I’ve got my first American’s Who Tell the Truth portrait up in the office. It looks great and it’s getting just as many comments from students as it is from others in the school. In about two days the other three portraits will be up and I think the reaction is going to be fantastic.

In the other post I mentioned that I contacted the artist, Robert Shetterly, to see what I could do to get some of the prints that were not on sale. Like I said, he was great and got right back to me and the whole bit. Today, after seeing my principal’s reaction to the Zinn print I thought that I would order the Chomsky poster for him. This one’s available from the store, so I figured easy-in easy-out. Poster will be here in a few days and the boss man will be stoked.

When I got home the wife mentioned that there was a message from someone about an order I made today. It turns out I messed something up and the folks running the Americans Who Tell the Truth store had called to clarify the order. At least I think that’s what happened. About two seconds into the call I realized I was talking to the person running the online store, Joseph K. Labonte. The guy’s a spark-plug, to say the least. He had gone to my web-site, found that I was working in a school, and had a proposition for me.

He wants to help develop a curriculum for schools based around the portraits. More specifically he wants kids to develop a curriculum for schools. And even more specifically he’d like me to help. We talked for a good half-hour about how to make this happen (mind spinning with a American’s Who Tell the Truth Moodle) and how to get kids involved. (Mind further spinning about getting the artist involved with the kids from my school)

There’s going to be a lot more conversations and I think by the beginning of the school year a big chunk of my curriculum is going to be based around this. I’m going to see what I can do to get other teachers on board (k-12?) and go from here.

On top of all of this I’m getting a copy of each of the prints, for free. These guys may be the artsy-non-corporate types but they sure know how to go after the heart of a teacher. Nothing will buy you the undieing love of a teacher as much as free stuff will.

The more I think about it the more I’m still not sure if I messed up my order or if Joe just wanted to talk to me. Either way it’s amazing the things that come your way when your sharing what your doing and are passionate about it. In this case it’s on both side and I’m excited to see what comes of it.

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