Gilroy
– A retired Glen View Elementary teacher is challenging the
Gilroy community to open their wallets for the teachers and
students who lost everything in Tuesday’s fire.
Gilroy – A retired Glen View Elementary teacher is challenging the Gilroy community to open their wallets for the teachers and students who lost everything in Tuesday’s fire.
“Kathleen (Taylor) has nothing left (of her third grade classroom). Not even a pencil,” said Barbara Grailey, a former Glen View first grade teacher. “Just a donation of $1 or $5 dollars would help those teachers enormously.”
Two third grade, and two fifth grade classrooms suffered fire, smoke and water damage. Nothing but the desks and chairs survived the fire in Taylor’s classroom.
“The teachers provide a lot of their own work, a lot of their own materials,” said Grailey who would know. She taught for more than two decades at Glen View, before transferring to Las Animas Elementary in 1992. Many of the same faculty members she worked with still teach at Glen View.
“I walked this ground. I taught at this school. I want a fundraiser for this school,” Grailey demanded.
The 73-year old retiree can remember when there weren’t any school colors, was no eagle mascot, and when the library housed the kindergarten class. “This is my baby,” she said as she sat inside an unscathed wing of the school.
But Grailey has more than teaching experience on her side – in 1959 the elementary school she taught at in North Platte, Neb. burned down. “I’ve been through it. (The teachers) need to replace as much as possible,” she said urging others to donate. “It doesn’t have to be a lot.”
Grailey is an active member of the Uvas Retired Teachers Unit number 66 in Gilroy. Three retirees have already donated to the cause she said.
To donate: 842-3034.
