{"id":5798,"date":"2017-12-14T12:00:59","date_gmt":"2017-12-14T12:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ayf.com\/?p=5798"},"modified":"2017-12-14T12:00:59","modified_gmt":"2017-12-14T12:00:59","slug":"in-the-depths-of-winter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ayf.com\/in-the-depths-of-winter\/","title":{"rendered":"In the Depths of Winter&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>&#8220;In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>-Albert Camus<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-5809 alignleft lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/ayf.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/15936603_1343696579006175_4923742333232330821_o-640x427.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"232\" height=\"155\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 232px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 232\/155;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><em>Margaret &#8220;Gigs&#8221; Hoerner is long-time Miniwanca Girl. A camper for eight years, Gigs went on to become an LIT and cabin leader at Miniwanca, and\u00a0a Four Trails leader at both Merrowvista and Miniwanca. Gigs spent three years working through Teach For America in Lawrence, Massachusetts\u00a0and is now a teacher at Match Community Day School in Boston.\u00a0 We reached out to Gigs earlier this fall and asked her to write about how her time at Miniwanca has allowed her to find the &#8220;invincible summer&#8221; inside of her.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Although seemingly opposite at a first glance, my 15 sandy, invincible summers with the AYF fuel my work as an elementary school teacher in an urban school during the icy, winter months of Boston. Throughout the year, I am faced with the pressures and high-stakes testing that all educators encounter in our nation. Additionally, I grapple with the challenges that come with working alongside resilient children who have endured poverty and trauma at such a young age. It is my inner cabin leader and trip leader that enable me to effectively lead my classroom, support children in discovering their personal best, and find immense joy amidst the intersection of the educational inequity, social injustice, and systematic racism. Against this backdrop, my students and I frequently break out in camp songs, our classroom rules are rooted in \u201cbest self\u201d, we hold class assemblies with cheers, begin our school day with \u201cMorning Stretch\u201d and close our day with \u201cAction Awards\u201d.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-5804 alignright lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/ayf.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/IMG_8785-XL-640x427.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"213\" height=\"142\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 213px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 213\/142;\" \/><\/p>\n<p>When the reality of the opportunity gap hits me as I examine test scores that are significantly lower than our more affluent neighboring district, my soul shaped by the AYF forces me to feel urgent, rather than defeated. I never anticipated that the 14 broken spokes of my Odyssey in 2009 or the 7 straight days of rain in the Georgian Bay as a leader nearly 10 years later would spark this urgency to stand, smile, and live even taller when handed difficult results.<\/p>\n<p>When I entered urban education as a 21-year-old with a crisp bike-short tan after leading an Odyssey, my colleagues warned me \u201cto never smile before Christmas.\u201d Not surprisingly, the AYF had taught me the opposite for over a decade so I sided with the latter. As a result, I admittedly struggled with classroom management at first, yet I firmly believe it is through \u201clasering with love\u201d (as Liz Marshall would say) and the same smile that radiates when I scream<\/p>\n<p>Founder Hearts at the top of my lungs, that have ultimately allowed me to build strong relationships with my students and their families. This same smile reached a former student who mastered long division after years of falling below grade level in math.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-5836 alignleft lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/ayf.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/20993833_1735009286511236_3813865244948793237_n-480x640.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"216\" height=\"288\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 216px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 216\/288;\" \/>Now that students think of me as the teacher who does \u201ccrazy\u201d things over the summer, teaches main idea using her bike tire, and has grown accustomed to comments from 5th graders on my Chaco-tan paired with a pencil skirt in August, I know there is no turning back. I have accepted a dare and hope to lead a school modeled after the AYF someday. Ever since I was a 5th grade Darer and now as a 5th grade teacher, I\u2019ve come to the conclusion that Miniwanca and Merrowvista are not confined to geographic locations. Instead, they exist to be carried with us and planted in unexpected places like the concrete in one of the poorest sections of Boston, in my case. For me, invincible camp summers fill my \u201cteacher tank\u201d so that I can help fuel the engines inside 25 huge hearts and curious minds.<\/p>\n<p>-Margaret &#8220;Gigs&#8221; Hoerner<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.&#8221; -Albert Camus Margaret &#8220;Gigs&#8221; Hoerner is long-time Miniwanca Girl. A camper for eight years, Gigs went on to become an LIT and cabin leader at Miniwanca, and\u00a0a Four Trails leader at both Merrowvista and Miniwanca. Gigs spent three years working through Teach For America &#8230; <\/p>\n<div><a href=\"https:\/\/ayf.com\/in-the-depths-of-winter\/\" class=\"more-link\">Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":5808,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[65,62,58],"tags":[70,59],"class_list":["post-5798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-updates","category-merrowvista","category-miniwanca","tag-merrowvista","tag-miniwanca"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>In the Depths of Winter... - American Youth Foundation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Even in the depths of the hardest winter, Miniwanca can serve as an invincible summer to light the way forward for our campers and staff.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/ayf.com\/in-the-depths-of-winter\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"In the Depths of Winter... - 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