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Like many teachers,

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every year on the first day of school,

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I lead a sort of icebreaker activity
with my students.

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I teach at Lincoln High School
in Lincoln, Nebraska,

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and we are one of the oldest
and most diverse high schools

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in our state.

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Also, to our knowledge,

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we're the only high school in the world
whose mascot is the Links.

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Like, a chain.

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(Laughter)

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And with that being our mascot,

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we have a statue out front of our building

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of four links connected like a chain.

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And each link means something.

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Our links stand for tradition,

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excellence, unity and diversity.

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So on the first day of school,

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I teach my new ninth-graders
about the meaning behind those links,

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and I give them each a slip of paper.

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On that paper, I ask them
to write something about themselves.

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It can be something that they love,

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something that they hope for --

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anything that describes their identity.

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And then I go around
the room with a stapler,

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and I staple each of those slips together

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to make a chain.

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And we hang that chain up in our classroom
as a decoration, sure,

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but also as a reminder
that we are all connected.

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We are all links.

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So what happens when one
of those links feels weak?

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And what happens when that weakness

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is in the person holding the stapler?

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The person who's supposed
to make those connections.

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The teacher.

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As teachers, we work every day

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to provide support socially,
emotionally and academically

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to our students who come to us
with diverse and tough circumstances.

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Like most teachers,

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I have students who go home every day,

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and they sit around the kitchen table

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while one or both parents makes a healthy,
well-rounded meal for them.

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They spend suppertime summarizing
the story they read

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in ninth-grade English that day,

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or explaining how Newton's
laws of motion work.

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But I also have students
who go to the homeless shelter

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or to the group home.

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They go to the car that their family
is sleeping in right now.

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They come to school with trauma,

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and when I go home every day,
that goes home with me.

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And see, that's the hard part
about teaching.

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It's not the grading,
the lesson-planning, the meetings,

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though sure, those things do occupy
a great deal of teachers' time and energy.

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The tough part about teaching

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is all the things
you can't control for your kids,

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all the things you can't change for them
once they walk out your door.

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And so I wonder
if it's always been this way.

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I think back to my undergraduate training
at the University of Georgia,

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where we were taught
in our methods classes

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that the concept
of good teaching has changed.

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We're not developing learners

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who are going to go out into a workforce

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where they'll stand
on a line in a factory.

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Rather, we're sending our kids
out into a workforce

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where they need to be able to communicate,

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collaborate and problem-solve.

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And that has caused
teacher-student relationships

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to morph into something stronger

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than the giver of content
and the receiver of knowledge.

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Lectures and sitting in silent rows
just doesn't cut it anymore.

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We have to be able to build relationships
with and among our students

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to help them feel connected

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in a world that depends on it.

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I think back to my second year teaching.

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I had a student who I'll call "David."

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And I remember feeling like
I'd done a pretty good job

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at teaching that year:

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"Hey, I ain't no first-year teacher.

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I know what I'm doing."

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And it was on the last day of school,

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I told David to have a great summer.

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And I watched him walk down the hall,

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and I thought to myself,

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I don't even know
what his voice sounds like.

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And that's when I realized
I wasn't doing it right.

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So I changed almost everything
about my teaching.

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I built in plenty of opportunities
for my students to talk to me

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and to talk to each other,

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to share their writing
and to verbalize their learning.

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And it was through those conversations
I began not only to know their voice

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but to know their pain.

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I had David in class again that next year,

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and I learned that his father
was undocumented

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and had been deported.

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He started acting out in school

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because all he wanted
was for his family to be together again.

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In so many ways, I felt his pain.

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And I needed someone to listen,

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somebody to provide support for me

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so that I could support him in this thing
that I could not even comprehend.

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And we recognize that need

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for police officers who've witnessed
a gruesome crime scene

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and nurses who have lost a patient.

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But when it comes
to teaching professionals,

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that urgency is lagging.

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I believe it's paramount

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that students and teachers,

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administrators, paraprofessionals
and all other support staff

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have convenient and affordable access
to mental wellness supports.

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When we are constantly serving others,

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often between 25
and 125 students each day,

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our emotional piggy banks
are constantly being drawn upon.

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After a while, it can become so depleted,

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that we just can't bear it anymore.

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They call it "secondary trauma"
and "compassion fatigue,"

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the concept that we absorb the traumas
our students share with us each day.

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And after a while,

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our souls become weighed down
by the heaviness of it all.

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The Buffett Institute
at the University of Nebraska

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recently found that most teachers --

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86 percent across
early childhood settings --

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experienced some depressive symptoms
during the prior week.

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They found that approximately one in 10

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reported clinically significant
depressive symptoms.

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My interactions with colleagues
and my own experiences

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make me feel like
this is a universal struggle

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across all grade levels.

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So what are we missing?

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What are we allowing to break the chain
and how do we repair it?

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In my career,

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I've experienced the death
by suicide of two students

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and one amazing teacher

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who loved his kids;

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countless students
experiencing homelessness;

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and kids entering and exiting
the justice system.

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When these events happen,

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protocol is to say, "If you need
someone to talk to, then ..."

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And I say that's not enough.

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I am so lucky.

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I work in an amazing school
with great leadership.

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I serve a large district

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with so many healthy partnerships
with community agencies.

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They have provided steadily
increasing numbers

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of school counselors and therapists

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and support staff to help our students.

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They even provide staff members
with access to free counseling

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as part of our employment plan.

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But many small districts
and even some large ones

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simply cannot foot the bill without aid.

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(Exhales)

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Not only does every school need
social and emotional support staff,

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trained professionals who can navigate
the needs of the building --

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not just the students,
not just the teachers, but both --

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we also need these trained professionals

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to intentionally seek out
those closest to the trauma

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and check in with them.

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Many schools are doing what they can

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to fill in the gaps,

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starting with acknowledging
that the work that we do

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is downright hard.

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Another school in Lincoln,
Schoo Middle School,

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has what they call "Wellness Wednesdays."

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They invite in community yoga teachers,

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they sponsor walks around
the neighborhood during lunch

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and organize social events

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that are all meant
to bring people together.

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Zachary Elementary School
in Zachary, Louisiana,

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has something they call
a "Midweek Meetup,"

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where they invite teachers to share lunch

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and to talk about the things
that are going well

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and the things that are weighing
heavy on their hearts.

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These schools are making space
for conversations that matter.

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Finally, my friend
and colleague Jen Highstreet

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takes five minutes out of each day

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to write an encouraging
note to a colleague,

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letting them know
that she sees their hard work

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and the heart that they share with others.

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She knows that those five minutes

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can have an invaluable
and powerful ripple effect

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across our school.

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The chain that hangs in my classroom
is more than just a decoration.

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Those links hang over our heads

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for the entire four years
that our students walk our halls.

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And every year,

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I have seniors come back
to my classroom, room 340,

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and they can still point out
where their link hangs.

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They remember what they wrote on it.

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They feel connected and supported.

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And they have hope.

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Isn't that what we all need?

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Somebody to reach out
and make sure that we're OK.

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To check in with us

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and remind us that we are a link.

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Every now and then,
we all just need a little help

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holding the stapler.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)