Wanted: One Parent to Supervise the Sabotage

I have volunteered at three schools and cut out four hundred paper apples. I have never been offered a job with "Sabotaging" capitalized.

Penny Wars, if you have been spared it, is a fundraiser in which children vote with their pockets. At Cairo-Durham Elementary in New York, in March 2024, the rules read like a treaty. Pennies and dollar bills went into your own grade's jug and counted for you. Silver coins went into another grade's sabotage jug in the main office and counted against them. The winning grade got a fancy lunch. The money funded the school's positive-behavior program. Nobody seems to have flagged this.

Crafton's version would run March 23 to 27, and the PTA asked the question every general asks: if it's only a week, how do we handle that? Answer: one final day for sabotage. Teachers would be asked to keep the pennies and the silver separate Monday to Thursday, until, and this is in the minutes, "Sabotage Friday." It could only happen at lunch, at a table. Hence the parent.

Asked whether the book fair would be buy-one-get-one this year, the minutes answer, in full: "NO."

Late in the meeting someone suggested an online option, one campaign per grade. Yes, said the minutes, and listed the benefits: "No counting required. All positive dollars."

All positive dollars. To a parent who has sorted a mixing bowl of other people's nickels, that is the most beautiful sentence in Pennsylvania. To a nine-year-old with a dime and a grudge, it is the end of the war.

The treasurer forecasts $1,500 from Penny Wars, the same as the talent show. Both still need coordinators. For Sabotage Friday I'd nominate whoever answered the book fair question. They have the temperament.