Second Fiddle No Longer

Enough is enough. JoElla James won’t say as much, but that’s what it boils down to.

Coeur d’Alene High School’s popular choir teacher, leaving Idaho for Texas next week, says the move has nothing to do with the secondrate treatment she and her students have received from the school district.

“In the world of public school music, Texas is at the top of the heap,” she says as brightly as a Longhorn cheerleader. “It runs so smoothly - like a business.”

No one can blame JoElla for bailing out of Idaho, even though the job at Coeur d’Alene High was her dream.

Her first year she had to share a classroom with a veteran teacher, a man with a strong presence and a sense of territory. JoElla minimized herself for one year, then searched for another space.

The high school population was divided into two schools for her second year in Coeur d’Alene, and Coeur d’Alene High School was partially renovated. Still, her program stayed homeless.

JoElla moved into the auditorium for two years. During the school’s frequent class meetings and assemblies, her students were ejected into the cafeteria.

They even were kicked out of the cafeteria once because other students were taking tests there.

Finally, the choir found a home in a vacant staff lounge. For two years, 35 teenagers crowded into a room built for 15.

When her singers had occasion to visit Lake City High School’s spiffy new choir room, they returned to her with battered spirits.

Last fall, JoElla hit the warpath, and her students protested in the homecoming parade. When the district’s proposed building plans didn’t include improvements for Coeur d’Alene High School, JoElla spent eight hours on the phone calling parents, who then lobbied district officials for a change.

Last spring, voters overwhelmingly approved the improvements JoElla wants. But a new choir room isn’t the school district’s top priority and won’t be reality for several years.

“I thought I could teach choir anywhere, in a cave,” JoElla says. “But I found out this year that my flexibility is used up. I want to teach music, not duke it out over facilities.”

Her school in San Antonio boasts a new choir hall and Yamaha piano. Texas prides itself on its school music programs, an attitude JoElla deserves to experience.

“But that’s not why I’m leaving,” she says for the record. “The materials you have to work with show you what you can do. I had great kids. I know I can go anywhere now, and I want to go to Texas.”

Which is Coeur d’Alene’s loss, says Kirsten Evensen, a June graduate who studied with JoElla for four years.

“We’re losing someone who really cares.”

Go Navy

Idaho may be landlocked, but that’s no reason to ignore the contributions of the U.S. Naval Armed Guard, says Coeur d’Alene’s Milan Lamarche.

After all, the U.S. naval base at Farragut trained thousands of sailors during World War II on Lake Pend Oreille.

At Milan’s request, Gov. Phil Batt recently proclaimed July 13 - Monday - U.S. Naval Armed Guard Day in Idaho.

The day recognizes the gunners, signalmen and radio men who served mainly on merchant ships without doctors and such amenities as recreational facilities.

The Naval Armed Guard served on more than 6,000 ships and lost 1,810 men in the war, but it never received anything to distinguish it from other branches of the Navy.

Good work, Milan.