…And We’re Back…
Heavy sighs all around.
Everybody is back to work now. Including me, in my own way. My kids started back at school today.
I considered doing a post before break was over about the angst of waiting to come back to school; the night sweats, panic attacks, crying, depression, cursing fits, plans to fake one’s own death and self-medication that had been the hallmarks of my reentry into the classroom after a long break. I have written before about the anxiety of coming back as well as about one particularly creepy and annoying meeting on the first day back conducted by a particularly socially incompetent AP.
To say I do not miss this would be accurate.
I’m curious how you all are holding up. I usually found that, as with most things, the anxiety was actually worse than the return, unpleasant as that could be. You just get back into whatever you were doing to sustain yourself before and you manage. Nothing much changes, but some things do.
You are now in the same calendar year as the approaching summer. That’s good. But you were probably introduced to a new data tracker or some other absolute piece of bullshit, a new rule or tardy reporting protocol perhaps, that the admin cooked up over the break that will cost you more time and not really help any children. The good news here is that they will probably forget about it in a month or two.
Send us a note and tell us what new crap for the new year was there waiting for you when you returned.
Otherwise, I hope you are feeling well, had a great holiday and I wish you the best for the coming year. I am looking forward to it.
Mr. Teachbad
Oh Teachbad! You must be psychic!
After months of teachers complaining about students being in the school as late as 8:00pm, we came back to a “new” read “old, but unenforced” afternoon dismissal policy which states students should be out of the building by 2:00pm. This email “asks” teachers and administrators to partner up and patrol the hallways and ask students “in a respectful tone” to leave the building.
Of course, this may have worked better before the headmaster walked in on an orgy in the school auditorium. There’s nothing like seeing a 14 year old performing fellatio on a 19 year old to really get admin to make an attempt at controlling the chaos.
I teach children with IEP’s – and I have an IEP due this Friday (1-7). Before break the high school coordinator (where this particular child will go) INSISTED that the IEP had to be done the day we got back, at 8:30. No other possible options. I spent hours getting things ready in the middle of the chaos special schedules cause.
Guess who forgot the meeting and didn’t bother to come? Yup…
**sigh**
That reminds me of my department chair. This guy is a total douche and rescheduling/blowing off meetings is one of his specialties. (Others include race-baiting and demanding immediate, seismic shifts in focus and effort because he read the summary of an article online somewhere about something.) I had a meeting with him that I was supposed to get all kinds of shit ready for once. At the last minute he rescheduled it. Fine. I show up at the next place and time with all my shit. He just doesn’t show up. And it is never spoken of. The height of disrespect. These moron APs need to learn how to manage people and their own time. Prioritize.
Yep, new tardy policy starts today. Too funny!! It won’t last.
and what crap there is! on the first day back, our team leader (who’s just a regular teacher with a meaningless title attached that means she takes the fall for everything that goes wrong on our side of the hallway) was told to meet the principal and counselor after school to discuss the scheduling options for the second semester. the second semester starts this coming monday. we teach 8th grade, and we don’t have block scheduling so there really shouldn’t be any scheduling options for the second half of the year. but alas, we keep getting newly enrolled students and we’ve reached out max number of students (something i predicted would happen in september, and suggested a major schedule change at that time. my principal said i was wrong and did it her way.) now she wants to add a related arts teacher to our team, and change our schedules from 4 teaching periods to 5 teaching periods a day. the saddest part? somehow my classes will only change from 32 kids to 28. not exactly alleviating the crowding problem in my room. oh, and there is no way in hell they will be ready to change any schedules on monday, so that means next week will be utter chaos.
the other change is the mega-focus on dress code. we’ve always had a sort-of uniform that kids were supposed to wear and they barely follow it. there’s never any follow through from the admin when i do send students to them when they aren’t in dress code. but yesterday our principal spent 5 minutes during homeroom yelling at everyone over the PA system about students needing to be in dress code and sending them to the office if they were. so i did, and they were promptly sent back w/o consequence or appropriate clothing. *sigh* i don’t even care what they wear to school.
happy new year! ha!
My first year NOT returning to a new calendar year at school in forever–cherishing every day I wake up RRALEMOI (really retired and loving every moment of it).
That does not mean I don’t feel for my teammates who all walked into a hallway full of signs such as: DO IT THE “SCHOOLNAME” WAY! NOTHING LESS THAN A 78.6% ON THE STATE TEST NEXT WEEK! or whatever the magical moving proficiency score has been changed to. God help us every one….
Please keep posting, TB!
On the day before break the administration sent out an email with the information we needed to register for our day of PD later this month. A few people checked their email over break and saw the registration info so they were able to register for the sessions they think will be most helpful to them. Those of us who don’t check work email on our vacation get the crap left over. When someone emailed the person in charge to complain they got an “out of office” reply, of course.
I’m also being asked to do a 4 hour PD this Saturday. It’s optional & I will be paid, but it’s on a SATURDAY. However, without the PD I can’t implement the XYZ#$@123 assessment they want me to give every week, aka I can’t do my job. So is it really optional? Of course not. But am I going? Of course not.
Construction at our school caused an outage of phones and internet along with random power outages during the day so our first week back has been funner than usual. Grades are due on Friday and it took several conversations with administrators before they understood that, despite our desire, we couldn’t input grades into our online system by Friday as we had no effin’ internet. Admin briefly considered asking us to input grades at home but one look at the grim set of our jaws and they decided to extend the grade input date until Monday. WTF? Does getting a position out of the classroom immediately cause one to forget how a clasroom operates? Damn! The kids are good though, all rested and ready to learn for a couple of weeks.
Our principal decided that since she wasn’t going to be at school on faculty meeting day (for personal reasons) that the staff should stay an extra hour anyway.
1. i’m thrilled to be back with my students. they’re what makes everything tolerable.
2. i’m fast approaching the point where “all the other stuff” is starting to take up more time than actual teaching, and i don’t know if i will reach a point where working with students is “enough.”
3. latest initiative? to make our classes count towards college credit. i work with kids who can’t read, who don’t understand basic grammar, and who struggle with high school level concepts. but hey, let’s have our remedial classes count for college credit because THAT’S how we prepare students for the “real world.”
As far as the first week back goes, working with the students is far more rewarding than working with incompetent adults.
Unrelated but curious: Does anyone have any experience with the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme? A neighboring district has been approved and now we are hearing rumors that it is headed our way.
I can relate. New tardy policy for us. We are supposed to call he EVERY time a kid is late to our class. I teach middle school/5 sections. I have about 5 kids late every period. Apparently I am now expected to call home upwards of 25 parents a night. Nope. Not happening. Also, we suggested admin use the automated call system for this to save time and they said no. Oh well. They can’t enforce it.
just discovered your blog. v. good therapy at the end of a three-day weekend, with all the accompanying anxiety. thank god for ativan & beer. your videos are priceless.