I considered taking an extra period, but I concluded that it's too much like gnawing my own paw off to get out of the trap. All that does is reclaim the physical space, but doesn't create a conference period. And the price for possessing my own eighth-acre of carpet is high: more students, more work, poor pay, and still no office hour. It's going backward.
There are only two paths: change my conference period (too late now for this year, but I'll be damned if I'm getting stuck for a sixth year) to share the love with other teachers for a change, or more classrooms, which of course is the ultimate solution.
We are putting in a new permanent building to replace those ancient 600 wing portable (one blushes with shame to attempt the word "temporary") rooms, the oldest on campus. What I hear is that two years from now a two-story cathedral of glass and stucco will descend from the clouds, and the rooms of it shall be fourteen, and lo, the high school office will find its home there. Much of the lawn on Woodruff Ave., at the end of the south parking lot and where the 800 wing ends, will be cut away to create a new driveway to handle the increased traffic (the whole parking lot gets reconfigured, too). I guess Color Guard will have to find a new place to practice…
I'm sure the newer portables behind the "raft" of currently raised classrooms will have to go to make room for the new building, so those teachers (Tressalyn King and some other RSP people are back there, and I don't know who else, or how many) will occupy much of it: six from the raft, and let's say six more from those other rooms. That leaves only two new rooms, and we have nine vagrant teachers this year. Not much relief there.
I may be wrong: Tressalyn et. al. may not be displaced, in which case eight shiny new rooms will welcome the lion's share of our current credentialed homeless. That will qualify as a bona-fide solution in my book, if that ninth wanderer can be given a room somewhere as well.
The building that is now the high school office? Who knows to what use that will be put. When I started shaving, it was for the use of ASB: a large central room with a conference table and chairs, one office on one side (where Lane's and Kameoka's two closet-offices are now) and the reason Burford has those sliding windows in her office is because that used to be the student store. Yes, you're right, there was no wall: it incorporated what is now Mr. Eeles' office. I wonder what Amanda would do the those kind of facilities at her fingertips?
Decades ago, when we had a sane situation, Rms. 100 & 102 was an undivided "counseling center." All the counselors (one for each grade level: what a revolutionary idea!) and a vice principal had offices in the back, with secretaries up front, and a service counter just inside the door running the entire width of the double-wide room (okay, there were a couple of cut-outs to walk through). All very Ferris Bueller.
The history lesson is not just an exercise in nostalgia: the situation has changed incrementally over time (with the absorption of the junior high school onto the Mayfair campus in the early 80s being a notable exception). Administrators have come and gone, teachers have folded up their careers to be replaced by fresher faces who don't remember how it used to be, and the current situation begins to become normalized. What's at the end of that process? Nine homeless teachers and James Flemming in an embarrassment of an "office" that three people can't sit in. What we have now is not normal, and cannot be accepted as normal, or we've already lost.
I'm not trying to return to the past (even though the accommodations were much more, well, accommodating); I'm trying to get back to the audacious "normal" of a room for every teacher, a conference period in every pot, and office space that has some. Space, that is.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Thursday, September 04, 2008
The Squeaky Wheel
There has been a traveling teacher using my classroom on my conference period every year for the past four years. This means I cannot use my desk, pick up my phone, access my file cabinets, or use any other resource in the room to review, plan, prepare, write, or anything else one might do with an office hour. I usually sit in the "teachers lounge," with slapping copy machines, rumbling soda vending machines, and the conversations that have to be loud enough to rise above that din. Not much of a lounge; visions of sofas and coffee pots must be left at the theater.
I've asked to be rotated out of the traveling teacher parade (poor homeless wretches that they are) and have a real conference period this year. After all, isn't four years enough? But we're over-crowded, and there isn't much physical space to put teachers and students. This situation has not changed in the fifteen years I've worked here.
Yesterday my room was given to the Special Ed. department to conduct an in-service. I understood they were to be there from 10:30 until noon. Fine, I'll go have lunch. But when I walk in, the instructor told me she was setting up camp until 3:30. On the day before classes begin, I'm displaced from my room. With a new subject to prepare for.
Well, this is just too much. I've been nothing but sympathetic and accommodating, but now I'm exiled from my room on the day before school starts. I'm done being nice about this, and if it's the squeaky wheel what gets the greasing, that's just what I'm going to have to do.
I've tried to be nice, and sympathetic, and understanding, and patient. But this was the straw that has broken the camel's back. I've spent my patience. I've gone from team player to irritant. Something has to change, and I don't care if it's my conference period, or if someone else takes a turn at being inconvenienced.
I'm going to raise the awareness of the larger issue, our need for more physical classrooms to accommodate the greater number of physical teachers and physical students. This problem needs to be addressed, and plans need to be drawn up and implemented for a final resolution. I'm afraid there are going to be people who are not going to like me, because there may be some toes that need to be stepped on. Well, a lot of change will only happen when enough discomfort is felt with the way things are, so I'm going to start wearing my boots to work.
I've asked to be rotated out of the traveling teacher parade (poor homeless wretches that they are) and have a real conference period this year. After all, isn't four years enough? But we're over-crowded, and there isn't much physical space to put teachers and students. This situation has not changed in the fifteen years I've worked here.
Yesterday my room was given to the Special Ed. department to conduct an in-service. I understood they were to be there from 10:30 until noon. Fine, I'll go have lunch. But when I walk in, the instructor told me she was setting up camp until 3:30. On the day before classes begin, I'm displaced from my room. With a new subject to prepare for.
Well, this is just too much. I've been nothing but sympathetic and accommodating, but now I'm exiled from my room on the day before school starts. I'm done being nice about this, and if it's the squeaky wheel what gets the greasing, that's just what I'm going to have to do.
I've tried to be nice, and sympathetic, and understanding, and patient. But this was the straw that has broken the camel's back. I've spent my patience. I've gone from team player to irritant. Something has to change, and I don't care if it's my conference period, or if someone else takes a turn at being inconvenienced.
I'm going to raise the awareness of the larger issue, our need for more physical classrooms to accommodate the greater number of physical teachers and physical students. This problem needs to be addressed, and plans need to be drawn up and implemented for a final resolution. I'm afraid there are going to be people who are not going to like me, because there may be some toes that need to be stepped on. Well, a lot of change will only happen when enough discomfort is felt with the way things are, so I'm going to start wearing my boots to work.
Monday, September 01, 2008
Every Good Thing Must Come to an End
It's Labor Day, the last day of summer vacation. I sense an underlying urgency to either get out and accomplish a ton of stuff, to make my last day "count," or just lie around, in complete denial, to "make the last hours of summer last." That's just a type of denial, as any student with homework due on Monday knows.
So I'm going to cut a middle path: just get some low-level errands done, putter around the house, getting things done in a low-level way. Works for me.
Been on campus all last week and much of the week before, getting all my new Driver Ed. material sorted out and planning the first week. Lots of drill & kill. but it will take going through it once or twice to get a lay of the land and begin to see where I want to make changes.
Uh-oh: tea kettle is whistling…
So I'm going to cut a middle path: just get some low-level errands done, putter around the house, getting things done in a low-level way. Works for me.
Been on campus all last week and much of the week before, getting all my new Driver Ed. material sorted out and planning the first week. Lots of drill & kill. but it will take going through it once or twice to get a lay of the land and begin to see where I want to make changes.
Uh-oh: tea kettle is whistling…
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Familiarity Breeds Contempt
Is it just me?
I grew up in an era where service personnel wouldn't think of addressing a customer by his first name. The correct form of address to use with a customer is the title "Sir" or "Ma'am", unless I'm a regular and invite the clerk to address me by my first name. But that perogative belongs to me, and until the invitation is given, it's presumptuous to be so familiar.
So today when I walk into It's A Grind and order my regular ice-blended mocha, no whip, I hesitated when the kid behind the counter asks me for my name. I looked around the virtually vacant store, and gave it to him, laughing that he wouldn't be likely to forget what I look like in the next three minutes. I was, at that moment, one of three customers in the store.
He's a nice kid, and bright. He recognized my discomfort, and laughed along with me. I don't blame him: he is only asking my my name because someone trained him to ask, but it just doesn't play well with people in my generation. This kid is not on a first name basis with me: he doesn't need to know my name in order to throw some milk, ice and cocoa powder in a blender and then bring it to me.
Same interaction when I use my debit card at the supermarket. The clerk looks at the readout, then thanks me, using my first name. I bristle. Once the clerk addressed me as "Mr. Coulter," and I was so pleasantly surprised, I smiled, even though he had no need to know my name either. At least after gaining the knowledge, he addressed me properly. I use cash more and more, for this very reason. I'm not in anyone's database, and the clerk just thanks me and hands me my purchases. Anonymous, as the Good Lord intended.
The whole idea of gradations of social status is being blurred. And when I am addressed by my first name by service providers, I lose status in the social interaction. That's why the policeman who pulls you over invariably addresses you by your first name once you hand him your license: he calls you by your first name, but all you can do is look at his name tag, and reply with "Officer Snodgrass". That is how these power relationships are played, and in my opinion, they're valid distinctions. When I'm addressed by my first name by people I don't know, that distinction is blurred, and I lose power in that interaction with that company. Using my title forces the company to treat me with respect. The vanishing of that social barrier may lead to the company taking other license in our interaction that may work to my disadvantage.
Besides, I'm forty-seven years old. The twenty-something behind the counter shouldn't be taking such liberties.
Do you you really want to be treated casually by companies that are supposed to be there to meet your needs? Your auto insurance agent? Your car salesman? Your plumber? Your car detailer? Go back through that list again, and play it both ways in your mind.
You may chalk this little rant up to someone who grew up in a blue collar household who is desperately trying to put on the airs of the middle-class by demanding the social courtesies, and you have that right. Or that I enjoy the superiority in my job with my students, and so now I want to experience it out in public. But I see it as a general loss of civility in our culture, so if you are over thirty, you can have an opinion based on actual experience.
In resturants, it has been de riguer or twenty years for the server to introduce himself to the table party. I understand this cultural practice originated here in California in the Eighties, but I haven't traveled enough to confirm this. The idea is credible, though.
Let me tell you: I don't care what the hell your name is. Your name is not intregal to my experience. Just bring me my food and keep my coffee cup topped off, and we'll get along just fine, anonymously. I'm not here because I need to initiate new friendships. I'm here to be served. And I don't believe for a second that you care what my name is either, or remember it for 30 seconds after our interaction. I don't expect you to, and I find with whole thing just a bit creepy.
In the Information Age, the first casualty has been our privacy.
And dont' get me started on employees chewing gum and eating food in sight of the customers!
I grew up in an era where service personnel wouldn't think of addressing a customer by his first name. The correct form of address to use with a customer is the title "Sir" or "Ma'am", unless I'm a regular and invite the clerk to address me by my first name. But that perogative belongs to me, and until the invitation is given, it's presumptuous to be so familiar.
So today when I walk into It's A Grind and order my regular ice-blended mocha, no whip, I hesitated when the kid behind the counter asks me for my name. I looked around the virtually vacant store, and gave it to him, laughing that he wouldn't be likely to forget what I look like in the next three minutes. I was, at that moment, one of three customers in the store.
He's a nice kid, and bright. He recognized my discomfort, and laughed along with me. I don't blame him: he is only asking my my name because someone trained him to ask, but it just doesn't play well with people in my generation. This kid is not on a first name basis with me: he doesn't need to know my name in order to throw some milk, ice and cocoa powder in a blender and then bring it to me.
Same interaction when I use my debit card at the supermarket. The clerk looks at the readout, then thanks me, using my first name. I bristle. Once the clerk addressed me as "Mr. Coulter," and I was so pleasantly surprised, I smiled, even though he had no need to know my name either. At least after gaining the knowledge, he addressed me properly. I use cash more and more, for this very reason. I'm not in anyone's database, and the clerk just thanks me and hands me my purchases. Anonymous, as the Good Lord intended.
The whole idea of gradations of social status is being blurred. And when I am addressed by my first name by service providers, I lose status in the social interaction. That's why the policeman who pulls you over invariably addresses you by your first name once you hand him your license: he calls you by your first name, but all you can do is look at his name tag, and reply with "Officer Snodgrass". That is how these power relationships are played, and in my opinion, they're valid distinctions. When I'm addressed by my first name by people I don't know, that distinction is blurred, and I lose power in that interaction with that company. Using my title forces the company to treat me with respect. The vanishing of that social barrier may lead to the company taking other license in our interaction that may work to my disadvantage.
Besides, I'm forty-seven years old. The twenty-something behind the counter shouldn't be taking such liberties.
Do you you really want to be treated casually by companies that are supposed to be there to meet your needs? Your auto insurance agent? Your car salesman? Your plumber? Your car detailer? Go back through that list again, and play it both ways in your mind.
You may chalk this little rant up to someone who grew up in a blue collar household who is desperately trying to put on the airs of the middle-class by demanding the social courtesies, and you have that right. Or that I enjoy the superiority in my job with my students, and so now I want to experience it out in public. But I see it as a general loss of civility in our culture, so if you are over thirty, you can have an opinion based on actual experience.
In resturants, it has been de riguer or twenty years for the server to introduce himself to the table party. I understand this cultural practice originated here in California in the Eighties, but I haven't traveled enough to confirm this. The idea is credible, though.
Let me tell you: I don't care what the hell your name is. Your name is not intregal to my experience. Just bring me my food and keep my coffee cup topped off, and we'll get along just fine, anonymously. I'm not here because I need to initiate new friendships. I'm here to be served. And I don't believe for a second that you care what my name is either, or remember it for 30 seconds after our interaction. I don't expect you to, and I find with whole thing just a bit creepy.
In the Information Age, the first casualty has been our privacy.
And dont' get me started on employees chewing gum and eating food in sight of the customers!
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
It's Started
This is the first week of the 4th quarter, and Brother, you can tell.
Students are slow to respond to instruction, easliy distracted, and talkative. I mean, even more than usual.
As for myself, for some reason I'm energized instead of enervated, so it doesn't bother me that much. School days remaining = 45. That may seems a low number at first read, but it translates into another eight weeks and change, or 2 months and 5 days. Counting all days until the last day of school: 65 days. Now it don't seem just around the corner anymore, do it, Willis?
That's what I'm saying. This is the best of times, this is the worst of times.
I think I'll go in early in the morning and do some planning.
Students are slow to respond to instruction, easliy distracted, and talkative. I mean, even more than usual.
As for myself, for some reason I'm energized instead of enervated, so it doesn't bother me that much. School days remaining = 45. That may seems a low number at first read, but it translates into another eight weeks and change, or 2 months and 5 days. Counting all days until the last day of school: 65 days. Now it don't seem just around the corner anymore, do it, Willis?
That's what I'm saying. This is the best of times, this is the worst of times.
I think I'll go in early in the morning and do some planning.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Quote of the Week
Overheard today somewhere on campus:
Teacher: What is the name of the Mexican president overthrown during the Mexican Revolution in the 1930s?
Student #1: Ceasar Chavez!
Student #2: That's Cuba.
Student #1: At least I got the state right.
Teacher: What is the name of the Mexican president overthrown during the Mexican Revolution in the 1930s?
Student #1: Ceasar Chavez!
Student #2: That's Cuba.
Student #1: At least I got the state right.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Exactly
from Gene Veith's blog
This is what my students come in with: subjective feelings, but no developed aesthetic. Part of that is because they're young, and part is that they haven't been trained to think objectively. That makes it difficult to teach literary concepts, because their first impulse is to filter everything through their subjective tastes. A discussion of humor is met with statements expressing whether or not they think something is funny; they respond to suspense with complaints of boredom conditioned from countless movie car crashes and 22-minute sitcom conflict resolutions; they miss the point time and time again, because they're blind to technique, and sensitive only to (emotionally filtered) effect. I have to deconstruct their non-aesthetic in order to establish a new foundation built in objective universals. I try to give them the "knowledge of the art form" so that "careful attention and reflection" can happen.
It's a mental slugfest. But I usually win, unless the student is so close-minded that new ideas cannot penetrate his protective cocoon of emotional warmth. I've had students literally put their fingers in their ears rather than hear an idea that challenged some cherished, comfortable view of life. Imagine.
Beauty exits not soley in the eye of the beholder: it's a Platonic form. The standard is outside ourselves, and getting teens to venture outside their selves is the challenge.
...[I]t is important to realize that there is a huge difference between saying "that is good" and "I like that." The former is an objective statement. The latter is a subjective response. Most confusions about aesthetic matters come from mixing up the two kinds of judgments. Indeed, ignoring the first one, considering the objective merits, and thinking that LIKING something is that same as recognizing its beauty. We can LIKE all kinds of things— things that make us feel gooey inside, nostalgic associations, easy jolts of hedonism, things we agree with, appeals to our sinful nature (which is why Hollywood goes the way it does)— whereas discerning beauty requires knowledge of the art form and careful attention and reflection. Growing in taste involves learning to subjectively "like" what is objectively 'good. (Emphasis added)
This is what my students come in with: subjective feelings, but no developed aesthetic. Part of that is because they're young, and part is that they haven't been trained to think objectively. That makes it difficult to teach literary concepts, because their first impulse is to filter everything through their subjective tastes. A discussion of humor is met with statements expressing whether or not they think something is funny; they respond to suspense with complaints of boredom conditioned from countless movie car crashes and 22-minute sitcom conflict resolutions; they miss the point time and time again, because they're blind to technique, and sensitive only to (emotionally filtered) effect. I have to deconstruct their non-aesthetic in order to establish a new foundation built in objective universals. I try to give them the "knowledge of the art form" so that "careful attention and reflection" can happen.
It's a mental slugfest. But I usually win, unless the student is so close-minded that new ideas cannot penetrate his protective cocoon of emotional warmth. I've had students literally put their fingers in their ears rather than hear an idea that challenged some cherished, comfortable view of life. Imagine.
Beauty exits not soley in the eye of the beholder: it's a Platonic form. The standard is outside ourselves, and getting teens to venture outside their selves is the challenge.
Friday, February 08, 2008
Jekyll and Hyde
The student fought me at every turn. Off-task. No homeowrk turned in. Little classwork done. Had to listen to me tell him every day to pull his pants up to cover his butt, to turn around and face the front of the room, to stop talking to other students: basically, I was on his back the entire term, trying to get something worthwhile out of him.
And he didn't like it. "Why are you always picking on me?" he asked. He was even belligerent at times; earned a couple of detentions. I may have even taken him outside for a "counseling with student" in the hallway, when the whole class knows he's being chewed out by the teacher for something.
He barely passed, and only because I cared more than he. That 62% was hard-fought.
This year, he calls my name across the quad whenever he sees me, and waves & smiles. He stops off in my room to tell me news about his life: driver's license, car, whatever.
Those are the rules of the game.
And he didn't like it. "Why are you always picking on me?" he asked. He was even belligerent at times; earned a couple of detentions. I may have even taken him outside for a "counseling with student" in the hallway, when the whole class knows he's being chewed out by the teacher for something.
He barely passed, and only because I cared more than he. That 62% was hard-fought.
This year, he calls my name across the quad whenever he sees me, and waves & smiles. He stops off in my room to tell me news about his life: driver's license, car, whatever.
Those are the rules of the game.
Friday, February 01, 2008
How Not to Spend $140
My frigid morning commute is not due to faulty vacuum switches, but to a clogged heater core. I had the whole cooling system flushed out this last weekend, and now that some of the grit and hard pieces are gone, the core is clogged slightly less: I can almost feel heat coming from the vents when the car is fully warmed-up, which happens about halfway to school. Not enough to make the slightest difference in my comfort, though the windshield does defrost slightly more quickly.
It's time to think about dumping this car.
It's time to think about dumping this car.
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