Post election deep thoughts (why I'm not shrieking nor obeying in advance and how novels help me make sense of all this shit)

I never voted for Donald Trump, and I never bought into the notion that because he wasn't part of government he could "fix" it, draining the swamp and all that nonsense.

I had read Jack Gance by Ward Just, after all, just one of many novels that show how despite whatever idealism a person brings to government, that will soon be beaten out of them for a more realistic (and/or corrupt) approach.  I had also lived and seen just how much the idealism that goes into entering the teaching field is quickly beaten out of you. AND I had become a parent, where the idealism of "my child will never" is destroyed within moments of leaving the safe cocoon of the hospital. 

If anything, in my mind, Donald Trump had a worse shot of fixing anything because he knew nothing about government, probably less than a fifth grader. Government is meetings and negotiations and downright fucking boring, and I never got the sense that Donald Trump could even handle that for a millisecond. 

But beyond all this, the reason I refused to ever vote for him was his behavior---making fun of disabled people, calling immigrants horrible things, telling people they come from shithole countries, his basic linguistic abuse of anyone and everyone. He embodied, and still embodies, the antithesis of everything I have ever taught my children or everything I was ever taught about being a decent human being. 

When I think about people voting for him to pack the courts or "save the babies" or close the border, I heard them compare him to biblical figures who, despite their flaws, did great things. But I saw the choice to vote for him for any of these reasons as a Faustian bargain. I still see it that way. 

Since the election, there has been great gnashing of teeth and shrieking, and perhaps those things are warranted, but they also feel like the exact same response from 2016, and it seems so extra this time. 

I am not at all suggesting that by 2020 things weren't shit because they were. Immigrant children were separated from their families, and the government was unable to locate and reunite them. The national debt grew even bigger under the Trump presidency per year than for many previous presidents.  Hundreds of thousands of people died due to COVID, but the fallout was profoundly shittier for the people who listened to Donald Trump and not their own physicians. None of this seemed like anything that would fall under the "What Would Jesus Do" heading. 

None of the people I see or read about who are carrying on are Cassandra, the Trojan princess. Unlike her, they have not been cursed with the knowledge of the future. And even if they did know the future and could speak to its accuracy 100%, no one will listen anyway. The assumption is that things will be horrible under Trump, and based on past experience, I don't doubt this, but how horrible will they be. Who knows? Will they be equally horrible for everyone? I doubt it. Or will it be like A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes where everyone, but especially women and children, are most ravaged?

The assumption is that if Kamala Harris had won, life would be roses, and that isn't a given either. I have been thinking about 11/22/63 by Stephen King about the assassination of JFK and what might have happened had it been foiled. The assumption is that everything would be wonderful in the future if only JFK had been able to complete his presidency, but protagonist Jake Epping visits the future to see the fruits of his work and finds that perhaps leaving history alone to play out as it did was the best option. 

Another thing I have been thinking about since the election is how much someone's political leaning matters to me. 

I recently had a falling out with someone who is very much left-leaning as I am. This person has a good heart, but I was working with this person in a professional capacity and was going crazy. I didn't understand why this person made the choices they did, why they micromanaged, why they were inefficient, how things could be in such disarray. It was stressing me out to a degree I just couldn't handle anymore and so I extricated myself in a way that hurt this person. It wasn't my desire to hurt this person, but I had just hit my proverbial wall. The relationship ended because I couldn't tolerate the manner in which this person operates; what works for them did not work for me. Should I have continued just because we are politically similar? Of course not. 

In another work situation, I am surrounded by people who are generally much more conservative than me. The working relationship is supportive, and I am not micromanaged. They value my input, and I value theirs. They are organized and consistent and communicative, all things I think are important to my professional mental health. So should I discontinue that relationship because we are politically different? Again, of course not. 

In October, before the election, some members of my family and I visited a small town in Kentucky and ate at a local restaurant. This town is largely white, and the county in which this town sits voted for Trump in the election (64/35). 

At the restaurant, I noticed that there were two black children sitting at a table. The little girl was coloring pictures, and the boy was watching a football game on an ipad. Their mother was working tables. What I noticed was how all of the other employees, who were white, took turns caring for the children. One server would sit and color with the little girl. A guy who I assumed was working back in the kitchen took her to a back office so she could watch television. Everyone was looking out for the kids and helping the mom, and that told me a lot more about this restaurant and, perhaps, the town, than who they vote for in a presidential election. 

Yes, this is simplistic, and I know there are horrible racist people in the world. But there would be horrible, racist people in the world if Kamala Harris had won. There were horrible, racist people in the world when Jesus lived. There will be horrible, racist people on the planet until there is no planet Earth. 

But I cannot listen to and watch people shriek and lament and wail because they just make me anxious. 

Whatl I can do is put good into the world in which I live. I can work with students and treat all of them with respect and kindness. I can share stories with them about history and discuss the ways in which life is complex and gray much more often than it is black or white. I can donate to causes that plant trees to help mitigate global climate change and help people have their civil rights restored (because that is a nightmare I will have to write about at some other time). I can stand up for others when they are being harassed or marginalized. I can stay the hell off social media much more than I was. 

I can refuse to submit to unkindness. I can refuse to call the police on my neighbors. I can decide when something is legal versus when something is moral...because don't we all do that anyway to some extent. 

And I can hope that MLK Jr was right and that the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice, but it will only bend if I am doing my little bit in my little corner of the world. 

Macbeth, MacDuff, social/political context, and being a man

I love to teach Macbeth to high school students because it is just packed full of so much humanity, and even though it is hundreds of years old, it is written in such a way that it is eternally relevant. 

My copy of Macbeth.

The other night a friend and I went to see a parking lot performance of the play (which was just brilliant for making theater happen safely for audiences during a pandemic). Even though I have read the play numerous times and seen the play performed numerous times, I was struck by how much the play relates to something I've seen being discussed lately in modern politics: 

What makes a man?

There seems to be a juxtaposition between Donald Trump as a "manly man" and Joe Biden as not because of showing affection to his son. I realize social media is not real life, but there seems to be this idea of a man as either 

1--physically strong, macho, won't back down, won't take no for an answer, grab 'em by the pussy

OR

2--affectionate with kids and dogs and therefore able to be taken advantage of. Rather than grabbing others by the pussy, this version of a man is that he is the pussy. 

A writer/professor I follow on Twitter recently wrote an article about this exact topic. 

I'm just going to acknowledge that it is stupid to have these polarities because manliness can be a lot of different things just as being a woman can be many things. A woman doesn't have to be maternal, just as a man doesn't have to be a clone of John Wayne. The context of the moment, though, is that there are two different men running for president who have drastically different "what a man is" personas. 

This is a central focus in Macbeth. Lady Macbeth gives her husband hell about having the balls to kill the king. "Be a man!" she more or less says to him. And so Macbeth becomes that "manly man" who ravages those around him, although after his first murder he does his killing mercilessly from a distance--he hires his murders out to others. He becomes paranoid and chaotic. 

On the other side, we have Macduff, whose wife and children Macbeth has someone else murder. When Macduff is told to "Dispute [their deaths] like a man," his reply shows the other option of what it means to be a man:

"I shall do so; But I must also feel it as a man, I cannot but remember such things were that were most precious to me." 

The entire play is a drama about the choices men make----to put ambition before everything else; to listen to others (in this case a lady) who insult them and badger them into "acting as a man" even when they know it is the wrong thing to do; to continue on the evil rampage because they've already gone too far and it's not worth it to turn back. 

It is always intellectually stimulating (those emotionally exhausting) when modern politics and Shakespeare's writing converge. 

Why I decided that unfriending people was the way to go

There came a time, I think it was in April, or maybe May, when I decided that I didn't need to be "friends" with certain people I know.
Heck, maybe I had made this decision by late March.

For a long time prior to this, there were people I was "friends" with whom I didn't actually like.
Mostly, they posted stuff like "Liberals this, that, and the other."
As if they know the hearts and minds of every single person who considers her/himself liberal-leaning.
Or they would post stuff about what Thomas Jefferson said about the republic, even though I know they didn't study history; they majored in business administration and maybe read a book or two about Jefferson.
Or they would argue with me, but arguing with me wasn't the problem.
It was their name-calling and willful fucking ignorance.
I can handle someone arguing me if they are presenting data or analysis or something more than, "But, but" and "Ok, then how about..."

I decided that in the world before FB existed, I would only raise my hand to wave at these people if I saw them in the neighborhood.
I wouldn't spend any time with them beyond a courtesy greeting once a year.
If I saw them out in public and knew they didn't see me, I'd probably also occasionally turn around and visit a different section of Home Depot to avoid speaking with them.

There is a whole mess of family that I am unfollowing and getting fairly close to unfriending since I haven't seen many of them since I was a child.
And they continue to post ridiculous stuff like "I don't see color" and "Christians are persecuted in the US" and other things that make me want to roll my eyes until they get stuck in the back of my head.

I had thought to myself that I was being open-minded by being "friends" with people who I strongly disagree with, but I finally decided that I was simply being driven crazy by people I don't actually care about.

And if I was gonna die during a pandemic or watch people die during a pandemic, I wasn't going to spend one extra second more than I had to being subjected to viewpoints that just make me angry.

I am all for having peaceful conversations because I am willing to learn from others and listen, but the truth is that there are some people whose minds are closed.
Having an argument with them is simply screaming into a void of nonsense or stupidity or derangement.

I determined that my own mental health was more important to me than making an effort to be "open-minded."

(I also deleted dead people because that just seems obvious.)

Dunder Mifflin and the conspiracy theory

I am old enough to have worked my fair number of jobs.

There was the ice cream shop when I was a teenager which was owned by a skeezy dude who made inappropriate remarks to his all-female staff.

I worked at the grocery store that went out of business because it was so poorly fiscally managed.

I worked at an online publishing company that had some cool people but also a manager who wrote soft porn and shared it with his employees as well as another dude who lived in his mother's basement and was so socially inept he would lecture his same-level peers on their work. There was the office worker whose skin was yellow because all she ate was fast-food.

I worked in a public school that had drama queens and unusual relationship triads/dyads and a whole lot of dysfunction.

There is no place I've ever worked that has been run so seamlessly and with 100 percent coordinated effort and enthusiasm on the part of every.single.person who was employed there. There were rumors and backstabbing and disaffection.

Last year, I subbed on a team that was completely dysfunctional. During a meeting with the principal to discuss why the kids were off-the-chain, one of the teachers admitted (this was in March), that he had never bought into the team incentive and hadn't been doing it the entire year.

I thought to myself, "I feel like I understand why this is all a train-wreck."
Everyone has to be on the same page, or at least within the same chapter for things to operate smoothly.

When I think about companies that are in operation now, I am sometimes astounded by the inefficiencies and general stupidity.

For example, I am a regular Kroger customer who has been using the Clicklist since quarantining began. I make my order, pick it up, and receive a receipt showing I spent $87.65.

However, on my credit card, Kroger shows anywhere between 4-8 DIFFERENT transactions adding up to $87.65.

And I ask myself, as well as the Kroger customer service when I email, if they can have 1 amount given to me on a receipt, why are they unable to give me 1 charge on my credit card?
I have yet to receive an answer.

Clearly, something is not right.
The left hand and right hand, somewhere along the line, are not speaking to each other.

And this is seen over and over again in each and every business, organization, or government agency in the world.
They are all flawed; sometimes outlandishly so.

With that in mind, I cannot really believe in most conspiracy theories, especially as they concern one-world coordinated entities that prey on people.

Is there corruption?
Of course. I don't deny that.
Might there be coordinated efforts to try to fool people?
Sure.
But are they successful to the extent that we are all puppets being manipulated by them?
Throughout the US and across the world?
Think of how many people would have to be involved for that to work?
Every single person would have to be equally intelligent and secretive.
And for there to be some kind of one-world-order, there would have to be thousands and thousands of people all coordinating to the letter.

Does anything in my own life experience, be it volunteering on the PTA or at church or working at a business, make me think this is realistic?

The short answer is no.

It's surreal in all kinds of ways

I often read historical books and think to myself, "I wonder what it was really like to live during whatever horrible event occurred."

My 4th grader and I just finished Number the Stars by Lois Lowry, and so my thoughts have been on life-altering, catastrophic events because I've been reading about them fictionally and non-fictionally (every time I read the newspaper).

This pandemic is surreal to me.

I generally always think that people experienced "the worst possible," but that is not the case, and I sometimes need reminders.

When 9-11 happened, it was life-altering for me, but I didn't experience the worst of it. New York City, both then and now, has been hammered.
There are degrees of experience.

Apparently, the country is anticipating over 134,000 deaths, more or less.
With states opening back up, that number is likely to increase.
What I wish I knew is how many people test positive who are completely asymptomatic.
That seems important but not included in the stats I'm seeing.
I see how many people test positive, but I don't know are they mildly sick, hospital-level sick?
There is so much we still don't know or understand about this virus.

There is economic fall-out no matter what course states and governments take.
If we close for longer, people suffer.
If we open back up, people suffer.
I think only hindsight will tell us in which scenario people suffered more.

What reading the aforementioned children's chapter book has made me notice and feel a little mystified about is the whininess I see, at least among the people I know and who post on social media.

I, too, want life to return to normal.
I, too, would like a haircut.
I, too, would like to take my kid to his orthodontist appointment.
I don't love substitute teaching but I would LOVE nothing more than for life to return to normal when I could substitute teach.
I would love to feel comfortable going to the grocery without a mask and browsing (and I hate to shop).

But my basic needs are met.
I have food, water, shelter, and prescription medication.
Everything else is an inconvenience.
It might be an inconvenience that makes me wanna cuss, but it is an inconvenience.

I have recently seen a petition going around with folks whining about maybe or maybe not being able to go to the pool which seems like a whole lotta privilege making its way to social media.
I both get it and hate it at the same time.

The petition itself doesn't make me cringe; it is the comments that go with the petition like, "How will I live this summer without going to the pool?"
And I'm struggling to know whether such statements are hyperbole especially after reading my fair share of books about people who lived during circumstances and times when even walking down the street put them in the range of a Nazi's gun.
When a hunk of cheese was a luxury and treat.
For some individuals right now during this pandemic, a hunk of cheese is a luxury and a treat.

And there are people in our city whose pools were shut down ages ago for reasons I don't even know. Because of the expense?
Because the pools are in the West End which has been redlined to death?
Because the pools were for the poorer and blacker segments of the community?

Also surreal to me is seeing the same folks who make the argument that women shouldn't have abortions even though pregnancy has severe financial/economic implications also argue that people should be allowed back to work because the pandemic has severe financial/economic implications.

How is the right of one person to control their body and what they do with it because of finances not the same as the right of another person to control their body and what they do with it because of finances, especially when harm to others' lives is the result?

Is it because harm to the fetus is a definite and harm to someone else (an older person/medically fragile person) because of COVID-19 is only possible?

It is surreal that individuals worship a Jesus who is compassionate and empathic and yet also support a president who hasn't the ability to offer true compassion and empathy to others, a man who has a necrotizing case of "it's all about me."

It is beyond bizarre to me.
And I guess it always has been but I didn't have the unfettered time to think about it almost constantly.

Making the best decisions in a run of not good decision options

I understand people want to return to work.

I understand people need to make a living.

I understand that the economy is tanking.

I truly get that.

But I also understand that without better information and testing, we are making poor decisions.

One day, it might be found that quarantining in itself was a poor decision because it was a decision based on not knowing anything about COVID-19.

How it spreads.

Where it spreads.

Where it currently is.

Who has it.

Who doesn't have it.

Who is immune to it.

Who has minimal immunity versus maximum immunity.

Who is most likely to get it and need hospitalization.

Who has the ability to trace it?

If we knew any of these, we might see that quarantining isn't necessary.
Maybe a huge percentage of the population has already been exposed?

But because we know virtually nothing, quarantining is the BEST option at the moment.

Quarantining is the best of a lot of BAD options.

The worst option right now is lots of death and hospitals overrun.
I would say that tens of thousands of deaths over the course of 4-6 weeks mean we're in worst option territory.

But here is the thing that gets lost in all the arguing about "opening the economy."

Without better information, even if stores reopen, how many people, given the uncertainty, are going to go shopping, especially for big-ticket items, like furniture or appliances (unless it is an absolute necessity)?

If you have a beat-up car, you're probably going to continue to drive your beat-up car because you could lose your job in the next week or six months or one year, depending on how things shake out.

If there are future lockdowns, maybe the economy gets even worse.
If we're dealing with this until 2021 or 2022, maybe I better save money to pay for food instead of spending it on a new couch (even though I'd love a new couch).

How many people are going to swarm the malls and cinemas?

How many people, given the uncertainty, are willingly going to go back to "life as normal? even if the governors aren't explicitly telling them to keep their butts at home?

Even if the governor said today, "Go out there and get' em, tiger," my butt and my family's butts are staying home.

Chances are the economy will not go back to normal because people who aren't willing (and have the means to work from home and stay at home) to take chances with their kids' lives or their older parents' lives are NOT going to return to normal buying, shopping, etc.

So if these people who are protesting are truly making an argument about going back to work, realistically are these businesses going to do much?

Of course, something is better than nothing, I guess.

The people who can afford to not go back to normal will continue doing as they do, leaving the people who can't afford to stay quarantined to be the guinea pigs of what happens when we try to reopen the economy.

People cannot make good decisions without good information, so it is best for governors to make decisions slowly.

To take a step and watch carefully.

But people don't want that.

They want to do whatever it is they want to do. They want to yell "My RIGHTS" with little consideration that others are suffering worse and accepting it as what we all have to do to get through this.

A love letter to America

I'm late (as usual) to all that is cool, hip, and trendy.
I mean, I knew what Hamilton was before seeing the traveling Broadway show.
I even own the soundtrack (although I had forgotten that I downloaded it).
I follow Lin-Manuel Miranda on Twitter, for pete's sake.

But I wasn't, like, gone over Hamilton.

I figured I would enjoy it.
I wanted to see it.
And so I did.

It blew my dang mind.

My neighbor (with whom I see the shows) encouraged me to listen to the soundtrack.
While I had listened to some of the most popular songs, I didn't listen to the entire thing for a couple reasons.
1. The school year is not over yet, and I'm still subbing, and DEAR GOD, when will this year end?

2. I have learned in my freelance work that I do a better job paying attention if I go in not knowing a whole lot. I don't do a ton of prep work on the front-end of interviews because I ask better questions if I don't do research and "know everything." I fact-check on the back-end. It seems to work for me. (I make a lot of assumptions otherwise. Also, thank goodness I'm not an investigative journalist because I would suck.)

I don't know that I would have "gotten" anything any better had I pre-listened to the entire show's soundtrack because there are so many performer subtleties (in the form of body position and facial expression, etc) that make the lyrics even better.

And then there was that moving floor, which made the choreography and execution of the choreography mind-blowing.
I just kept thinking about how much practice the performers had to do in order to keep the song lyrics in their heads and keep their feet working in sync and not tripping over the moving floor at the same time.

So, I was gobsmacked, to say the least.

What I left with was a musical that is a love letter to the United States.
That's how I think of Hamilton.

That may sound sappy or sentimental, but I feel like the emotions it left me with, the pride it led me to feel in this country (or at least it's origins since the current state of things is lacking in.....ahem, intellectual rigor and exquisite communicative ability), makes it more profound than any national anthem I've ever been part of or witnessed others half-assedly sing
and any Pledge of Allegience I've said by rote.

Watching Hamilton made me proud to be an American and to believe in the American dream (even though I know the union is flawed and America is not perfect and has sometimes been downright cruel to its own citizens, when it deigned to even consider them citizens and not property and that politics has been nasty and brutish.

Hamilton made me see the ideal for a few hours on Tuesday night.

Teacher sickout (short-term, long-term, and realities)

I take the teacher sickout in stride for a number of reasons.

Partly, I think about the short-term consequences and the long-term consequences and try to balance those against realities.

I could complain mightily because as a sub, I've lost two days of pay. For me, this doesn't affect my family's ability to eat or pay bills, so I take it in stride, but I understand how subs who do rely on the pay each day would be frustrated.

That is the short-term view, and I know that there are plenty of people who are focused on the short-term because they do not have the luxury of focusing on the long-term.

The short-term view individual may be frustrated that kids are out of school today because it is an inconvenience. Having to wrangle child care is frustrating, although if it were snowing or flooding or too cold, that frustration would still exist. Or if the child was sick. Or if the school was closed due to flu. Being a working parent means having to deal with all kinds of unexpected issues.

The short term view also worries about what kids are missing each day they are out of school and how that will impact them overall for the year.

All of these short-term concerns are valid. I have some of them myself.

But that doesn't mean the long-term doesn't matter.

The long-term view is that the school year will run longer, so subs who are missing pay now can make up for it when the days are extended into June.

The long-term view is that childcare people would have had to figure out for the end of May or early June is a non-issue because children will be going to school then.

The long-term view is that for most kids, losing some educational time is not going to make a dent in their overall education if their parents are doing things like reading with them each day and providing cultural opportunities and talking to their children. And the children whose parents don't do these things and never have are already so behind that missing a few days of school isn't going to make them significantly worse. If a 6th grader can only read at a 4th-grade level, these three (or four or five or however many) sickout days don't mean beans.

I say this from my own 4th-grade experience when my teacher became ill, and we had a series of substitute teachers. If you have a good sub, children can learn. If you have a crap sub, not much happens. (To be fair: if you have a teacher who leaves crap plans and has never had good management of a classroom, not much happens either). I went to a private school, and 4th grade was a bust.

Somehow, though, I ended up with a master's degree plus credits (which has more to do with my parents being educated and on my ass about my education and in a stable marriage and financially sound).

The long-term view is also why the sickouts are occurring. If charter schools are funded, this is going to have a long-term impact on public schools that will affect subs, parents, and students in ways that few people fully understand.

Myself included.

I don't KNOW what charter schools would mean. But I have CONCERNS about what they would look like and how they would impact public education.

When I'm feeling particularly fatalistic, I just want charter schools to come around and let the chips fall where they may. Let's see whether they are as wonderfully redemptive as some people make them out to be. A recent news story out of Nashville, TN suggests that they may not be as fantastic as they seem.
And this one out of Buffalo, NY.
And in New Orleans, LA.
These are just three news stories.
But that's a lot of potential disruption to a child's education, and I would venture to say schools closing their doors forever seems far more disruptive than three or four sickout days.

(Let me say that I don't always or necessarily agree with the funding decisions by public school districts. I think money is sometimes spent wastefully. But there is a certain amount of transparency that may not happen with private/charter schools).

So what concerns do I have about charter schools?

1. Skill?

Teachers in public education have to meet certain pretty stringent qualifications, which charter school teachers do not have to have. Just because a teacher has an advanced degree does not mean he/she is amazing, but it means they have had instruction in child development and the content they teach.

Just as I wouldn't want a plumber to do my sinus surgery, I wouldn't want someone without a teaching degree to teach my kids for any great length of time. I wouldn't want someone who has never taken a woodworking class or apprenticed to take a whack at my hardwood flooring.

2. What happens to the remaining public schools and their students?

If charter schools come along and siphon students, then the students who are left in public schools may be the toughest kids to teach, the kids who have the lowest opportunities and structure outside of school.  What happens if all the charter schools are full of the "wonderful" kids, and my kid or YOUR kid has to attend the public school where a large portion of the well-behaved, highly motivated kids no longer attend. What is going to happen to your child's education if this situation occurs? Because not every kid will be guaranteed a spot in charter schools. Your kid, whom you think might make it into a charter school, might not.

If this is the situation, what kinds of teachers are the public schools going to be able to hire? If your kid doesn't get into the charter school, then you may be left with the coffee dregs, not only in terms of the student population but also teacher qualifications.

(I don't know this for certain, but it is a question I have.)

3. Closings

If a charter school your child attends shuts down, what rights do their parents have to their children's transcripts, and what rights to students have to their credits?

What happens if a child's charter high school closes down, and the child goes to another private charter school? Is it possible that the charter school makes them jump through extra hoops or payments in the form of summer classes? I don't know, but I have this question.

What happens if a charter school closes down, and the owners/operators simply vanish? How does a parent get a record of credits and classes to give to the new charter school? While this news story out of Michigan is from 2016, I find the situation troubling.

And a general thing that perturbs me:

Our district provides a school calendar, and on this calendar, it shows the absolute last day that students could possibly have school if school is called off for whatever reason. That date for this year is June 11. The days when school could be extended to beyond what we "hope" is the last day are always highlighted in a color, typically yellow.

With these sickout days, I have seen many parents complaining about their summer plans being ruined. Something as simple as a calendar is either misread or actively ignored by parents. Parents plan their vacations for these "yellow--potential to be school days if school has to be canceled." So either parents misunderstand the calendar, or they did what they wanted to do and hoped that school would be done in accordance with their vacation wishes.

Parents have every right to decide to pull their kids out early if they are going on vacation, but it drives me nuts that they bellyache about it. The district tells parents the dates when school MAY happen due to unforeseen circumstances. Usually, those circumstances are weather, but sometimes they are not. If you don't want to feel bad about pulling your kids out of school, then don't plan your vacation until after those dates have passed.

Today's rant/lecture is over. 

Teacher sickouts, pensions, and school choice

Today is another sick out for our district's teachers.
I am not complaining. I am doing a 12-day (now 11-day) sub job with 7th graders, and I'd be lying if I said it bothered me to sleep until 9 am today.

There are many things that teachers are protesting; some of which I agree with, and some of which I don't.

I am finishing up a book called Nudge about libertarian paternalism, which I think describes what I believe in a lot of ways. Not every way, of course. That would be too easy. Given the sickouts, I have been metacognating on various public education issues.

Pensions

Personally, I don't like pensions, but I suspect much of that is because I didn't go into teaching until after I'd held a job in the private sector. I had a 401(k) for five years prior to teaching. That was what I was used to.

I like being in control of my retirement; saving as much or as little as I want and determining where it goes. Given what has happened with pensions in our state, I certainly trust the market and myself more than I trust legislators to not tap into retirement savings for public workers.

When I left full-time teaching, I rolled my pension contributions into an IRA. Now that I am back subbing, I am once again enrolled in the pension, although I will never retire from it with full years of service. Whatever I will get will be a pittance. I could buy back my 15 years, but I have no desire or intention to do so, especially given that lack of trust I mentioned.

I'm not sure if a pension system works as well as it used to when people expected to work for the same employer their entire careers. Teaching is so hard, I think it's a miracle that people do it for 27 years and stay sane.

Still, I think that if individuals go into teaching expecting a pension and being told that they will get defined benefits, the state needs to follow through on promises.

School choice

Everyone likes choice, and everyone thinks they like lots of choices. But the ice cream section of the grocery tells me that people cannot handle too many choices. In reality, our brains can only handle a small selection of choices in most things.

What I find maddening in the local district's situation is how many people say they want choice and then in equal measure condemn our district because the choices are too confusing.

G will be attending our "neighborhood" middle school. He could have applied to at least two other schools and likely would have gotten into both based on his gifted/talented scores. But he would have had to apply, write essays, and it would mean longer bus rides and being further away from home each day (which might interfere with his involvement in afterschool activities). He opted to go the easy route, which was fine by me, considering I've been driving N to and from "choice" schools for four years.

Due to G's OCD issues, I am fully prepared to have to make changes to his educational program in the coming years, which could mean homeschooling him or putting him into a different school. Neither of these would be my preference, and both would involve sacrifice, both financial and psychological.

I am a product of private education, and while I think I received a good education, I was a motivated student without behavior problems. My concern with the desire to siphon money from public education to private education (i.e. "school choice") is the kids who will never, ever, ever be able to get into a charter school.

My kids are bright, have good executive functioning skills, and are well-behaved. Personally, if our state went to private schools, my kids would be totally fine. My kids will get a good education wherever they go because D and I educate our kids. We are involved, and we are financially stable.

Yesterday, I subbed with a group of 7th-grade kids. Many of them have special needs and lack parent support (either because their own parents are hot messes or because they are simply unable to be more involved due to jobs, other kids, etc). These are kids who, if they were accepted into a charter school, would likely be tossed out on their heads within minutes. Their parents, who likely work in low-paying retail, fast food or nursing home jobs, don't make enough to pay for any kind of tuition. Someone making $18,000 a year with multiple kids cannot afford a private choice school.

I say this as someone who works for a private educational institution when she's not working in the public schools. The cottage school I work for is very good because the directors strive to hire people who have backgrounds in education and who have taught before. But there is a certain amount of instability that comes with the cottage school because we rent space each year. Parents who are committed to homeschooling and love our program would hate to see it disappear, but they won't be "left in a complete bind" if we did close down. A parent whose child attends a 5-day-a-week charter school would not have this flexibility.

While I feel like the oversight on public education and chronic standardized testing is a pain and mind-numbing, I worry about the lack of oversight on charter schools, especially for vulnerable populations of people.

Until or unless you are in public schools working regularly with these students, you do not have any CLUE what I'm talking about. If our governor came to some of the schools I've subbed in and tried to get anything done, I feel 95% certain he would be eaten alive. Some of these hard-to-reach students would take his pious, patronizing tone and destroy him with it.

Yesterday, a 7th grader came to school reeking of pot; I'm not certain if he still had some on him or not. Suffice it to say, he is not a student with straight As who is highly motivated to be at school. Some students are dropped off at school by parents who open their car doors and a plume of pot scent follows the student as they exit the vehicle.

I'm not sure why anyone thinks a choice of schools is going to make this kid's life miraculously better.

Addendum to Teens are dumb

I have decided, in light of other videos coming out showing more of what happened in DC with the Covington teens and the indigenous man, that I will go through what I wrote earlier and see how I feel now.

1. Teens are dumb

This still holds true. A group of teen boys is, in my opinion, way too immature to take to a Right to Life rally. Boys' brains mature even slower than girls, and when there are a bunch of teen boys, that is just a vat of hormones and poor judgment.

Some people have said the boys were chanting in solidarity, but if you have spent any time around teens, you might have paid attention to the sidelong looks some of them gave each other. Those sidelong glances say a lot. To me, they say, "I feel stupid, and I don't know how to act." They did not say, "I stand in solidarity with this indigenous man because I have a respect for his age and his experience."

2. Students who do not attend school with a diverse population often have "ideas" about their superiority.

This holds true, which I say from personal experience. I cannot guarantee that it applies to the Covington kids, and I'm not a betting person, but I'm gonna go with my hunch.

3. If you're wearing a MAGA hat, chances are you subscribe to some of the beliefs about how things used to be (read as "When white people had all the power, all the time").

I do not like to or want to blame the victim, but anyone with an ounce of sense should be aware that wearing a hat to a rally in DC that concerns a hotly debated constitutional right and happens during a tense government shutdown, is going to be putting oneself in a potentially tense situation. If you do not understand this, you should not attend such a rally at all (hat or no).

You have a right to wear whatever you want wherever you want, but people also have the right to think certain things of you if you wear such apparel. Women deal with this garbage all the time. Welcome to our world, boys.

4. If you're an adult who is taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC, you may want to discuss these things IN ADVANCE and urge them not to wear such accessories that will make them targets in a politically-charged atmosphere.

I stand by this. I put this squarely on the chaperones. I would have instructed students to not wear those hats. Wear them on the bus. Wear them in the hotel. Do not wear them on the Mall.

5. If you're an adult taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC that is supposed to be about respecting LIFE, you may want to consider all forms of life in the respect equation. Not just white, fetal life.

And this includes the asshats who are voicing their own loud sentiments that you might find abhorrent. Just because a person is yelling crazy sh*t at you doesn't mean you have to respond in kind. Ignore them.

6. If you're an adult taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC, you may want to think about and discuss how much recording of events happens at these events and that there is this the possibility that acting foolish will get you a lifetime of notoriety on social media.

No one could have foreseen this happening, but in all these videos floating around I do not see any adults blowing a whistle and yelling for the boys to move. I do not see any adults trying to intervene and perhaps get the boy to back up from the indigenous man, to say to the man, "Could you give this boy some space." I do not see any adults intervene when the other indigenous man says something inappropriate back to the Covington boy.

And so I still stand by this, too. The boy who "stood his ground" looked smug to me. That smugness may have truly been fear or confusion, but he was in a weird situation and none of his chaperones appear to have stepped in.

7. If you're an adult taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC and you see something going down, you may want to intervene and GET THE KIDS OUT OF THAT SITUATION so that they don't have notoriety on social media and get crucified by people who think they are smug little shitheads (which they may very well be, but they are teenagers and don't understand the fallout from their actions).

Teens are dumb, but adults shouldn't be

I have ALL kinds of thoughts about the march in DC and the Covington Catholic kids.

1. Teens are dumb

The pre-frontal cortex doesn't fully form until a person is 24 years old or so, which means teenagers are primed to make stupid decisions. That is just what they do.

2. Students who do not attend school with a diverse population often have "ideas" about their superiority.

I say this as a person who attended private school my entire life. I was under the assumption that public school was "bad." I thought private Catholic school was "the best." It wasn't until I was getting my master's degree in education that I got to see that public schools often offer more opportunities for students. Private schools might be good for some children and families, but they aren't necessarily "the best."

3. If you're wearing a MAGA hat, chances are you subscribe to some of the beliefs about how things used to be (read as "When white people had all the power, all the time").

I do not own a MAGA hat because I will not financially support Donald Trump in any way. I personally think he's a charlatan. If you think he's wonderful, you are entitled to your opinion. I am entitled to my opinion that you are easily duped.

America has, historically, been great for one group of people: white men. Not women, not blacks, not Asians, not gays or lesbians, not indigenous populations. To make America great again means to make it suck again for all those other people who are not white men.

If you leave the confines of your little bubble and go to DC for a march, you should probably be aware that your hat will provoke sentiments in others, and many of those will not be positive. You may be yelled at or ridiculed. That comes with attending public marches (which is why I never attend such marches).

Knowing that these sentiments will not be positive, you should be aware that if you do things like tomahawk chops (and you're not at a Braves game) while a Native American man is near you, it will probably be considered insulting.

If you yell things like "Build a Wall" in the midst of a government shutdown that is contentious at best (look, it's understatement), that might be ridiculed, too.

4. If you're an adult who is taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC, you may want to discuss these things IN ADVANCE and urge them not to wear such accessories that will make them targets in a politically-charged atmosphere.

5. If you're an adult taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC that is supposed to be about respecting LIFE, you may want to consider all forms of life in the respect equation. Not just white, fetal life.

All life is all life.
Indigenous lives.
Black lives.
Gay lives.
Latino lives.
Addicted lives.

6. If you're an adult taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC, you may want to think about and discuss how much recording of events happens at these events and that there is this the possibility that acting foolish will get you a lifetime of notoriety on social media.

7. . If you're an adult taking teens with unformed pre-frontal cortexes to a march in DC and you see something going down, you may want to intervene and GET THE KIDS OUT OF THAT SITUATION so that they don't have notoriety on social media and get crucified by people who think they are smug little shitheads (which they may very well be, but they are teenagers and don't understand the fallout from their actions).

So while I think the kids were idiotic, I am left wondering why the heck the adults who were there didn't put their allegedly fully formed pre-frontal cortexes to better use.

Voting

I vote in every election because I want a say in my government. No one has ever accused me of being an optimist (because I generally am not), but I believe my voice counts. Even if it doesn't make a decisive difference, it is valuable and counts because it is mine, and I think I'm very important.

I vote in every election because women before me fought to give me the right to vote. It hasn't even been 100 years since women were allowed to vote.

I vote in every election to set a good example for my children.

I do not vote in every election because my friends and family tell me to.
I do not vote because social media is blowing the heck up with people demanding that I vote or haranguing me to vote.

To be perfectly plain, it actually bugs me to see every single person I know urging me to vote.
It makes me not want to vote.

I am a bit very much hella contrarian and, perhaps, this is why I enjoy being around middle and high schoolers.
They are contrarians, too.
I understand them in this way.

Here is the thing--when I experience someone urging me to do something, and that something is typically political or religious because those are two things people often feel strongly about, I think to myself,
"Are you aware that you are strongly urging me to vote or find God because your bias assumes that I am going to vote the same way you do or find God the same way you do?"

Here is where the non-optimist part of me comes through--based on my experience on both ends of this. I do not believe that people are urging me to do things out of an abundance of neutral sentiment.

People generally urge others to do something because they expect others to do as they do and feel as they feel.

Once upon a time, I was a very strong breastfeeding supporter, and I still think breast is the best thing a baby can get. If and when I urged women to breastfeed by saying, "Are you trying breastfeeding?" or "Are you going to breastfeed?," I wasn't urging them to "just try it" or "do it for 3 weeks." Inside my head, I was urging them to do it for a full 12 months without any formula, and even longer since that is what the World Health Organization says. I wanted them to be as committed to breastfeeding as I was.

What I said and what I thought and expected were vastly different things.

When people have urged me to visit their church or seek God, they have not done so thinking that I'm going to believe in my own loosey-goosey, skeptical way. That I'm going to believe in kick-ass Jesus and not necessarily a literal translation of the bible.

They want me to full-on "COME TO JESUS" and be an evangelical and sing his praises on high and wear shirts that say, "I LOVE MY CHURCH" and believe every word of the bible is right, true, and not to be critically analyzed.

And I can't help but think that when people urge others to vote, they are doing it in part because their bias is that others are going to vote as they do.

Doing VBS in a week of incivility, hostility, hatred (Badass Jesus)

Last week was a hard week for me to do VBS at church.

We were in year two of a program about feeding the hungry, and I was in the storytime group.

Our pastor pretended to be so sleepy from having been up half the night caring for unexpected visitors whom he and his wife had to feed....because that is what you did when someone came to your door.
You washed their feet and fed them.
To do otherwise was to violate norms and be considered uncivil and inhospitable.

As you can imagine, my brain was pummelled by the cacophony of "love thy neighbor" and the Muslim ban, the ICE detention centers that separate children, the restaurants who pick and choose who they serve.

I am not a Bible thumper by any stretch of the imagination, but I love me some badass Jesus.

Badass Jesus ate lunch with Zaccheus, a tax collector who may or may not have gouged people.
Badass Jesus told Martha, who was all concerned about "looking like a proper hostess" to chill her ass out and visit with him. (Which makes me feel MUCH better about my meh hostess skills when book club friends come every summer.)

Badass Jesus politely (and sometimes not politely) gave the middle finger to "propriety" and to hypocrisy.

I suspect that Jesus, who himself was an infant refugee, would have his sandals down in Texas protesting and flipping tables and not having any part of children being separated from their parents.

I suspect Badass Jesus would be giving hell to the rich white folks who claim to be Christian and yet seem to be perfectly ok with denigrating anyone who is brown-skinned or poor.

I admit, though, that I'm not sure what Badass Jesus would say about the restaurant refusing to serve Sarah Sanders.

I really have mixed feelings about this one, as does apparently everyone.
Maybe Badass Jesus would too?

I follow Reason magazine, which is libertarian, and they posted opinions by two of their writers that had diametrically opposed feelings about the actions of the Red Hen owner.

My own feeling is that I would have served her, taken pictures of my staff serving her, giving her a really excellent evening and then posted all over social media that "WE DO NOT AGREE WITH ANY WORD THAT COMES OUT OF HER MOUTH (she is a bonafide liar), but we serve even those we disagree with."

I get not wanting to serve her, but I would choose differently.
Because if we're going to not serve people based on being liars, where do we draw the line?
Cause I've lied.

Being kind, being compassionate does not have to mean allowing people to run roughshod over you, which is often the response when anyone questions the treatment of refugees or immigrants at US borders.

It's like you can't be a kind person AND have boundaries.

"Do you want open borders where anyone can just waltz right on in?"
"Will you let people just walk right into your house without your permission?

Well, of course not.

I am procedure-oriented, not rule-oriented, and the current procedure for seeking asylum in the US states that you have to be PHYSICALLY PRESENT IN THE US, which means the procedure is to cross the border and step onto US soil and state you are seeking asylum.

So don't blame immigrants or refugees because this is the procedure.
Desperate people take desperate measures.
If I was running from persecution or violence or abject poverty, I may not care about breaking a law either.

Or if you insist on blaming them, then at least be sure to spread the blame around sufficiently.

Maybe blame politicians who don't adequately fund immigration courts, meaning there are too few judges to manage the proceedings, which means it takes YEARS for asylum cases to be decided?

Maybe blame the Americans who illegally smuggle/sell guns to cartels in Mexico, thereby worsening the violence from which people want to escape?

As with virtually everything under the sun, if you don't think it's complicated, you're not paying attention.

The sermon today at church was about how Jesus often followed the "spirit" of the law and maybe not so much the exact law.

How many people who lambast immigrants for crossing the border illegally (and therefore deserve whatever horrible things happen to them as a result, including the forced separation from their children) break the law by speeding?
Or by violating intellectual property rights by showing a film to a large group of people?
Or by not giving attribution every time they download a photo off the Internet that they then use on a flier to advertise their business?
Or drive while using a cell phone?
Or don't wear their seatbelt?
Or drink while underage?
Or sharing medication?
Or failing to update your driver's license when you move?
Or not registering their pet?

Or any of the other laws regular citizens break all the time.

I'm smart enough to know that I know virtually nothing about immigration law.
I'm also smart enough to know that our country is going to pay a heavy price for separating kids from their parents, whether it is through legal action or through the animus that will pervade these kids and, perhaps, make them do harm to Americans down the road. 

Why public school doesn't work sometimes and what can be done about it

I subbed yesterday and spent the much of the time thinking about why the school district "doesn't work and needs to be taken over by the state."

Let me be perfectly clear: The district can and should change things. If you think I love everything the district does, all of its teachers, and every policy it has implemented, you haven't read my blog (nor are you my husband who gets to hear 99% of my diatribes).

There are definite disadvantages to having a district as large as this one is; unfortunately, because our city is so segregated, I'm afraid that attempting to break the district into more manageable "chunks " is liable to have consequences that many people do not want.

Anyway, back to yesterday.

I noticed a number of things that help explain why some kids do not achieve in public schools. All of these things happened right before, during, or right after first-period class---so give-or-take 70 minutes.

1. One student left her glasses at her dad's house.
2. At least 4 students in math class did not have pencils.
3. The pencil sharpener in math class is a POS, which means students could not quickly sharpen their pencils.
4. One student slept during class. I tried to wake him repeatedly. He said he didn't feel well (likely due to allergies based on his symptoms).
5. One student, who I gave a pencil to in math class, walked across the hall to social studies and needed another pencil. What happened to the pencil from math class, you ask? I asked her that myself. I have no freaking clue, nor did she.

There were 3 adults (all certified teachers in this classroom). Although I am a substitute, unlike some substitutes who don't know what they are doing, I actively help in the classroom; I've worked with these kids often enough that they know me, seemingly respect me, and allow me to help them.

Let's assume that the state takes over the district. What can the state do to remedy these situations above that negatively impact student achievement?

1. One student left her glasses at her dad's house.
Options:

• Call parent to retrieve glasses. 
• If the parent can't or won't retrieve glasses, the state drives the child to her home. (Yes, I'm thinking 1984, too.)
• If the child doesn't have a key to get into the home, break windows and get glasses. (Here we are verging into Maze Runner territory.)
• The child spends the day with no glasses. 

2. At least 4 students in math class did not have pencils.
Options:

• Have a fresh box of pre-sharpened pencils available in every math class. Pencils must be pre-sharpened because of item #3 on the list. 
• At the cost of $3.89 per box per 180 days of school, this comes to $700 a year per 1 math class. If this one teacher has 5 math classes per day, that comes to $3500 per year.  If one school has 3 teachers teaching 5 math classes per day, the cost per year for one school is $10,500. Our district has 150 schools, so the cost per year is $1,575,000.  

3. The pencil sharpener in math class is a POS, which means students could not quickly sharpen their pencils.
Options:

• Purchase pencil sharpener for $13.18 for this one math class. 
• Purchase boxes of unsharpened pencils since at least four students didn't have pencils at all. (I'm too tired from doing the aforementioned math to do the math for a box of unsharpened pencils per math class). 
• Remind students repeatedly to sharpen pencils.
• If they refuse to sharpen pencils, sharpen them for the students. 
• Delay the start of class instruction because of pencil sharpening, either because the teacher is sharpening or because the students are dorking around while sharpening and causing a distraction. (Even the most well-behaved kids on the planet cannot stand in a line and sharpen pencils without dorking around.)

4. One student slept during class. I tried to wake him repeatedly. He said he didn't feel well (likely due to allergies based on his symptoms).
Options:

• Call child's parent to wake him up. 
• If a parent doesn't respond, forcibly make the child sit up and stay awake. Force might involve smacking child, dumping water on his head, or using a taser. 
• Take child to the doctor for allergy treatment. 
• Continue taking child once a week for allergy injections. (Cost of this: astronomical, which I can prove because I do it with two kids.)

5. One student, whom I gave a pencil to in math class, walked across the hall to social studies and needed another pencil. What happened to the pencil from math class, you ask? I asked her that myself. I have no freaking clue, nor did she.
Options:

• See # 1 but repeat for 6 class periods every day in middle and high schools. 

One of my questions for anyone who thinks a state takeover or charter schools are magic bullets:

What do we do with the students who do not care?

Some of them don't care because they don't care. 

(Have you ever tried to make a child do something that he or she doesn't want to do? How did that work for you?) 

Some of them don't care because their lives are 100% about survival (Will I have a home when I get out of school? Will my home be the same home I had when I left for school this morning or will we have gotten evicted? Will I get dinner tonight?)

Another question: What do we do with the parents who do not care?

Some of them don't care because their lives are train wrecks.

Some of them do care but don't have the ability to do any better than what they are doing. They may be financially strapped or inadequately educated themselves. 

Some of them, whose children are disruptors, cannot handle their kids any better than the teachers can. 

Other questions:

Are we going to reinstitute workhouses of Charles Dickens' time for the children who refuse to do their school work? Do we let them run the streets? Do we put them in prison until they mature and (hopefully) see the value of education? 

Will we make their parents go to workhouses or prison for not making their children do the work? We can legally penalize them for truancy, but can we legally penalize them for their children sitting and doing ABSOLUTELY nothing in the classroom or causing distractions in the classroom? Is this a road we want to go down?

During planning period yesterday, I helped some of the teachers prepare Extended School Service (ESS) materials. ESS happens after school two days a week and some Saturdays to help kids who are failing in school.

One child, in particular, is failing every.single.class during every.single.grading.period. He has attended 5 out of 30 ESS sessions and none of the Saturday schools. He failed a grade last year so he is already at least 1 year behind.

I don't know his whole story, but what can the state do for this child that his teachers, his principals, and his counselors have not tried doing???
For all I know, this kid's family is ready to kill him because he won't do anything.
Does anyone think a charter school is going to magically save this child?
Is the state taking over the district going to suddenly make this kid do work?

Regardless of whether the state takes over or the district continues as it is or the district makes vast changes or charter schools happen, the following is what I feel pretty darn certain about.

• Some students are never, ever going to perform well on achievement tests. Not because they don't care and not because they don't try and not because they don't have great support systems. Not everyone has the same brain capability, but that doesn't mean they are stupid or know nothing or are FAILING somehow. How is it that a large percentage of parents (myself included) can think a school is great even if our kids aren't distinguished or proficient? Maybe it is because it is simply common sense that a danged once-a-year test is not the be-all and end-all of ANYTHING. 
• Some students don't care about school and cannot be motivated to perform. We either punish them, let them fail, or find new and different ways to motivate them that may not look like school.  
• Some parents are never going to make the best choices for themselves or their kids. We either do it for them, or we accept that they have the freedom to make messes of their lives and also acknowledge that as a society, we have to deal with it as best we can. 

State teachers, stupid things politicians say and do, and my own pension

Even though I am a teacher and in the pension system, my situation is very different from other teachers. This difference has me in a weird position.

When I left teaching to have N, I rolled all of my pension into an IRA because I didn't know what my future plans were. I had 3.5 years of service.

Now that I am back subbing in the district, I am once again in the pension system. However, because I don't substitute a ton, it will take me forever to accrue much money. In two years of subbing, I might have $1300 in my pension at this moment. It's not something I'd want to lose, but its also not something I can live on.

Even if I started teaching full-time today, I would never get a full pension because I don't expect I'll want to teach full-time after age 65, especially since I don't know that I have the energy to teach full-time in my mid-40s.

So I have a personal investment in the pension system, but at this moment, at least, it is not a strong investment.

As a sub, it has been lower-case frustrating to be in the midst of the politics because subs don't get paid if they don't work. I was supposed to sub the Friday before Spring Break, but that got canceled when the district couldn't find enough subs. As much as I support teachers and public education, I would be lying if I said it hasn't ramped up my anxiety to be wondering, "Should I take this job because it might be canceled if there is a sick-out?" or "Will I get dinged for not working enough days if these sick-outs continue?" And there is also the uncomfortable feeling of "I want to support teachers but I would also like to work." It is one of those times where the greater good feels at odds with my own personal good. I have to remember that while my pocketbook is thinking of the short-term, I have to think of the long-term game.

I didn't put any thought into being in a pension when I decided to become a teacher. A pension was not a draw. I had worked full-time and had a 401(k) and contributed to Social Security). My salary actually increased when I became a teacher (which is sad). I became a teacher because I wanted organized chaos and busyness. After I became a teacher, I realized that I really love working with kids.

Being a sub has reminded me of a lot of the work that I had forgotten when I left full-time instruction. I forgot the staff meetings, the team meetings, and the department meetings that teachers put their time and energy into. I forgot the parent/teacher conferences. I forgot the Open Houses for registered students and the Open Houses for prospective teachers. I forgot the sub plans and the recovery from what the subs do with your lessons. I forgot the time crunch of submitting grades. I forgot the SBARC meetings during planning periods. I forgot the modifications for students with IEPs. I forgot the grading that never ends. I forgot the field trip planning; collecting money, getting chaperones, coordinating buses, and everything else that is involved. I forgot about holding detention after school when I wasn't in a staff, team, or department meeting. I forgot the professional development on gold days and during summer before school begins. I forgot about being a staff moderator for an extracurricular activity. I forgot about calling and emailing parents. I forgot so much that full-time teachers do of which the general public isn't cognizant.

This isn't to say that teachers are saints. They are human and flawed. And some teachers should be tossed out on their butts because they undermine their teams or simply aren't good teachers to students. Although I support labor unions, there are some things about unions that aren't so great, and the inability to get rid of ineffective or downright detrimental teachers is one of those things.

And this isn't to say that monies to fund education are always spent in the wisest way. I remember getting money each year to buy supplies for the classroom. I didn't need extra paper or pencils or crayons, but I did need class sets of reading level books for the kids who weren't at grade-level. We couldn't "save up" the money over a couple years, so sometimes grade level teacher colleagues and I would pool our money to buy class sets and share them with each other.

In addition to teachers not being saints, politicians aren't either. They sometimes say and do stupid things.

Don't get me wrong: I say and do stupid things all.the.time.

But I am not a politician under intense media scrutiny. I just interviewed a local politician the other day for a magazine article, and this is one of the things we talked about: how as a political figure, you never get to relax. You are always potentially "on." That has to be difficult.

Still, what has been lost is a basic civility. Even if you don't agree, you can say that in ways that are not antagonizing and insulting. You can disagree while still supporting people's basic rights to peacefully organize. As a writer and a writing teacher, I think about this a lot. You have to have to think about how your audience will read or hear what you are writing or saying. Unfortunately, some of our politicians allow their frustrations to come out of their mouths, further alienating their constituents.

Perhaps those politicians need to come sit in on my class?

Perhaps these politicians need to think of better go-to analogies for what protesting teachers are, rather than thugs or high schoolers wanting a better car?

The sub, the abortion talk, the fallout

On Tuesday afternoon, when I picked N up from school, she was fired up. She said her sub was arguing with her about abortion.

Now, I didn't just fall off the turnip truck, so I know not to believe every.single.word that comes out of my children's mouths without probing. So I asked questions.

What I determined from her is that students asked the sub his opinion about abortion, and he engaged with them. N reported that his comment to her was, "If people are going to engage in those behaviors, they have to accept the consequences."

I was so busy Tuesday night that I didn't have time to stew over this conversation much besides saying to both her and myself that it seemed wildly inappropriate for a sub to engage in this discussion for a variety of reasons.

But Wednesday morning, when I woke up, I was immediately still bothered by this incident. It isn't part of the curriculum. I doubt that the regular teacher had this topic as part of his sub work. A sub is the last person who should engage students in controversial topics. As a sub myself, I would never engage students in this, even if they asked me to. Fully grown adults can't have civilized conversations about abortion, so why would anyone expect middle schoolers to be able to do so?

It also rubbed me the wrong way because it was a male sub speaking to my female student, a male sub in a position of authority over my female student. And the subtext behind his statement, "If people are going to engage in those behaviors, they have to accept the consequences" bothered me, and I discussed it with N.

What I heard is this statement: If WOMEN are going to HAVE SEX, then WOMEN have to accept the consequences even though MEN DO NOT.

I doubt very much that he was even aware that this was implied by his statement because female ears hear things differently from male ears.

This is when I informed N that even when women use highly effective birth control, as HER OWN MOTHER DID, they can become pregnant. Hello, littlest brother M.

Since it still rankled me on Wednesday morning, I emailed the principal and explained my reasons for being concerned.

Yesterday, I got an email apology from the sub. He was attempting to get the students to think critically about their arguments but realizes now that he probably should have paid more attention to the sensitivity of the topic. He was sincere and professional, and I appreciate his direct communication with me.

This abortion discussion coincides with my own recent subbing, in which I have been with many students who are terribly neglected. Many of them are, essentially, parenting themselves, and as a teacher friend of mine said, "Kids don't do a very good job at raising themselves."

Some of their parents are struggling just to survive---working jobs, with more kids than they should have as a single parent. Some of them are drug addicts. Some of them don't know anything about how to be a responsible parent.

If anyone, including my daughter, asked me whether I think abortion is right or good, I have to say no. I don't think it is, and I wish it wasn't a choice that women feel they have to make. In a perfect world, I wish every child was wanted, treasured, and able to be given a secure, economically stable life.

But we don't live in a perfect world. We live in a world where children are subjected to things that children should not be subjected to. Raising themselves. Drug-addled parents who shouldn't have the responsibility of caring for an inchworm. Parents who can barely read and are, therefore, unable to promote reading or learning or the importance of education. Extreme institutionalized poverty sandwiched between poor financial decisions.

And as much as I dislike abortion, I think it is a far, far worse sin to bring kids into the world that you then abuse or neglect, that you can't feed, that you don't guide.

And if there is anything that makes my head hurt, it is the people who are anti-abortion as well as anti-funding for health care (including birth control) and food and welfare and economic development in impoverished areas and living wages and education.

My friend told me about one boy who has been living at the Home of the Innocents for three years. The father gave up his parental rights (who knows where the mother is or if she is even alive). This child would have been in 3rd grade when this occurred, and he will live forever with the knowledge that his dad gave him up. He wasn't a baby who won't remember anything. Even if the father did this out of an abundance of love, care, and concern, from the child's perspective his dad gave him up, abandoned him. A child doesn't easily recover from that if he does at all.

Many of these neglected kids will become addicted themselves. The girls will become teen mothers. Many of the boys will end up in prison. They will become the parents of the next generation's neglected kids.

As much as I don't think abortion is good, I also don't think life at all costs and under all circumstances is good either.

Probably not everything I want to say about guns, rights, mental health, and parenting

but many of the thoughts I've had this week in the wake of the Parkland, FL shooting.

I. Rights and regulations

The older I've gotten, the more rights conscious I've become.

Right are a tricky bit of business.

When I see people who tend to be more liberal lash out against guns, I cannot help but remember how strongly they lash out when someone who is more conservative wants to restrict their reproductive rights. The way one person feels about the government poking its nose into what a woman does reproductively is the same way another person feels about the government poking its nose into what weapons they can or cannot purchase.

The difference, I think, is that the government in its current form is continually attempting (even if unsuccessful) to restrict and regulate reproduction, and the same is not done for gun-ownership. I frequently see news stories about legislatures in various states trying to pass laws to restrict abortion.

Just as gun-owners don't want the government dictating to them what they can and cannot go with guns, so to do millions of people not want the government dictating to them what they can and cannot do with their bodies.

But what about the babies, someone might argue? The fetuses? This might be the conservative response.
And the people who want some level of restriction on bump stocks and military grade assault weapons might respond, "But what about the innocent school children who are shot?"
In both cases, there is a common desire to protect the innocent.
In protecting the innocent, that may mean that BOTH SIDES must be willing to compromise in some measure.

This country is not very good at the middle ground.

If every person followed the tenets of natural law, there would be no need for man-made law. We have man-made laws because not every one does adhere to natural law. Natural law is the Declaration of Independence, that humans have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If every individual could pursue their own life, liberty and happiness without infringing on others' lives, liberties and happiness, that would be grand. The Constitution is the set of man-made laws that we created to help ensure the natural laws are upheld.

We restrict or regulate for things like pseudoephedrine (because a small slice of the population creates methamphetamines) or yard darts, but we do not regulate as much for guns.

My lifetime allergies make me sympathetic to gun-owners who don't want their rights infringed on....because I know what that infringement feels like when I have to buy my Alavert-D piecemeal at the pharmacy and turn over my driver's license to make my congestion go away. But as a person who is currently infringed on, I also lack sympathy that anyone can go to a gun-show and purchase military grade weapons without submitting their driver's license.

II. Parenting 

Without a doubt, parenting is different now, and I'm not entirely sure why.

When I was a kid, if my teacher said I did something wrong, my parents would absolutely take the side of the teacher, and my ass would have been grass. Even if they disagreed with the teacher, which they might express to the teacher, my parents would have (to me) been a united front with my teacher.

As the Larry Nasser trial has shown, accepting "authority" figures without question is not always good. It is not a terrible thing that parents are less willing to accept without question or critical thinking the authority figures in their children's lives. How many kids were abused by priests in the 1970s and 1980s because parents respected these "authority" figures beyond reproach?

But rather than taking a middle ground, parents have gone off the proverbial cliff. If a child does wrong, everyone but the child is held responsible. It is the teacher's fault, the administration's fault, the school board's fault, the district's fault.

My hope is that eventually the pendulum will swing back.

Of course, there are plenty of children whose lives are untimigated disasters because their parents lives are unmitigated disasters.

Even though I am a lowly substitute teacher, I see this all the time. One student who is in a class I have frequently subbed for is one of four children who are being raised by grandparents. From what I understand, her mother lost custody because of drugs. I do not know if a father is in the picture. This girl is a special needs student who is heading down a road that will go nowhere.

She is a sad, sad child, and I cannot help but feel for her (even though I am also fully aware that she can be/is manipulative). What I have noticed is that she works very hard, at least when I am there. She is by no means perfect, but she tries very hard. Unfortunately for her, her special needs (and I'm not certain what they are) make learning a difficult thing, but she does the work as best she can.

One week, when I subbed, I overheard her talking to a girl in class about when she turns 14 soon, she is gonna smoke pot. She mentioned that she hangs out with a guy who is 18. I don't need to tell you how messed up this is. I didn't say anything that day to the girl.

The next time I was there, though, I did say something to this girl. I commended her on how hard I see her working when I'm there, and I mentioned her conversation from the previous week. I told her that I know she is going to probably do whatever she wants, because I was 14 once too, and I remember how stubborn I was, but that I hoped she wouldn't do it because she is such a hard worker and has such potential.

This girl got tears in her eyes, so I let her hang out in the hall for a few while she composed herself. When she came back in the classroom, she came up to me and thanked me for saying what I said. I told her I never say things I don't mean, and that I hope she at least thinks about it.

I'm not this child's parent, and there is little I can do, but my hope is that what I said makes some difference for her. I don't expect that she is going to go down the "better" path, the path of less heartache, but for the moment, she knows someone sees her potential and cares, that someone doesn't want her to fall through the cracks.

She is one child of perhaps hundreds of thousands of children who are at-risk, through no fault of their own. And one teacher with 30 students in every class cannot be expected to "save" every child.

Unfortunately, there are some students, perhaps like the boy in Parkland, who are beyond saving.

III. Mental health and gender

I have a "mental illness," though I would say it is of the mild variety. I was self-aware enough to get help.

I have a child with a "mental illness," and I have done what I can to get him help.

I work very, very hard to instill empathy in my child, to help provide some protection that his mental illness will not ever become one that harms others (or himself).

I have seen a number of comments about mental health in the wake of the Parkland shooting, like the fact that females make up a large percentage of the incidence of mental illness, and yet it is boys who are the school shooters.

Why is this?
I wish I knew.

Boys are falling behind in many ways. Girls are outpacing them in college.
The push to help girls attain equality has, perhaps inadvertently, left boys behind.
As a mother of a girl, I'm glad females have more opportunities.
As a mother of two boys, I worry about their self-image and opportunities.
In the wake of helping boys become more sensitive and empathic, there has been a pendulum swing towards hyper-masculinity.  It seems like there is an either or. Either a boy is a sensitive-type or a masculine dude.
Again, our country isn't too great with the middle ground that a boy can be both.

IV. Schools, teachers, and police

If I wanted to be a sniper, I would have gone into the military or law enforcement.
No teacher goes into teaching because they want to wield a gun. They either love their subject and want to share it with others, or they love kids. Or both.
Given all the responsibilities of teachers, they do not need to be tasked with protecting children by carrying weapons.

There is no way in hell that asking teachers to carry weapons is a good idea, and I'm saying this on a purely logical level.

Things to consider--

1. When exactly are teachers supposed to get training for weaponry? Is this going to count as professional development or will they still have to do their normal professional development each year in their subject areas? Are schools going to pay for this additional training? How often does the training need to be reviewed? Is there licensing and associated fees? Who pays for those?

2. Will schools provide the weapons to teachers? Will schools pay the increased insurance for these teachers? If a teacher carries his/her own weapon, who carries the insurance? The school or the teacher or do both? Does the teacher get additional pay for acting as both teacher and security?

3. Do parents have the right to request that their children not be placed in a classroom with a teacher who carries a weapon? Do parents have the right to request that their children be placed in a classroom with a teacher who carries a weapon? How does this affect class size and scheduling?

4. If there are schools where no teachers have weapons, while some schools have an overabundance of teachers with weapons, do those teachers have to change schools? Will this be a stipulation in employment contracts?

5. Are schools going to provide weapon safes in the classrooms where these teachers are? Are these teachers the only ones with access to these safes? Does administration have access?

6. Given the budget cutbacks for most schools, where is the money going to come from to pay for these guns, insurance, safes, and training? Would the money be better spent in getting metal detectors for schools?

7. If a child were to inadvertently get a hold of a gun and hurt someone, is the teacher responsible or the school? How much liability insurance is needed? Given that there are limitations on what types of playground equipment schools have, I wonder if underwriters would even give insurance for this?


V. Conclusion?

It's complicated. I consider myself fairly intelligent, but I'm no expert on any of these things. These are just the thoughts that have been running through my head without any evidence or dialogue with others.