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Colonel Richard Niemtzow is an Air Force doctor and the military’s most respected acupuncturist. On this morning, he’s making rounds at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington D.C. He’s treating 24-year old army sergeant Jack Schumacher in a hospital bed.

Niemtzow: How bad is your pain then? Can you describe it?
Schumacher: They usually go by the 1 to 10 scale. Right now it’s about a 5.

So Niemtzow gets started and inserts a gold-colored needle, no larger than a centimeter, along Schumacher’s right outer ear.

Niemtzow: Did it drop your pain down?
Schumacher: No.
Niemtzow: I’ll do another one.

As Niemtzow continues to insert more needles, Schumacher closes his eyes and breathes deeply. His fingers rest on a hand-knitted blanket, which hides his bandaged right knee where the leg was amputated. He got injured this past May in Afghanistan when his convoy was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.

Colonel Richard Niemtzow and Dr. Stephen Burns run the military's only acupuncture clinic at Andrews Air Force Base.

Niemtzow: How do you feel right now that the needles have been in your ears for almost 15 minutes?
Schumacher: I feel fine. I feel excellent. My body feels great.
Niemtzow: Your pain level sir?
Schumacher: Pain level is still at 4. I can still feel throughout my legs, rushes. But it’s not the sharp pain.

Schumacher sits comfortably with five needles stuck in each ear. They look like piercings and will naturally fall out in several days. Compared to the painkillers he’s also taking, Schumacher says he’s noticed that acupuncture relieves his pain quicker and doesn’t make him feel loopy. Dr. Niemtzow calls this technique battlefield acupuncture. He originally designed it in 2001 to provide rapid pain relief for soldiers in combat.

Niemtzow: For instance, if you were a sharp shooter or a frog man, that you’re going to dive in the water and you had a terrible headache, you probably wouldn’t do it. But suppose instead of taking the narcotic, which would cloudy his head and remove him from the mission – you could put a 50 cent needle in his ear or a couple of them, make the headache go away and he could perform and get his mission over with.

But right now, battlefield acupuncture is mainly used on the home-front to help wounded soldiers manage their pain. The Air Force is the only branch in the military to have a full-time acupuncture clinic, and Niemtzow is currently running an acupuncture pilot project to train doctors across the armed forces. Colonel Arnyce Pock is the medical corps director for the Air Force’s surgeon general’s office.

Pock: When you can administer some acupuncture with a few strategically placed needles, and markedly reduce or totally relieve their pain and allow them to have their doses of narcotics markedly reduced, I have to admit that often times it’s incredibly convincing even to those who might be somewhat skeptical at the outset.

But active duty military, veterans and their families are starting to turn to acupuncture to relieve stress. Dave Schiman works in the civilian sector and is one of the organizers behind the Philadelphia Area Veterans Acupuncture Project, which started less than a year ago.

Schiman: Hearing about these guys coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan in a state of shock, being afraid every time a car backfires or a balloon pops and knowing the impact that has to have on their families and kids- opening up my practice to treat veterans for free was a way to give back to these guys who had given so much and a lot of them are suffering.

Even though acupuncture is being used in the military, it’s been difficult to attract veterans and their families. Schiman says he and his fellow acupuncturists are rethinking how to break down public skepticism, and how to strengthen ties with veteran and military support groups in the area.

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Sam Reed is a Philadelphia public school teacher. He's had to find ways to cope with burnout.

Reed: I used to be super stressed out and my wife pretty much didn’t like me. Told me to stay away from her until I got detoxified.

Reed says his wife likes him better now because he’s learned how to channel his school day stress into exercise, ballroom dancing, and yoga.

Reed: When I feel the stressors coming from students, just real simple: hands at heart center and just breathe.

Reed has been teaching for 12 years and currently teaches middle school social studies. He says he’s more motivated in the classroom by attending professional workshops and conferences outside school.

Reed:You’re always working on improving your craft or your content knowledge, your pedagogy. It might sound boring. But that’s the life of the teacher, I guess.

During the school year, teachers face working conditions that can sometimes frustrate them to the point they either change schools or quit. Richard Ingersoll is a University of Pennsylvania education professor and an expert on teacher turnover. He says teachers leave their jobs at higher rates than lawyers, engineers or academics.

Ingersoll: Schools with higher salaries have lower teacher quit rates. And it also turns out those schools that do a far better job dealing with their student behavioral issues have significantly better teacher retention. And the data tell us that buildings in which teachers have more say, those buildings have far less teacher turnover.

Ingersoll says to lower teacher stress, school administrators should manage  working conditions better. Ingersoll’s colleague Mike Nakkula agrees. He’s also a Penn education professor.
 
Nakkula: If the teachers see that the accountability system is fair, if they can get support when support is needed- they are more likely to have a longer tenure in their schools and not be burned out.

But at the same time, Nakkula says teachers must learn how to cope with the social and emotional issues students bring to the classroom. In poor urban school districts, there can be a 25 percent teacher turn rate over every year.

Nakkula: Those who are passionate about caring for children and teenagers will find ways to survive in the profession or even thrive in it. But you have to want to take on the messiness. If you want things to be tidy and neat with good results at the end of the day, you’re going to meet with failure and be more likely to get burned out.

Rita Sorrentino has definitely had her share of stressful days after 30 plus years of teaching. Sorrentino is now an elementary school computer teacher and says one main thing keeps her going.

Sorrentino: Those moments when the children really surprise you and you see that they have something to offer and they’re happy learning. Then it keeps you coming back.

Sorrentino is a big fan of professional workshops and conferences outside school. She says they're intellectually exciting and let her bond with teachers like Meagan McGowan. McGowan is a high school social studies teacher and started teaching three years ago. After a stressful first year, McGowan changed schools and signed up for the Philadelphia Teachers Institute. She found that she connected with more experienced teachers like Sorrentino and Sam Reed.

Sorrentino: It’s overwhelming when you have to step in your classroom as a relatively new teacher and say what am I going to do and how am I going to justify doing it? So when you get to talk to all these people and say what’s worked for them- a lot of the trial and error has been taken out of it.  And you can start implementing good practices as soon as possible.

McGowan is being proactive about avoiding burnout and says having mentors helps her. As new data shows, the city’s most inexperienced teachers are more likely to be placed in stressful schools where student poverty and teacher turnover are high.

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The kids at Stetser Elementary in Chester love their playground. They swing across the monkey bars, sway on rocking cars and planes, and zig-zag through the grass playing tag. Here’s 1st grader Justin Atkinson.

Atkinson: We get to slide down the sliding board and play and do a lot of stuff. When we go back in, I'm a little bit sad.  But it's still going to be fun going back inside because we can go the computer lab and stuff. 

Last year at this time, Stetser didn’t even have a playground. Gregory Thornton runs the Chester Upland School District, where most of the students are poor and black.

Thornton: When we came to town, there wasn’t a playground to be found. We had eight schools, one with a playground and that playground was probably 25 years old. Within the last 18 months, every single one of my schools has a playground.

Thornton says kids should get fresh air and play outside, so he’s made lunchtime recess mandatory. Stetser and several other schools had cut out recess in response to dismal standardized test scores. Stetser 3rd grade teacher Georgine Zamonski believes students are doing better since the return of recess.

Zamonski: After lunch, we have math. And our math scores are on the rise because , I think, these students are more focused because they had that release of energy. Their attention is back on.

When Zamonski started teaching in Chester 13 years ago, her students had recess three times a day. Now her students only get recess once a day at lunch for 10 to 15 minutes. But Zamonski doesn’t think that’s enough.

Zamonski: I like to do a lot of movement when I’m teaching. I think that helps them focus more. I like to let them get up, switch seats, move around. Do that to kind of compensate for the lack of not being able to go out for recess.

Recent studies have shown that kids benefit physically, socially and academically from a certain amount of recess. Romina Barros is a developmental pediatrician at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. She did a study about the connection between recess and classroom behavior on eight and nine year olds.

Barros: We found that the children who were having recess were rated as behaving better in the classroom by their teachers compared to those kids whose schools didn’t provide recess.

Kathy Schultz is a University of Pennsylvania education professor and a Chester-Upland School Board member. She walks the halls with me inside Stetser Elementary, and says the school district faces tremendous pressure to raise test scores. But she thinks the district’s new recess policy enhances creativity in the classroom.

Schultz: I think that it all comes down to problem solving and interaction. Bill Gates, I bet, had recess. People worry a lot about schools becoming so routinized and focused only on test preparation that we’re preparing good factory workers. But we’re not preparing the kind of people that the United States is known for, which are people who think creatively and understand how to design new things and invent new things and part of that is unstructured play.

But Schultz and Chester Upland officials say it’s unlikely the kids will get recess multiple times a day anytime soon. They acknowledge much more work in the classroom still needs to be done, especially as the district has failed to meet federal reading and math proficiency levels for the last five years. 

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Saint Monica Lanes in South Philadelphia is home to six different bowling leagues. The daytime one for senior citizens is especially popular and has 48 members, including a petite woman with glasses named Catherine Frankel.
 

Ninety-three year old Catherine Frankel

In this game, Catherine bowls a 159. Not bad for someone her age, and who can’t see out of her left eye. Her teammates cheer after she throws a spare.
 
Frankel: I got that one. That son of a gun.
 
In the next lane over from Catherine, 92-year old John Gallichio is attempting to knock down a lone-standing pin.
 
Gallichio: Ha, ha, I missed it. Ha, ha!

Gallichio: We have a lot of fun. That's why I'm here- to have fun. I live by myself and take care of the house and do everything. Cook. Clean. Do everything. My wife passed away in 2001. Helen- she was a very good woman.
 

Ninety-two year old John Gallichio

But it’s unclear whether future generations will join bowling leagues as they get older. Sociologist Rebecca Adams from the University of North Carolina in Greensboro says the nature of how we socialize is changing.

Adams: Everybody has probably seen the Cheers television show where everyone knows your name. Well, those kinds of places become very important to friendship formation. I have noticed that has been replaced somewhat by the various websites and chat rooms and blogs. So the question is whether people will continue to need to see each other face-to-face in order to form friendships.

Adams says traditional tight-knit areas like South Philadelphia are perfect examples.

Adams: The continued existence of neighborhood bowling leagues and the kind of activities that bring people together close to home- a lot of that will just depend on what happens to neighborhoods.  And as long as there are stable neighborhoods where people live in them for large portions of their lives, you will probably see those kinds of activities continue.

Most of the bowlers in the senior citizen league at Saint Monica Lanes have spent their whole lives in South Philadelphia, and love socializing face-to-face. But with more interactions happening online, it's unclear if their grandchildren will do the same or even join a bowling league. Virtual video games have now made it possible to go bowling without ever having to leave home.

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The University of Pennsylvania’s top salesperson is working extra hard these days to get admitted students to say yes. Inside Irvine auditorium, Penn president Dr. Amy Gutmann works the stage before a packed house of prospective students and their families.

Gutmann: Come to my house when I open it for undergraduate events, which I love to do. Parents, too, welcome. Email me. Tell me your first impressions.

Students from Central and Masterman, which are Philadelphia's top magnet public high schools, on a campus tour of Penn.

Furda: If a student qualifies for need-based financial aid, the financial aid package will have a small component that is college work study. Outside of that, it is all grant money. So families can look at that package and they don’t see any indebtedness, which is very important. It then frees that family up to take out some loans if they need to, to pay for other expenses.

Penn's information booth for admitted students visting campus.

One of her friends at Masterman is Jordan Gifford from South Philadelphia. At home, Jordan sits at the kitchen table with his parents and fidgets with a pen. He’s torn between Penn State, Pitt, and Boston University.

Jordan Gifford: I found out earlier that I got into Penn State and Pittsburgh. So I already had got my mind set one of those two schools. And then I found out I got into BU, and I was like, ‘Ok, cool.’  And then she said ‘I won’t let you make a decision for any college until you go see it.’ Then I went to BU, and I really enjoyed it.

The Gifford Family at their home in South Philadelphia before driving to Penn State for a final tour.

Joe Gifford: So we ask the questions about what happens if somebody loses their job. Well, of course, you lose half of your income, you’re going to get more aid.

Sheri Gifford: Sometimes, I’ve wondered if I should just quit work and then my kids wouldn’t have any college loans.

The Giffords are looking carefully at which loans they’ll need. After filling out the online federal financial aid form, they were shocked to learn that they’d still have to pay $30,000 out of pocket.

Joe Gifford: I said, ‘Ok. Tell me where that bank account is that has 30,000 dollars in it?  Do you have 30,000 dollars hidden somewhere?’ And of course we don’t.

Sheri Gifford: Our kids and us will pay off loans like everybody else does for higher education. But you don’t want to see your kid in debt to their eyeballs. And Joe is going to be 59. I just turned 55 . At some point, we really have to stock away some more money to retire.

May 1st  is the deadline for students to make a final college decision. Public universities have seen a spike in applicants against taking on debt for higher education in this weak economy. In response, private institutions are increasingly taking steps to reduce loans and increase grant-based financial aid in years to come.

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Kevin Tolbert doesn’t mince words about what Pickett Middle School was like when the Philadelphia School District ran it.

Mastery Charter School was formerly the Pickett Middle School

But Tolbert says his school became safer, cleaner, and a serious learning environment after Mastery Charter took over two years ago. Mastery renovated the building to feel brand new and eventually accommodate 700 students in grades 7 through 12 come 2011. Right now, there are 300 students in the 7th, 8th and 9th grades. Kevin Tolbert is a 9th grader, and so is Sydnei Ellis.

Sydnei Ellis (left) and Kevin Tolbert with one of the many inspirational signs posted on Mastery's walls.

Taylor: The last time we had a fight in this building was September 24th, 2007.

That’s Rufus Taylor. He’s the assistant principle for school culture.

Hallway at Mastery Charter

But to do that, Taylor says a spirit of community, non-violence, high standards, and consequences must shape everything students do. For example, students enter the building everyday through the cafeteria where staff members check their id badge and uniform.

Staff Member: Badges up, shirt tucked. Badges up, shirt tucked. Badges.

These sleepy-eyed teenagers then eat breakfast, and Rufus Taylor sometimes serenades them with a variation of the theme song from Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.

Rufus Taylor addresses students in the cafeteria.

Teachers then collect homework. But one morning, Taylor doesn’t like what he sees.

Taylor: Put the papers down. There’s absolutely no talking. We have 2-1/2 minutes to give homework submission in. I shouldn’t be having this conversation with eight weeks left in school. Let’s try it again.

Taylor eventually dismisses the kids. They exit silently in a single file line. Remedial reading teacher Zach Hasse says if students act up during class, he can count on school administrators for help.

Mastery's code of conduct

The school’s walls are covered with inspirational quotations, college banners and posters tracking academic progress. One chart shows the school’s 2008 state standardized test scores. The scores are noticeably higher than 2007 when the school district was in charge. Mastery’s principal Dr. Kelli Seaton says the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment is an effective benchmark.

Seaton: Our mission is that our kids go to college and that they’re ready for the global economy. So if they’re not doing well on the PSSA, we have huge concerns about them being ready for the SAT, which means we have huge concerns about college work, and then huge concerns about career and global readiness.

Signs remind students of what is expected of them.

Evans: I find him getting up sometimes 4:30, 5:00 o’clock in the morning, trying to finish something or going over homework again. He’s coming in, X-box is to the side, and he wants to be one of those students that receives that full scholarship when he graduates.

Officials at Mastery say they’ll put in a bid under the Philadelphia School District’s Imagine 2014 reform plan to turn around struggling schools.