The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Teacher packing school with role models
Men Count brings in mentors for children in North Carolina.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Michael Hayes grew up in rural Georgia in the mid-1970s with one beef: few of his elementary school teachers looked like him.
“My dad would tell me, ‘You can complain about it or do something about it, ”Hayes told the Charlotte Observer.
Decades later, he did. Hayes is a fifth grade, multilingual teacher at Hidden Valley Elementary. The school sits on Snow White Lane in Charlotte, and it’s where the 51-year-old Hayes started Men Count — a program that calls on men to volunteer in the school. While he can’t change the professional pipeline by himself, he’s doing his best to get more male representation in classrooms.
“There is an underrepresentation of men in our profession, ”Hayes said.“Children need to see people who look like them. They need that exposure.”
Every three months, more than 40 men from around Charlotte — businessmen, city officials, police officers, educators and others — go into Hidden Valley and help kindergarten children cut out shapes, read to second-graders, eat lunch with first graders or are recess buddies.
“They come in and spend time with the children,” Hayes said. “And both the men and the children love it.”
‘Pack the building’
Men Count is exactly what Hayes envisioned a few years ago: a program students at Hidden Valley love and one men don’t say “no”to.
Most of the men are from outside of the Hidden Valley community and all walks of life, including an inventor, an insurance salesman and a UNC Charlotte educator. They come in for a day each quarter and buddy up with a student, but Principal Daniel Gray and Hayes want to grow the program so it’s monthly and both girls and boys get to work with a volunteer.
“We want 948 folks,” Hayes said.“We could never have too many. We want to pack the building.”
Hayes and Gray say Men Count is not only boosting their students and inspiring them, but the group of male volunteers is connecting the entire Charlotte community to Hidden Valley Elementary. It’s opened doors to partnerships across the city and helped defuse negative stereotypes of gangs and drugs that lingered around Hidden Valley in the ’90s.
“Men Count is helping lift that dark cloud,” Gray said. “Hidden Valley is truly a community school. Families here believe the school belongs to them.”
The community deserves to be represented the right way, Hayes said.
“We’re one of the hidden gems,” Hayes said.“Now people are getting to come in and see that.”