On Schools
Supplying support for teachers

By Alice Keesing
Advertiser Education Writer

It all started when Maggie Ulm got mad.

She got mad that kids didn't have crayons in school, that teachers didn't have the books to teach with and that parents didn't have faith in the education system because of everything that it doesn't have.

Luckily, Ulm is not the kind of person to shy away from a problem. Two years ago she harnessed her frustrations and founded the Adopt a Teacher program. The program pairs both private and public school teachers with benefactors who want to give their time, money and products to make up for the shortfalls in the system.

•	Call Maggie Ulm at 485-0601 or e-mail adoptateacher@hawaii.rr.com. She also plans to have the Adopt a Teacher Web site up and running by the beginning of the school year: www.adoptateacher.org

Ulm is so busy these days that she hasn't had time to tally the number of adoptions she's fostered, but it's in the hundreds. Last year, adopters gave $43,000 in cash and thousands more in products and work hours.

Big businesses are involved, as are individuals. One adopter gives his teachers $200 a year to buy supplies. Another helped pull out an old, stinky classroom carpet and put down fresh, new tile. Others have bought computers, floor rugs and books.

Setting the example of giving is Ulm's motto.

"You can't just talk about it, you have to do it," she explains. "And if the kids see it, they learn to do it, too. That's the best thing we can give children."

Growing up with seven brothers and sisters helped instill the giving ethic in Ulm.

"We were just taught to take care of each other," she said. "We didn't know we were poor. We didn't have toys and everything, but we were pretty happy. My mother always gave. Her pots were huge and she helped the community, fed the sick."

Sometimes these days Ulm is not so much mad as exhausted. Exhausted from staying up until the wee hours putting up the Adopt a Teacher Web page; exhausted from working on a new system where people can adopt students who need supplies, exhausted from helping her husband run their electrical telecommunications business on top of everything else.

"There have been a lot of times I've said, 'This is too big for me, this is huge,' " Ulm said. "But the teachers don't want me to give up, and I've had more and more people step up."

And she won't stop until every teacher in Hawai'i is adopted.