by Aimee Mendel

Created on: September 11, 2008

Poverty smells and humiliates and sickens. There are those who climb out of poverty by being really brilliant, really talented or really driven. Just as with any success, however, I suspect that a large part of being "discovered" out of poverty has to do with being in the right place at the right time.

I took a job as a nurse in a high school in my county; the school was a Title I school and it was in the "bad" part of the county. Somehow I felt drawn to this school even before school started; it didn't take me long to grow to love my charges, each and every one of them. I loved the troublemakers, I loved the "good kids", I loved those who would come to my clinic to hide out to escape gang activities.

My children's schoolmates had doctors; most of them had more than one doctor. Most of the kids at the school I worked at not only did not have doctors, they didn't have insurance and they didn't have enough money to buy decent clothes. Many of the ROTC kids joined so that they would have something to wear one day a week. Many of the children came to my clinic in the morning because they were hungry and didn't have money to buy breakfast. I bought cheese crackers for my diabetic students in the event that their blood sugar dropped; I had to stop handing these out to the non-diabetics because so many of them came in to get "breakfast." These kids tried to get jobs at local fast food restaurants and shops but were not always successful.

There were times when the students came in with significant medical issues; they told me their parents could not afford to take them to the doctor. One girl was hearing voices; she was clearly disturbed. A call to her parents resulted in their telling me that she was making this up. Another girl had a felon (infected end of the finger) which got worse by the day; I told her she needed to go to the doctor because she needed antibiotics. I set her up with an appointment at the free clinic; she told me that she and her Mom waited a really long time and didn't get seen. Eventually her mother "drained" her finger by opening it with a razor blade. Felons can result in the loss of a digit.

Virtually none of the children went to the dentist. Their answer to a toothache was to have the tooth pulled. They saw no other option. Root canals were way too expensive.

There were very bright kids who went to this school; these kids who had caring parents who would actually go to the central office with concerns. Over and over again I heard the same thing: once the school officials found out that the student went to "X" high school they essentially dismissed any effort to take the issue seriously.

I loved this job, but I had to quit because I couldn't make enough money. I have gone back to working in the hospital. Doing this automatically tripled my income. How sad, considering how much these young people needed an advocate and a health advisor.

If I ever win the lottery, I will open a free dental clinic in the area of this school. THese kids are just as smart, just as funny, just as sincere and just as deserving as those in my own affluent home district. Sadly many of them will replicate their parents' lack of success in their own endeavors.

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