Since I was very young, I have learned from both good and bad things that have happened. I haven't had it easy and would be a zillionaire if I had a penny for all the times things have gone wrong for me, but I keep going and learning and hopefully I'm a better person because of it.

Wishing you the Blessings of a Merry Christmas and a wonderful 2006.

Have a wonderful Christmas. I will. Letters like yours are really encouraging and are what keep us teachers going. My next years' "political" agenda will be to see what good I can do for the community and to thank all of the neat people I know we have here.

Kudos to you and yours. Keep on being a GREAT parent. I know you are.

I learned something one time. I rode the bus and walked everywhere for about 10 years. I had this wonderful bus driver who was just always cheerful no matter what. She mentioned that some students from a particular high school were always well-mannered. I urged her to tell that to the principal. She took me up on my offer. The principal was flabbergasted. It was the first time someone had come in to say something positive. He made a big deal about it and they even put it in the school newspaper.

Another time I was at the library and saw the father of these boys who went to our school. Their mother is a teacher's aide and does a lot for the school. I went over and said hi to them. I mentioned to the father that I appreciated the boys for being the good students they were and the mom for all that she did for the school. I said a couple more good things. I later found out that the mother and father were divorced. The mom said she really appreciated me saying the good things, because all they ever heard were really bad stuff about their mom from their dad. I was so dang glad that I hadn't said anything bad. It taught me that I have to be careful what I say to others because you never know if it will come back to bite you.

As anyone who has received one of my posts knows, I am full of hot air and dum-dumness. But I REALLY appreciate your note again and hope that again, you have a great CHRISTMAS and that you receive many blessings in the new year. You deserve them for being a great parent.

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