As for an explanation:
I don’t typically type emotional blatherings on this webpage, but I wanted to explain why I haven’t been on in about a week. I find my motivation for many of the things I enjoy starting to slide. However, tomorrow I will share with you things I have gotten done.
I hate my job. No, seriously. I found myself backsliding from apathy to animosity. Here I am, squarely in bitterness land. I don’t think I can continue to compromise my belief structure this way. It’s demoralizing to sell out my values everyday. And for what? A salary? Benefits? It is an abysmal waste of time to keep a job out of fear. To quote Dolly Freed’s father, “Sure, you have security, but the slaves on the plantation didn’t starve either.” Right now, I am supporting a system that is modeled from the Prussian model, designed to create workers and squelch any creative thought. We are schooling our children, not educating them. The length of adolescence keeps expanding, independent of any logical thought on the matter. Why should a parent of a college student think it’s acceptable to call a professor on the student’s behalf? Why would a twenty five year old law school student find it acceptable to renege on a rental contract because he “found a better deal’? Our population is largely becoming infantalized and shallow, only interested in clothing, gossip or sports. And why? Because we schooled them to be this way. A shallow populace is easier to control and manipulate, whether it be employees or citizens. Anymore, our most sucessful inventors and entrepeneurs are high school or college dropouts. Mind you, education is one of the most important processes; however, education is not the same as schooling. In my personal experience, most of the people I know who are intelligent and introspective are not graduates of college; some did not even graduate high school. Now, I do know people who are college graduates and have the aforementioned qualities, but I know many more college grads who are just as superficial and shallow as the “uneducated.” Education is a lifestyle choice which has absolutely nothing to do with school. An educated person is able to self-teach or find his own teacher. He is willing to try things and even fail, then get back up and do it again. Resilience is critical to education and sucess. Really, it’s just a matter of getting up one more time than you fall down.
All of these thoughts have been rolling around in my head for a while now. By and large, I have been rather apathetic to the body politik involved in school. However, I have been moving towards aggression, slowly but surely. For instance, a student threatened a teacher with bodily harm. As is procedure, the teacher wrote up the student, assuming that the necessary steps would be taken to remove the student from school. Nope. The school refused to adequately or effectively punish the student. The teacher had to go outside the school and press charges against the student. Now, the school is targeting the teacher because he “went outside the school.” It’s ludicrious. Teachers’ grades are examined for failure rates, though no one bothers to look at why the students are failing, largely because they refuse to do most of the work. Exclamations of “fuck this class” and “this class is bullshit” loud enough to disrupt the entire class will only get you one day of In school suspension, which by the way, has been reduced from being a full day to ending at 1pm, so that the administration can code the ISS as a time out instead of a full day suspension. It is so they can report to the state that the behavior problems are diminishing. This is just the tip of the iceberg, as it were, explaining my anger which is starting to seep out of my skin.
I am transforming from the cheerful employee to the sarcastabitch from hell. For those of you unfamiliar with the idea of a referendum, it is a request for higher taxes from our local taxpayers in order to fund projects. While the superintendent was pitching the referendum to the staff, because he wants us to call people to get them to vote for it, he said, “can you hear me?” Without thinking, I replied, “unfortunately.” Apparently, I said it loud enough to be heard four rows up from where I was sitting. I am having a harder time containing my anger at students who absolutely refuse to work, but then apologize for their behavior and want to know why their grade is bad. They will ask for help, after having been complete assholes. Somehow, they have been taught that you can get away with being a jerk, so long as you say “I’m sorry.”
On Thursday, the proverbial straw fell onto this camel’s back. I was teaching “The Speech to the Virginia Convention” by Patrick Henry, the one featuring the immortal words “give me liberty, or give me death!” This brought about the concept of dying for honorable reasons. Nope, nothing is worth dying for or getting hurt. They would rather be alive under any circumstances, even slavery, because at least they would be alive. My hope for our country took a serious blow and is currently on life support. I know that it is popular these days to say that they are “just children,” but I don’t believe that for a second. They are from the ages of 15-20 (yes, I have some twenty year old juniors); they are adults by most generations before. I was so depressed, that I went home and did nothing. I mean, absolutely nothing. I wouldn’t even get off the couch to cook. DH asked me if I was hungry, to which I responded, “yes, but I don’t feel like doing anything about it.” My plan was to just be hungry rather than do anything. DH had to cook dinner, which was delicious, because I felt so broken. I have gone up at least two sizes of clothes and added thirty pounds over the course of the last five months because the stress makes me want to eat or punch people in the face. Since, obviously, I can’t accost people, I eat to allevate the stress.
I can’t do this anymore.
Themocracy
Wow, Penny! That’s a lot! Whether you know it or not, you are making a difference every day. You need to stick to your own beliefs and follow through with them. Keep teaching the best you can every day. Still hold a high standard and expect the best from your students. Remember, you teach for the students, for the kids who come your way. The students need you to hold a high standard. Ignore the administration, the system problems, the trends that you are sensing and that are making you angry. Keep on trucking and doing your personal best every day. This is how you can change the world.
I have been teaching 18 years. I have had a few days when I could write the exact post that you have written, but then I have had thousands of glorious days when I know that I am making a difference. It seems that just when I have a frustrating day or days, I will see a student that I have taught in the past in a store or the mall or the post office. And when they recognize me, give me a hug and tell me what they have accomplished in their lives, I realize that I have made a difference and that, by doing some of the difficult things that teachers have to do, by holding a high standard in class, by not letting myself fall into frustration, and by doing my personal best every day, I have helped a child on their way to being a responsible adult.
I hope that this helps!
Tamarie
Tamarie-
Thank you for our kind words of encouragement. I think I have managed to get ahold of myself enough to limp out the end of the year, at least.
It’s wonderful how people in the cyber world, many of whom I have never met, have managed to help me sort this out. I’m blessed. 
So this is how it is on the other side of the desk. My youngest is a senior in high school. The most amazing teacher she has ever had retired in December mainly for the reasons you stated in your post. I honestly do not know how to advise someone to keep pushing when the barrier is so impenetrable. I do know you pride yourself on work well done, so if for that reason only, you need to continue to do your best. You may be the teacher that makes the rest of the day bearable for a student. I am so thankful my daughter had a chance to learn from a teacher who cared. Hang in there, year end will be here soon.
Wait till you read Rhonda’s post on Down-to-earth, she is doing what WE WANT TO DO!
Exactly, though I don’t want to wait until “retirement.” My plan is to move in that direction within the next few years.
I have rather figured out how to deal with getting to the end of the year without self-imploding, but I really can’t wrap my brain about doing it again next year. Thank you so much for your words of encouragement, Laura. You have been a much needed cheerleader.
I’m so sorry! My husband is a high school teacher and is getting increasingly frustrated as well. The administration won’t support the staff, the parents baby their kids and refuse to let them accept responsibility for their actions and the kids are doing horrendous things and getting away with it. If I hear “we have to get used to it” one more time I might scream. Someone needs to take a stand and say this isn’t right and it can’t continue. Good luck and keeping it together til the end of the year.
Thanks for your support. I am sorry to hear that your husband is having the same troubles. It’s ridiculous that our country is coming to this, but I don’t think the change is going to come from teachers. I think it will probably have to come from the parents and society at large.