Over the past ten years, Nursery Road, like many schools across the nation, has seen  dramatic demographic changes in its school community. According to the school's principal, Mary Kennerly, “our free and reduced lunch population, our minority population, and our disabled population has more than doubled. We have also added tremendous diversity to our faith communities.”

At some schools, these changes could provoke confusion about how to create a sense of community among an increasingly diverse student body. For Kennerly and the rest of the Nursery Road community, however, “these changes have enriched our schools in many ways and have contributed to our ability to teach and practice tolerance, to appreciate differences, and to examine our values.”

The ways Nursery Road will continue to expand its practice of tolerance are myriad: a flag display will be hung in the school cafeteria, representing each country of origin that is represented in the student body; each class (grades 1-5) will produce a class newspaper at least once a year, featuring opposing viewpoints and stories selected by the students; and in addition to ongoing staff development for the faculty, First Amendment-related materials and resources will be distributed to the parents via the school newsletter and the school's Parent Center.

Most importantly, though, the Nursery Road community can continue in its work to demonstrate, in the words of principal Kennerly, “the need to understand the power of the five freedoms of the First Amendment, the ways to use them to become powerful, and the responsibility to each other those powers bring.

“When we demonstrate that this is possible for my school community, for all of us in the First Amendment Schools project, and for everyone in education, I believe this could truly be the start of something big.”

To learn more about Nursery Road Elementary School, visit their website:

http://www.lex5.k12.sc.us/nres/