SOURCE: Blackchristiannews.com
Dr. Mike Wilson, the former principal of Glen Iris Elementary School in Birmingham, has witnessed teachers go to extraordinary lengths for their students. But never has he seen anything like what one teacher, Valencia Maiden, did for a special student named Jamie.
Ever since the day Jamie started kindergarten at Glen Iris, everyone knew and loved her. For one thing, she stood out physically from the other students with her bright red hair and fair skin.
The teachers and staff also knew her because of her family situation. Her father wasn’t in the picture, and her mother’s parental rights were severed when she was in second grade. After her grandparents took her in, her grandmother died. The school counselor worked closely with Jamie’s grandfather, a mechanic, to help him navigate the court system to get custody and disability benefits for himself.
When her grandfather rented a house, it was “gutted and stripped” before he and Jamie could move in, says Mike. The landlord couldn’t be bothered to replace anything, so Mike and others from the school pitched in to help. Along with a group from his church, Carpenter’s Hands Ministry, “We got the house rewired and up to code and furnished it with essentials they needed,” he says.
Jamie’s grandfather, who she called “Papa,” “absolutely loved her,” says Valencia. “He did anything and everything for her.”
When he came to pick up Jamie from the aftercare program, “He would have worked a long day and would be covered in grease,” Valencia remembers. He would wash his hands, then go to the office where, invariably, Jamie would beg him to let her stay and play for a while longer. As tired as he was, he would give in to her. “
He talked to her like she was a mini-adult,” Valencia says. “He was an awesome man. I was really blessed to know him.”
One morning in September of 2018, a distant relative of Jamie’s came into the principal’s office to inform the administration that her grandfather had died over the weekend. “He said she had no place to go,” Mike recalls. “She would go into the foster care system.” Valencia, a fifth-grade teacher at Glen Iris, became especially close to Jamie. When Jamie was in fourth grade, Valencia would help her with homework in the aftercare program. Like the other teachers and staff members, she considered herself one of Jamie’s cheerleaders.
“Everybody was rooting for her to grow up and do big things,” she says.
Valencia recalls that one day, she watched as Jamie stood on the playground and put out her finger for a little bird, who jumped right onto it. “That’s the kind of person she is,” she says.
Valencia, who until then had been single and childless, immediately registered as a foster parent. She talked it over with Jamie and assured Jamie’s biological mother that she only wanted the best for her the little girl. “I’m not trying to replace her mother,” she says, “but I’m here to support her in any way she needs.” “I’m not trying to replace her mother,” she says, “but I’m here to support her in any way she needs.”
In July of 2020, Valencia officially adopted Jamie . One of the coaches at Glen Iris organized a “Gotcha Day” drive-by parade to celebrate.