When my friend, Beckie Spears, accepted the honor of being named the 2024 North Carolina Principal of the Year, she described her school as “a love letter to public education.” While she spoke, I reflected on just how true that sentiment is and how blessed I have been as a school leader to watch the inner workings of schools, thinking she really put into words what we as principals get to see every day in our buildings.
The older my children become, the more I realize — not only as a principal but also as a mother — just how right Beckie was. Our schools truly are love letters to public education, written daily through the care, commitment, and belief of the people who serve children.
As I reflected on her words, I began to see something else. Perhaps the children who walk across graduation stages each spring are the living proof of those love letters. They carry with them the fingerprints of every adult who helped shape them along the way and become the lasting testament to what public education makes possible.
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My son Otis is a rising seventh grader, and my daughter Caroline is a rising sophomore, both in Surry County Schools. They are still actively being shaped by the educators and the school communities surrounding them each day. Their stories are still unfolding. They will continue to become love letters to the work happening in public schools across our district and our state.
Last week, my oldest daughter, EmmaGrey, graduated from North Surry High School as a magna cum laude student and North Carolina Academic Scholar who will attend Montreat College this fall on a wrestling scholarship.
Like any proud mother, I could list her accomplishments and celebrate her determination. But the truth is, her story does not belong to her or our family alone.
It belongs to public education.
It belongs to the kindergarten teacher who first taught her to believe she was capable.
It belongs to the front office staff who knew when something was wrong before she ever said a word.
It belongs to coaches who taught resilience after difficult losses, and teachers who reminded her that hard work matters more than perfection.
It belongs to counselors, cafeteria staff, bus drivers, custodians, substitute teachers, administrators, and countless adults who may never fully realize the impact they had on her life.
It also belongs to a public school system that helped prepare her for life beyond graduation. Through opportunities like internships made possible by Surry-Yadkin Works, EmmaGrey was able to explore possible career paths, gain real-world experience, and begin thinking intentionally about her future profession while still in high school. She was also able to earn college credits through the college-going culture intentionally cultivated within our schools, helping her enter the next chapter of her education already equipped with confidence, experience, and opportunity.
While EmmaGrey’s story is uniquely her own, it is not uncommon. Across North Carolina this spring, thousands of graduates are crossing stages carrying similar fingerprints of public education and the influence of educators who helped shape their journeys.
Because public schools do far more than deliver instruction.
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Public schools help children navigate grief after the death of grandparents. They steady students through divorce and separation. They help children learn how to resolve conflict, build friendships, manage disappointment, and discover confidence in themselves. They provide stability when life outside of school feels uncertain.
As educators, we often hear conversations about public schools framed through test scores, politics, budgets, accountability models, or rankings. Those conversations matter. But they rarely capture the deeply human work happening quietly inside school buildings every single day.
The real work of public education lives in relationships.
It lives in the teacher who notices a student suddenly becoming quiet.
It lives in the coach who stays late after practice to talk through life decisions.
It lives in the office assistant who keeps snacks in a drawer for children who come to school hungry.
It lives in the administrator who attends funerals, ball games, graduations, and celebrations — because schools become extensions of family and community.
As a principal, I have the privilege of watching these moments unfold daily. As a mother, I have experienced them personally.
EmmaGrey is who she is today because an entire public school community helped raise her alongside our family.
And the truth is, so many of our children are walking love letters to public education.
Not because they are perfect.
Not because their journeys were easy.
But because they were loved consistently by adults who chose to invest in them day after day, year after year.
In a time when public education is often criticized, politicized, and reduced to headlines, I hope we do not lose sight of this truth: Public schools still change lives every day.
A diploma may carry one student’s name, but behind it stands an entire community of public educators who helped write the story.
If our schools are love letters to public education, then our graduates are the stories those letters tell.
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