My graduating seniors can get in front of 200 people and feel confident. They can take a group of 50 of their fellow cadets, plan a project, supervise it and follow through with the paperwork until the end.”

That’s how retired Navy commander Randy Laws describes the Junior ROTC cadets under his charge at Robert Service High School in Alaska. Laws and instructor James O’Neal, a retired Marine—and fellow member of the AFT-affiliated Anchorage Council of Educators—have led their Navy JROTC cadets to honors. The cadets recently finished second in an international competition.

The cadets put in long days and weeks of training that paid off. They attended a series of drill meets throughout the year, competing in a wide variety of military events, including air rifle, competitive color and an academic team covering military history and oceanography. After placing first in their region, the Service High School team was rated above more than 600 other JROTC programs worldwide.

The program itself emphasizes citizenship and service. Students attend academic classes three days per week, perform uniform and drill inspections another day, and exercise the final day of the week.

Though the program does not emphasize recruitment to the military, cadets who choose that path receive good benefits. Any cadet who completes the four-year program automatically receives a two-level boost on the Navy payroll and a one-level boost on the Marine payroll.

But O’Neal believes the benefits extend beyond military pay, particularly since a majority of the participants don’t enlist. “I think the program helps them find their potential for self discipline,” he says. “Most kids have that potential, but they don’t know.”

Laws emphasizes the opportunities presented to JROTC cadets at Service, the largest high school in Alaska. “It is very difficult to get on the football team or basketball team,” he says, “yet a cadet can go out for our exhibition armed drill team, for example, and earn the same athletic letter as a varsity football player.”

Variety keeps Florida bus driver moving
Reading and riding keep her students happy

Boring isn’t a word that usually comes to mind when you think of a school bus driver’s job. Stressful, noisy—even terrifying—might be more common adjectives. But for Florida driver Ellie Frechette, following the same route and routines and having a vehicle full of the same well-behaved students just isn’t very exciting.

So Frechette, a member of the United School Employees of Pasco (USEP), is always looking for new challenges. On the job, that has involved shifting to a position as a “relief driver,” meaning she never knows what route or what students she’ll be driving from one day to the next. But more broadly, it has meant a constant search for what’s best for the students, other bus drivers and her union colleagues.

A few years ago, for instance, some of Frechette’s fifth-grade riders told her they were worried about moving up to middle school. To ease that transition, Frechette started a pen pal club between the fifth-graders and some current middle school students. As they boarded the bus, it would be time for mail call to exchange letters. “It worked quite well,” she says. “The kids said they weren’t nervous about becoming sixth-graders anymore.”

Frechette also started a reading club on the bus, another successful way to control noise as well as stimulate young minds. Students would see a variety of books lining the dashboard as they got on; they could select one or read their own. Just as important, they would also see their driver reading as they boarded because Frechette wanted to be a good role model for the youngsters.

Frechette also looks out for an often overlooked group: transportation assistants. Last year, she hosted an appreciation brunch for the assistants. “When you think of transportation, everything is usually about the driver,” she comments. “You don’t think about the assistants, but they need to know they’re important.”

That effort is just another piece of what drives Frechette: “I am happiest when I’m helping people, whether it is the students on the bus or my colleagues.”