Buckle up friends, this will be a long one. When you’re as short as I am, your soap box has to be tall, and if I’m going to climb all the way up here, I’m going to stay awhile.
Let’s begin with our setting. My daily duty is bus duty at dismissal. Those of you moaning, yes I know, but honestly? I requested this duty this year.
For the past four years I’ve had this duty. Yes, it often runs past my contractual 20 minutes of duty. Yes, it is high paced and has a level of urgency that even the classroom doesn’t.
But there’s good stuff too. Firstly, it gets me away from my desk at the end of the day. I HAVE to walk away, take a breath, and FOCUS on something without grades or growth measures or data.
Secondly, I get to say bye to kids. I get to say “Have a safe weekend!” to a kid I haven’t seen since the day before (alternating block). I remind them I care about more than their work.
Thirdly, I get to interact with kids I don’t teach. Great game last night, cool shirt, have a great weekend... those are nice things to hear no matter who you are, or who says them.
Lastly, in those short lulls between bus loads, I get to talk to an admin person to person. Three different APs actually. Y’all their job is crazy hard too.
So, now my point. Today’s dismissal was me and a radio due to a discipline situation that required administration elsewhere. No worries, I can do this. I’ve done this before.
Everything goes off without a hitch except one bus is a bit late. Still no worries. I let the three boys know they could come stand up front and wait for their bus.
Now these three young men are not three young men I teach, but I know who they are. We all know who they are. You know who they are at your school. These aren’t the young men who collect As and awards and accolades.
These young men collect referrals more often than most things.
Can I tell you what they were discussing? How to pay bills.
These three young men, in high school, were discussing how to pay bills, and I don’t mean a lesson their personal finance teacher had presented.
I don’t mean a PBL assignment where they had to plan and implement a budget.
I mean they were discussing which place in town charged the lowest fees for money orders, so they could pay bills like utilities.
They were discussing which bills you can let go a week or two or three and only pay a late fee and which bills will cut you off immediately.
Do you know these things? Do you, their teacher, understand that level of poverty?
Do YOU know where in YOUR town to get a check cashed for the lowest fee? Or who to ask if you needed to know?
How can I prepare these young men to work in a world neither of us understand when they already live in a world that’s ridiculously hard?
How does any single “high engagement”, “personalized”, “differentiated”, “high interest”, “student choice driven” lesson prepare these students for the choices they already face on a daily basis?
I 👏 LOVE 👏 MY 👏 JOB 👏
I love my kids, and my amazing administration, and my crazy co-workers, and my perfect for me school.
What I don’t love is all the crap that gets in the kids’ way. I don’t love all the things outside of their control that keep them from succeeding.
I don’t love all the things that walk in my classroom on their backs.
And I really don’t love that when we talk about why certain students, or certain teachers, or certain schools “don’t succeed”, we don’t talk about these things. Fin.
