Second in a series
Re “Reviving Memories of ISPY Charter – Where Are They Now?”
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Educator Jessica Jacobs with her family – Sage, 14, center, husband John and now 8-month-old Rai at left, and Kaien, 9, at right.
The Culver City education community may not have realized the sui generis gem of a Renaissance woman/innovator/educator it was voluntarily – nay, enthusiastically — losing a year and a half ago. On a night equally memorable and predictable, the School Board hunkered down and cringed. Without a nuance in sight, the Board spiritedly voted unanimously No on a creative charter school proposal, rejecting ISPY, the Innovatory School for Professional Youth, slamming an opportunity door in the disappointed face of Jessica Jacobs and her partner.
Not for long, though.
Ms. Jacobs not only stood up, determinedly, and brushed herself off, this was just about the time she learned she was dusting herself off for two.
Nine months later, almost to the day, she gave birth to Rai, her third son. But the trip to the hospital – out of the country, out in the country, in Italy – was as unconventional as Ms. Jacobs’s upbringing and her professional life, from which Innovatory took its name.
Last August, a month before the birth of her third son, the Costa Concordia cruise ship – that had capsized off the coast of Italy in January – reached the salvage stage of operations. In a quaint piece of timing, her husband was hired to participate in the parbuckle salvaging. This meant the righting of the ship would play a dominant role in the family’s life for a few intensely critical weeks.
With Ms. Jacobs eight months pregnant, was this the time to shift the family around the world – to Italy?
Who had time to think through a decision?
Within hours, at 3 a.m., they received a second telephone call: “We will fly you to Rome, first class, tomorrow, if you will come to work on this project.”
They had a choice?
Trouper that she is, “It was really hard to say no,” Ms. Jacobs said. No was not an option – “even though it meant I was going to have to do the move by myself at eight months pregnant. So of course I said ‘fine,’ and he goes to Italy.”
Fourteen-year-old Sage, nine-year-old Kaien, Ms. Jacobs and her unborn child will follow in a few days.
If she thought packing the kids and belongings for a trek of unknown duration across the world was an adventure, living abroad at this crucial time held a bundle of unorthodox surprises for the family.
(To be continued)
