TULSA, Okla. (AP) — Earlier this month in Bethany Martin's kindergarten class, a little boy's ragged old shoe literally ripped in half.

Sequoyah Elementary, a Title 1 school northeast of downtown Tulsa, has a donation closet for exactly this kind of emergency. But Martin couldn't find the right size, so she pieced the shoe together with duct tape and sent the boy limping home.

"Do you have another pair to wear tomorrow?" she asked.

"No," he said. "They're all too small."

Since joining Sequoyah's staff as a teacher's assistant this fall, Martin has found it an eye-opening and sometimes heart-wr...