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Hot, Flat and Crowded Leadership Team Wows the Principals

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Forty-five Fremont Unified School District principals and administrators sat transfixed as 12-year-old Bea Florentino, a student at Azevada Elementary School in Fremont, feelingly said the words from a speech of another 12-year-old, Severn Suzuki, taken from the book Hot, Flat and Crowded.

Bea’s recitation, begging adults to remedy the harm that was done to the environment for future generations, kicked off a 45-minute presentation from the members of the AAUW Fremont Branch’s Hot, Flat and Crowded Leadership Team to underscore the importance of incorporating the book’s messages and ideas into the FUSD’s curriculum.

Severn Suzuki, from Vancouver, Canada, spoke in 1992 at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  “My dad always says, ‘You are what you do, not what you say.’  Well, what you do makes me cry at night.  You grown-ups say you love us, but I challenge you.   Please make your actions reflect your words.”  This is how Severn ended her plea to adults in that speech given over 20 years ago.  The point that seemed evident is not much has changed since then.

The school district leaders appeared visibly moved by Bea’s rendering of this speech. (It’s on page 457 of Hot, Flat and Crowded).

Martha Crowe, who was chief organizer and conductor of this special event which took place Thursday, January 20th in the Fukaya Room at the Fremont Main Library, then introduced Bea and her father, an engineer in a local solar company and told the audience of principals what the speech was all about.

She then introduced Kathy Bray who recounted how the One Book, One Community project got started and enumerated the three books (Three Cups of Tea; Animal, Vegetable, Miracle; and Hot, Flat and Crowded) that were proclaimed by the Mayor as the selections for the whole community to read.

Florence Silver followed her to give the reasons why the AAUW Fremont Branch One Book, One Community Selection Committee chose Friedman’s book.

“With what is happening with the environment and the sinking of our spirits in America, said Florence, this book spoke to us.”  We felt it would also speak to our community.  Fremont is at the very forefront of the green movement and its citizens are dedicated to a greener world.  We thought this book contained an important message and would stimulate excellent dialog and ideas.”

Jo Szeto then explained the group exercise that was to follow.  She asked the principals to form groups of eight.  Each group was led by a member of the Hot, Flat and Crowded Leadership Team and was given one of seven questions or quotes from the book to mull on and discuss.  Then each team selected a spokesperson to report on the essence of their conversation.

In reporting, many talked about how their own schools were becoming greener and recited some of their creative environmental projects and programs.

What was particularly inspiring was that many of the principals said that the students themselves were the ones pushing for more environmental consciousness and action and that many of the projects came from the children themselves.

Next Margery Leonard reminded the principals that Hot, Flat and Crowded worked particularly well with the FUSD service learning theme of “Health and Wellness.”

“After all,” said Margery, “what could be more important than the health and wellness of the city, the nation and the planet?”

Margery passed along some suggestions for incorporating the themes of the book into the district’s study program.   Here are some of them:

• Read the book, share it with your staffs and brainstorm ways to bring it into the classroom.

• Continue with “Earth Day” related lessons.  Principals received a list of reading that children and adults could explore.  Margery came up with a list of important questions you could ask students from the book.  One of them centered on the quote:  “It’s more important to change your leaders than your light bulbs.”  Margery suggested the students discuss that idea.

• Organize a school-wide debate, forum or forensic competition based on one of Friedman’s themes, such as: “Resolved:  You Cannot Be the Leader of the World Without Being the World’s Leader in Inspiring Clean Power Solutions.”

• Educate your school community by including information about Hot, Flat and Crowded in your school newsletters.  Showcase the book in the main office.   Encourage the school community to come to city-wide discussions of the book.

“When the book is widely discussed in the schools and throughout Fremont,” said Margery, “we will be the community of leaders, thinkers and discussers that both Friedman and AAUW envisioned.”

Martha ended the presentation by showing a potpourri of clippings from various newspapers and publications that contained stories on the move to green technology and programs countering global warming – or global “weirding” as Friedman calls it.

“I have been struck,” she said, “by how many of these stories there are today when several years ago we heard so little about the greening of America.”

She also announced, to some applause, that each principal would receive a book free of charge thanks to a donation from Thomas Friedman’s PR firm.

The presentation stimulated a lot of excitement on the part of the principals.  One had gone to our web site and was really impressed with information there.  Another asked that the Leadership Team do the same type of session for their school’s PTA group, and Dr. Deborah Sims, the District’s Assistant Superintendent of Instructional Services, who led the principal’s meeting, asked for more information to add to her own newsletter that goes out to all parents.   Dr. James Morris, Superintendent of the Fremont Unified School District, also present at the meeting, encouraged future collaboration and was very supportive.

“If every AAUW Fremont Branch member were there that Thursday morning,” said Genevieve Angelides, who was instrumental in planning the meeting, “they would have been so proud of their AAUW colleagues and how favorably they reflected on our organization.”

Enjoy some pictures taken at the Principal’s Meeting

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