Which Part of the Problem Don't You Get?

My pet peeve is what I have termed The Broken Teacher syndrome: regardless of the issue in education, it’s the teacher’s fault. Perhaps I would have considered a couple of more years standing at the podium had it not been shoved down my throat how totally incompetent I am in the performance of my job: just ask a parent; just ask a kid; just as an administrator; just ask the public.

Test scores, of course, determine my job performance, and low test scores indicate poor job performance. A beautiful bar graph of the “score spread” for the classes I teach confirms just how poorly I am doing my job: there are more F’s than A’s, and that, my friends, spells Broken Teacher.

Today, another collaborative day, means that teachers meet (3 times a month), so the students come in an hour later, we shorten the classes, and the loss of instructional time doesn’t seem to faze anyone except me. I think it sends a negative message to students when almost weekly throughout the school year, there is a shortened day for one reason or another: Pep assemblies, collab meetings, minimum days for in-service, non-student contact days for more in-service, we hardly need a reason to shorten the school day.

But, by god, keep on pace with that pacing guide because if I religiously adhere to the pacing guide, I am not only a “good teacher,” but the kids will meet both my high expectations (rigor, relevance, and relationships are our 3 buzz words this year) and raise the scores on standardized testing.

What? You followed the pacing guide and the students not only failed your class but their scores on standardized testing went down????? It’s obvious you are A BROKEN TEACHER.

Today, at the collab meeting, teachers were directed to forget trying to change the students: we have to fix our instructional techniques to fix the problems in our classrooms. Let’s see, that includes adding more tech (I have one, count it, one computer in my classroom that is 8 years old, an overhead projector that is at least a dozen years old, an equally aged TV set, and both a VCR and a DVD player that I purchased out of pocket) and adding more projects to the curriculum.

Sure, that works: a project, instead of say, an essay. Printing some graphics and gluing copy off the internet onto poster board, and then scribbling a border with crayons to add interest? That oughta be worth what? 100 points? Believe me, if I give the kid something to read and then test him/her on it, there ain’t no way the result is going to come anywhere near 100 points! But a project? Yeah, that’ll plump up those failing grades and make my end-of-year stats look a whole lot better.

No way! We ARE not going to talk about tardies or truancies, nor the failure of students to bring books to class, or come with paper/pencils/pen, nor the inability of any except the most dedicated student to complete homework assignments. Remember: students are only on the clock between 8 am and 3 pm, unless it’s a shortened collab day, and then it’s only from 9 am until 3 pm, unless it’s a pep assembly, and then it’s from 8 am until 2:20 pm, unless it’s a minimum day, and then it’s from 8 am until 12:15 pm, unless it’s a non-student-contact day, and then we get another in-service in how to improve student performance by improving our ability to deliver relevant, rigorous curriculum because ALL of our students are going to college!

Today was the day to hand in the enrichment project (yep, a project, which I’ve been assured students will complete, find interesting and enjoyable, and learn from doing) which was assigned one month ago, on April 16. The students had a choice of 6 different enrichment projects, ranging from writing a letter of recommendation to making a video tape (remember: our buzz word is "relevant"). Throughout the month, I’ve reminded the students about the coming due date, and last week, went over the choices several times.

A total of 105 students were offered the opportunity to add “enrichment credit” to their dismally low grades with 19 days left of the semester—not much time to leap from the 30% range into the 60% range and actually pass the class. Of the 105 potential projects, I received 6, and that includes the artist who has been painting the knight coming out of the castle, 2 letters of recommendation, a really crappy poster, and 2 superhero write-ups, one of which was downloaded from the internet and the other handwritten in pencil and filled with errors.

That’s all, folks. In my world, that means that 99/105 students just don’t give a damn. The kids don’t care if they fail a class: they’ll make it up in summer school, getting 18 weeks’ worth of credit for spending 3 weeks during the summer doing worksheets and more projects! It doesn’t matter what instructional strategies I use in the classroom because they are in charge of their success—and their failure—not I.

I am not broken, but I am frustrated, discouraged, and angry. I cannot fight a system that not only empowers kids to fail, but assures it by refusing to maintain high expectations for them regarding attendance, discipline, participation, and accountability—and reinforcing the message that “we don’t need no education” by cutting precious instructional minutes from day after day after day.

Until we are willing to look at the kids, as well as the Broken Teacher, the system is going to continue its amazingly rapid downhill slide into total chaos. I won’t be there: 18 days and counting.