Thanks for the support. I really appreciate it. Everything I ranted about was, well, true, but not something we were allowed to say in teacher ed classes. At least, not above a whisper. It’s most certainly not what we’re supposed to be saying in higher academia when we ask ourselves, “Is our children learning?” 
The things I rant about with other teachers or in private company is not something that we really talk about in teacher ed or conferences or in the education magazines. It sounds insensitive when we do that. Racist. Ethnocentric. Elitist. Anything but honest. My boss/admin grew up in Baltimore and he is very sympathetic to a lot of these kids, but not to their parents. (He, too, saw his brother shot when he was just a kid.) I also appreciate that he will tell the superintendent, “Hey, we don’t do magic here. We can’t fix their homes. We do what’s right, and we hope it sticks with some of them.” He rolls his eyes when he hears that our attendance goals are 90 per cent and pass rate 80 per cent. He leaves it up to us if we want to fudge numbers and give passing Ds to kids who can’t (or wouldn’t) read and write all year. I don’t. I gave out mostly Fs for the first quarter - even to the kids I really, really adored. If you didn’t do the work, I won’t give you credit! (There is one teacher at our center who regularly helps the students cheat with Google…grrr.)
In response to Argent Tower’s question, I actually do ask kids why they act that way. I try to do this in private, but a lot of my students have anger issues and they know they act like shitheads. They’ll say, “I’m sorry, Miss, I know, I’m gonna do better…” and they can’t quite figure out how to regulate themselves. I do what I can to teach those tools, but I’m a teacher, not a shrink. Usually I phrase it like, “Student C, what’s up? Why all those nasty words?” and then further explain, “I have a job to do, too. You understand why it’s not cool for me when you talk to me like that?” and (my favorite) “Do you talk to your mom that way? Your boss? Let’s respect each other, okay? How can I help you feel better right now?” Kids will 9/10 times own up to their actions, even grudgingly. Even if they say, “I called you a fucking bitch because fucking I hate you and you’re always up in my business an’ I ain’t playin’ around!” they’ll admit that they’re out of line. And after awhile (these convos last 10-20 mins in the hall), they will say something like, “Miss, I just get so damned mad! I can’t help it!” and I say, “Okay, well, do me a favor. If you start using that language, just check yourself. Say, ‘Oh, sorry, Miss’ and I’ll appreciate that. And if I see you getting upset, I’ll let you cool off and we’ll take it to the hallway. Or you can just tell me you want to be alone. But you can’t talk to me that way. It won’t happen here. If you can’t handle this, you go home. Period. And then we’ll try it again tomorrow.”
I think this approach works (most of the time). It’s not magic, and no one changes overnight, but I’ve had some very bad attitudes change (towards me) over the course of the last eight weeks. I remember last week a girl was angry at me and she was like, “Fucking — sorry, Miss — this is so frigging stupid, why I gotta do this damned work?! Hey, I can say ‘damn’! Why you gotta be in my faaaaaace? Shii----shaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaggh! BAD WORDS!”
re: Immigration: I am angry at parents who have lied to their kids about status or never took the steps to correct it. Most of them came here with papers and the papers expired. Or maybe only mom or dad has papers and they came later. Parents have to take care of that. I have SO MANY students who just missed the five year extension lapse deadline for getting a new visa and now they’re stuck: conversational Spanish skills, good English, no papers, no chance of much now. If they go home, they trigger a five or ten year ban. Their only options seem like gangs and/or babies. (Try to get THAT student motivated to do well in class or go to college!)
I have a student with a deadbeat dad, right? His dad left twelve years ago. Guess what? His dad is a citizen. This kid has no papers. None. So he finally found his dad online and his dad didn’t give a damn. He’s a sweet kid, really - a tad lazy, can’t read well, tries to act tough but he really isn’t. He seeks the approval of adults. He’s also ‘associated’ with the gang that has been ‘stalking’ the other boy.
Oh, my god. I hate gangs. They take kids and turn them into criminals (or worse: take kids, get them into trouble, and kids are locked up with real criminals). The ‘adults’ run those rings. I teach in the Denver metro area - which isn’t anything like DC or East LA - and I still see how it ruins people’s lives. Innocent people, too. Kids!
Today I fed a student. Again. The drawback about kids coming to our center (for expelled kiddos) is that we don’t feed them. At their old schools, they got free breakfast and lunch. Sometimes we have kids that eat nothing until 1 or 2 in the afternoon, and it’s usually junk. Sounds weird, but hungry kids make me the angriest. I’d like to feed all 40 of them every day, but I can’t. I keep granola bars in my desk. Not the most nutritious thing, but they’re cheap and will kill the stomach pain for awhile. Some of these kids don’t have a lot of food because their parents don’t take care of them and some just don’t because their moms try but it doesn’t go far. A bowl of cereal at 6am. School til 11. Not a full meal til dinner.
Thanks again for the encouragement. I get so frustrated by the defeatist attitude I see everyday. Admittedly, sometimes it’s my own.
//end rant
I would have loved to have you as a parent in my class!
It makes us both look good to the higher-ups.
I said, “Well, dear, I imagine that’s what lemons might taste like if you squeezed them and added a bit of sugar and water.” And he said, “It ain’t bad, Miss, it ain’t bad. I can get behind that.”