First Day at Summer School Number 2

July 6th

This morning I got up early so that I could help Emily prepare my room for summer school. Similar to last year, it was chaotic. Students and parents lined the hallways eager to register their kids for classes. Inside the office teachers stood around looking frantic and quickly snatched up supplies as soon as they were put on the table. I was no different. After locating my room, Rogelio's old Spanish classroom, and dropping off my magazines and writer's notebook, I returned like a hungry wolf to the supply corner. I grabbed tape, a box filled with pens, a highlighter box, 26 notebooks, and a box of files. I marched them upstairs and then grabbed Emily and returned for a pad of poster paper and scissors. An older woman told me I was only allowed one pad at a time so I was resigned to the fact. Last year Erin and I had taken about six. I'm guessing the budget's a bit tighter this year. Although I can't recall her name, I knew she was in charge of the program so I asked her if I had a class list. She looked me dead in the eye and then turned away, ignoring me completely. This was not lost on Emily who commented later on how incredibly rude it was.

In the course of my 20 minutes of being there, I discovered that no one had a copy code. The minute I began making copies of my syllabus, other teachers descended upon me like I was fresh meat. "When did you get the code?" one asked. I told her that it was my old code from working here this past year, which still worked. To appease the multitude, and prevent them from maiming me, I handed out my sacred password. You cannot imagine their desperation. No one, not a single teacher, knew the time class started. There were rumors running around that it was at 7:45 and possibly ended at 10:30. Others heard 8-11. It was 7:30 when I left and no one knew when to begin or even who was going to be in their class. No one had a pass code for the printer so lessons planned were or would have crumbled if it weren't for my passing on my code. When I left I told Emily that last year we picked up our classes down in the cafeteria. As I turned to leave, I saw her run down the hall way hoping that someone, anyone was in the know.

True Poverty

What do you say to a student who asks you if you've ever been truly poor? The question caught me by surprise. "Like only havign two pair of pants and a pair of shoes poor. Like going without a meal poor," he said. I paused and thought back to the "poverty" of my youth. Growing up with a single parent busting her ass to keep me in private school. Although we had little, we did have a roof over our heads and food on our plates, even though the food was occassionally left on our doorstep. I had a grandma who bought me clothes, a father who spoiled me, and I never thought of hunger. My mother also married men that did well so I had plenty of Barbies and stuff animals to play with. "Have I ever been poor?" He told me of his life in Mexico City, of being left with relatives while his parents tried to make it in the States, "Sometimes they didn't send us money. Sometimes we didn't eat." He went on to describe his brick home with the tin roof. I had asked his class why people immigrated and whether or not they thought it was worth it. "It's better here," he ended. To him it's worth leaving Mexico in pursuit of the American Dream.

My Year In a Nut Shell

I had an interesting and eventful year as well. Like many of you I’ve been RIFed and am waiting to be called back. My original school is now full, but I’m not all together sad. For the most part my year was fine minus the first and fourth quarter. The first quarter I had a student threaten to shoot me, which I later discovered is more common place at my school than expected. Typically students receive 3 to 5 day suspensions even if they mention the day and time in which they will commit the act. Apparently this is considered venting. I was the rare teacher that pushed and succeeded in having him removed although without much support. My fourth quarter was when the gossip girls turned on me and decided to stage a rebellion. They were rude and started writing me lovely notes about how much I sucked as a human being. According to one parent, he didn’t so much care about the note but rather the fact that his little darling wrote her name on it. He told me that he had advised her to remove her name since she could be held liable with it. Therefore she took his advice and wrote a note in which she stated that she wanted to stab me to death and burn me alive. She went on to describe certain sexual acts she had had and then discussed me in that manner. Although her and her little pose were threatened with suspension nothing actually happened because she did not write her name. Off the record I was told by an administrator that since I was being laid off and had no hope in returning that it wasn’t worth pursuing. I felt special. Lastly, after packing my bags I returned later that week to discover that someone had stolen four of my boxes. According to the office it is just so sad and they will get back to me after viewing securing tapes. It’s been a week and my things are still missing. I almost want to put pictures of boxes on milk cartoons to see if that would speed up the process. But like one teacher put on my goodbye card, you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince. So two facts I know for sure: 1) I do love teaching despite it all and 2) My School was definitely, between you and me, a frog. Here’s to the next school year when we’ll have jobs and hopefully ones that we love!