Ok, I will try to make this brief, but y'all know that's not one of my strong suits...so bear with me or just don't read this if you have no opinion about public education.
First a few background things about myself, if you don't already know them.
I have been a substitute teacher for 2 years now for the k-2nd public school in my town in MS. I take my job very seriously and do not consider myself a glorified babysitter in any form or fashion and do my utmost to make sure that the children experience the same or better learning environment when I am there as when their regular teacher is there. I am deeply emotionally invested in this school. My son is enrolled there (he's about to start 2nd grade) and out of the nearly 1000 children, you will be hard pressed to find one that I do not know and have not personally interacted with. I love each one of them in their own way...
I say all of this to give you a better idea of where I am coming from and where my outrage is coming from in this story I am about to relay. I also ask for your honest advice and opinion; whether you agree with me or not, please share (don't just attack, by the way, please use logic and, if possible, references to back up your ideas)...Thanks in advance for that.
This is a convoluted story, so I will try to keep it understandable the best I can.
First off, at my school, you are able to have a choice of what teacher your child gets each year. (You have a list, order them among your preferences and child is matched to best meet his needs, etc...great system). I was troubled last spring when trying to choose my son's 2nd grade teacher because I wasn't comfortable with the teaching styles and lassie-faire attitudes among many of the teachers in this grade. (To back-track for one minute; my school is a level three in the rating system of the FABULOUS NCLB act) Because of this ridiculous rating, the administrators feel the need to do everything under the sun to make that rating higher (preferably the 5)...So, more often than not, whether they want to or not, most teachers give in and spend the majority of each day teaching the kids so that they will pass these standardized math and reading tests...Eventually, after rigorously questioning anyone with personal experience with the best of the teachers I had in my head to choose from, I chose one particular teacher, we'll call her Ms. Rainy. Yeah, I get Ms. Rainy and am actually quite happy, pleased with her teaching style and kid philosophy, etc. Well, Tues a teacher from the school who has a daughter who is in my son's grade and who was going to also be in Ms. Rainy's class calls and says we no longer have Ms. Rainy; she's been promoted to "reading facilitator" (a fucking joke of a job, by the way). Well, obviously I am not pleased about this idea, especially considering the school hasn't contacted me, only a friend who heard it through the grape vine. So I call another teacher and she gives me the whole story. Essentially the Vice principal at the school (whom I LOVED) was promoted to central office and because of this there was an opening for VP, so the reading facilitator (I'll call her Ms. Tom) gets promoted to the VP job. Hence, this is why I lost my great teacher. Anyhow, if this were the worst of it I would probably figure a way to switch teachers (I don't want him to have a first year teacher again, we've had that before and it was a nightmare). But its not the worst of it.
Ms. Tom is a person that I have NO respect for in the slightest possible manner. (Also a side note, she hires the substitute teachers now.) Ms. Tom has personally told me, in no uncertain terms, that the children I teach reading to MUST pass all tests. And when I say this, I mean she expects for me to TELL the children the answers on the tests. And for those that even telling them the answers doesn't work, give them their tests back repeatedly until they at least make a passing grade. We had a huge showdown over this and I basically told her that I would NEVER, EVER cheat a child out of learning for the sake of giving the school a higher freaking ranking and that if I ever, ever heard of her encouraging a teacher to cheat MY child, I would make it my life's mission to make sure she lost her job. Yes, I am sure someone thinks this is stupid or going overboard, but this woman quite truly and honestly KNOWS that this reading program is a bunch of shit and DOESN"T teach the children much more than how to read words; they don't understand comprehension, they have no ability to use synonyms, that cannot paraphrase the stories into their own words and share them back; etc...its a horrible program. And for her to tell me that I "already have the lowest readers in 2nd grade, so they better not fall behind into Roots [this is the lowest level reading of 1st graders]", quite frankly she attempted to bully and intimidate me into doing as she wanted and I refused. Obviously, I have made an enemy for this and it doesn't hurt me for one second that that ladder climbing bitch doesn't like me. But, I am sick deep in my heart to know that she was promoted!!!!!!!!!! So she will now have even more power over these teachers to try and intimidate them into CHEATING on these test, especially the state tests. I am not the only one she's done these things to. I can nearly get each and every 1st and 2nd grade teacher to attest to these very same tactics, all in the name of getting a higher NCLB ranking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ok, so what would you do?
You can sing the praises of women all day long, but as long as you put a fertilized egg ahead of [their] welfare, you do not really care about them.-Dori 4/07