Do I have to be heroic?
My school district has to cut up to $36 million right now.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...
Call me crazy, but I think these kinds of cuts will affect scores on the California High School Exit Exam.
http://www.ocregister.com/...
In the picture, the young lady on the right was one of my Algebra students.
The California lunch program feeds 3.1 million children. It may run out of money before the end of this school year.
http://www.insidesocal.com/...
Santa Ana Unified School District is the largest school district in Orange County. Yes, that Orange County, home of seriously virulent Republicanism. Home of "Laguna Beach." Home of "Housewives of Orange County." Home of "Orange County," both the movie and the teevee show.
Straight from the District web site:
Number of Students: 54,369 (K-12)
Geographic Size: 24 Square Miles
Number of Employees: 6,680
Size of Operating Budget: $487.2 million
Student Racial/Ethnic Composition:
94.4% Latino
1.89% White
3.3% Asian/Pacific Islander/Filipino
0.7% African American
0.1% Native American
0.4% Other
Other Info:
SAUSD is the 7th largest school district in California, and the largest in Orange County.
Approximately 60% of SAUSD students are English learners. Spanish, Vietnamese and Khmer are the most common languages spoken at home.
80% of SAUSD students participate in free or reduced-price meal programs.
It's taking a while, but I'm writing a diary about No Child Left Behind, high-stakes testing and its effect on my teaching. It's not ready.
But a diary currently on the Rec List, and the comments it has generated, hits me hard.
Why do I have to be heroic?
Let's say it right now: There is no way anybody could say my school district is in a middle class area. It's not in a war zone but there's a gang presence. It's worse across town from where my school is but only by a degree. There are lots of kids in my school who are technically homeless. Lots have been dumped by their parents on to grandmothers, aunts, older siblings. Nevertheless, most students are nice kids with quick smiles. Most kids make a decent effort at learning stuff. Sure, I have students who drive me crazy because they're disruptive or won't do anything but for every one of them, there's a kid who will stop on the way out of class, hold up his or her paper and say, "I get it now. I can do it."
My smallest class has forty students in it. An "educational decision" was made to increase the time students spend in math class (two periods a day, now) but it was coupled with an increase in the number of students in the class. In other words, it was b.s. By increasing the number of students in the classroom, the district saves the cost of one math teacher per grade and covers it with blather that the extra time in the class will increase student achievement (Let's get real; it's supposed to raise student scores on high-stakes, NCLB testing.).
There are no extra classes for students who are low-achieving. They are right there in my classroom and that's what they get. English-learners, mainstreamed Special Education students, kids who have never done well in Math, all of them; they are in my classroom and I'm tasked to make them "Proficient." After school tutoring is voluntary; that is to say it is voluntary for the teacher because there is no money to get paid for it. There's Federal money available for tutoring from private companies that don't have to hire credentialed teachers; they are for-profit companies so you can imagine who they hire and for how much.
There is still a music program at my school but it is the only "extra." All of the other electives are gone. I figure, with the latest cuts, this year's holiday concerts will be the last.
I took my job in Santa Ana because I needed a job. I wasn't hired through some get-teachers-into-needy-schools program. I probably belong where I am because I'm a trench fighter. I have whatever psychological make-up that's necessary to go do battle in these conditions. I probably don't belong in one of the other, have-money areas districts where every student is assumed to be college-bound.
So this is my rant:
- Bail out the schools. Hire a bunch of Americans to go in and fix what's broken, modernize what's old and make each site energy efficient. Make sure there's enough money to feed the students who need to be fed. Make sure every school district has enough money to keep enough teachers working. Make sure every teacher has resources. Make sure every teacher has help with children who have needs, whether those needs are academic, language-based, personal, due a disability, whatever.
In hard times, make the schools the shining example of recovery and hope. Don't let the schools stand in line for their share. Schools should be in the front of the line and other concerns should do without. Decide that children are more important than adults.
- Decide what school is for. Is it to make students college-bound? Is it to train workers? Is it to inform and prepare future voters? Is school just about reading and math?
- I don't need more computers; I need more teachers. I need another Math teacher so that my class sizes can go down to a manageable 35-or-so. Yeah, that's right. I'd be happy at 35 and they really ought to be smaller than that. I need another Special Education teacher available to help the ten kids in each of my two morning classes. I need my classroom aide to not be fired when the the cuts come. I could use another guidance counselor to help with my "troubled" students.
I need people. Real, live, paid people.
- I need politicians to stop talking about hiring better teachers. Do you have any idea how insulting that is for those of us working right now? Let's admit what we're saying: Anybody who is a teacher must not have gone to the best colleges. Anybody who is a teacher must not have achieved the best grades in college. Anybody who is a teacher must not have what it takes to do something else that would pay better. College graduate who can't find a job? Well, gee, you could always teach (as if anybody could be a teacher).
Let's change the message and smack our politicians around until they start saying the right thing. Let's make being a teacher an attractive career option. If we really care about children and their future, then the best people available should be attracted to the job, trained to do the job, paid to do the job and honored. It should be an object of honor if a young person is training to be a teacher.
And if I'm not plain enough on what you non-teachers should think and expect our politicians to think, watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/...
Yeah, would that be you nodding your head at what that "dinner guest" was saying about teachers? Do you have children; do you want them to grow up to be teachers?
I am not some kind of hero. No teacher should be. But we're under a heap of pressure to do heroic, even miraculous, things while society makes demands but cuts us off at the knees. We are objects of derision or pity, and sometimes both. People whisper when they say they think we deserve the money we are paid.