Summer Sizzle

It's August, we're the middle of the country on the Kansas plains, and it's supposed to be hot. If you decide to open schools during August, wouldn't it make sense to plan for this heat? And if it gets very, very hot -- shouldn't you have contingency plans for high heat and humidity days?

I love my school district. I think they usually plan well and they care about their charges AND employees. But where heat is concerned, this year they have made stupid decisions based on cost cutting.

At 3 p.m. each Friday they have decided to turn off all the air-conditioners in the schools. My building, built in 1935 in the old classical school model, was retrofitted with air, but it's not really an operational unit. Especially on the far end of the third floor where my room is situated. The rule is that our huge, high old-fashioned windows are NOT to be opened, except in emergencies. We have no room fans. We DO get hot, but in past years this has been acceptable heat. The air circulates and when we complained, a little more air would be filtered our way.

But this year when the cooling goes off on Friday, it stays off until 6 a.m. on Monday, so the heat and humidity build. And build. And build.

This Monday morning the AC in our building did not come on. They jimmied with it all day yesterday. The admin gave in and allowed windows to be opened and we tried to get what cool breezes we could. The temps outside rose to 95 and inside it was 93. We sweated. A lot. Finally around 1 p.m. the air came on and stayed on -- but at 3 p.m. the district shut it back off -- to meet their cost saving goals.

Of course, again, this morning the air would not come back on. The heat continued to build. Outside, by 1 p.m. it was 97 degrees -- and the heat index was 107. ONE HUNDRED AND SEVEN DEGREES. The humidity -- because a huge storm is headed our way -- must have been at 130%. The air dripped with moisture.

Inside, we baked. It was so hot we could barely breathe. We opened up windows -- but then would be required to put them back down every time they thought the air was working -- but then the air wouldn't work.

If the air comes on tomorrow we might get our huge historic high school just cool enough to walk around in without sweat dripping into our clothes and turning us sopping wet. But every night that air will go off, negating what little cooling has been done during the day.

And to make matters worse, the district, to save a penny, will turn the air back off for the weekend, so for three days (Labor Day weekend) the heat will continue to build and on Tuesday we will be broiling all over again.

Last week I got sick on Thursday night -- woke up at 3 p.m vomiting. Initially, I thought stomach flu -- but it wasn't. I was simply over tired from all the rigor of starting school -- and from the heat we had been fighting all last week. This week the heat is exponentially worse.

The district, however, is adamant about turning off the air conditioning every afternoon. God only knows what will happen if we also have a very frigid winter -- and they insist on turning the heat off.

Back to School

The teacher workshop for this first week after school closing is being held in a 1970's built (ugly!) school. This means three floors, no elevator service, and no windows.

Today was our first day to top 90 degrees -- and with the high humidity of the mid-west it was very hot.

We started the meeting in the basement (what they called the first floor -- guests enter on the second floor). It was announced they were working on the air. At 9:00 it was already 88 degrees in the building.

At 10:00 they released us to meetings on the 3rd floor. I'm schlepping a heavy Apple laptop which I was required to bring, plus all the curriculum junk they had requested -- and my lunch. On the 3rd floor we find out that besides losing air-conditioning, they also had no Internet service in the building. Can the laptop.

By noon the heat was at 93 degrees inside the building. No cool place could be found to eat my lunch. They did deliver bottled water to us -- at room temp.

At 3 p.m. the temp inside the building was at 98 degrees and we were all feeling sick.

But they wouldn't release us early -- we ran right up to 3:30.

True to my form, my cell phone wasn't functioning and Hubby had driven me to the site, not to pick me up until 3:30. Otherwise I'd had walked out.

As it was, by the time I got home all I could do was go to bed and sleep away my misery. Now, of course, it's 1 a.m. and I'm not sleepy at all. However, you can guarantee that by 6 a.m. tomorrow morning, I'll be exhausted again.

No guarantee of air tomorrow either. I'm leaving the laptop at home. I might wear underwear and I might not.

Phooey!

Selling Your Soul to the Devil

When I quit teaching in the KCMO school district in 1990, I explained to astonished friends that I had grown tired of selling my soul every year to the devil. I needed to find a place where evil wasn't done on a daily basis, both to children and adults.

On returning to teaching, one of the things I have most valued in the last four years was that I worked for an ethical employer. Though an urban core district with all the inherent problems therein, I have deeply respected their approach to education. By promoting superintendents and administrators from within, USD 500 in Kansas City, Kansas put the value of their employees first. By working diligently to increase test scores and provide a coherent, cohesive, seamless curriculum across the district's varied schools, they put the educational advancement of their very diverse students first. I have been unfailingly proud to be a part of this district.

Yesterday, though, I learned disturbing news. A women I have grown to value and rely upon, a woman who always put the children first, a woman who added great value to our Special Education department, was "non-renewed" and told she would not have job for the next school year. The news wasn't delivered nicely. She simply got an e-mail and was told to report to the Director of Personnel's office at 2:15 on Tuesday evening. The Director handed her a form letter telling her that her services were no longer needed, as the SPED department had decided to "go another direction" and the position of transition counselor would now require full teaching certification. This woman had been hired 22 years earlier because she had training to work with adults with disabilities in finding career help. She was hired because she had abilities beyond those of a certified teacher.

Yes, 22 years she had worked for the district. Now her services were no longer needed.

This is the way my previous employer had always handled things -- throw out the baby with the bathwater. Damned are the teachers and doubly damned are the students. I stomped around my third floor for awhile, spouting off. I hugged the sobbing woman in her office. I told everybody that had a modicum of power within in my school and that I would do "anything" required to try and keep the lady in her job.

And at 2:30 my department chair came to find me to explain that my principal was at that very moment in meetings with the Personnel Director to save the lady's job.

Arrangements have now been made to ensure that this fine, competent lady will be employed in the fall of 2010. She has been enrolled at the same college I attend, in the same program, actually -- and the district is paying for the courses she needs to earn her teaching certification. If at all possible, she will be placed in our high school -- but if not, a promise has been given that she will be employed in the fall.

This is why I work in the Kansas City, KANSAS school district. It isn't perfect. The initial release of this good person should have been handled much more humanly. But when things went array, powerful people stepped up and spoke out and made the right things happen.

The administration and teachers at MY school have earned even more of my respect. I certainly landed in the right place four years ago. They worked together to save my job the first year I taught with them. They have gone the extra mile to help a respected colleague again. Some educators really do get it -- to have a good educational system you have to treat your employees decently.

Shame

I am completely a product of the Kansas City, Missouri school district. I was educated in the district from kindergarten through high school graduation. Then I attended Kansas City Junior College, now Metropolitan Community College and I have both a bachelor's and master's degree from UMKC. My first job out of college was to teach in the Kansas City, Missouri school district -- first at Southeast Junior for seven years and then at the original Paseo High School for fifteen years. That totals 42 years of my life given to the KCMO schools. I hang my head in shame and mortification that I supported this criminally racist district for so much of my life.

Once I graduated from the pristine white enclave of Southwest High School, the school that created the need for the huge desegregation plan Kansas City lived under for so many years, I was always very clear that my career in education belonged in urban core schools. Consequently, I have never stepped back into Southwest since I graduated in 1964 -- the year the school was nominated as one of the 50 best in the nation.

For my 22 year teaching career in KCMO district I never earned a salary above $32,000 – that’s with 20 years tenure and a master’s degree. I quit in 1990 when my high school was detonated to make way for a performing arts school. During the late 1980's and early 1990's, J.E. Dunn (the city's pre-eminent construction company) and Freedom, Inc. (an African-American political group) bilked the district of over ONE BILLION DOLLARS (and I lost count after the first billion -- it was probably closer to TWO BILLION) claiming that they were building new schools of the highest quality and renovating the old ones to top standards.

So the beautiful school I taught in (on the right) was leveled. There was nothing wrong with it, frankly, other than the greed that bringing it down and rebuilding a huge complex on its site generated (on the left, below). The high school I graduated from, Southwest, cost over $33 million to renovate. They even put in a planetarium. Westport High School in the center of the city was renovated at a cost higher than that. And the decrepit Central High School, the only high school for African-Americans during the shame of the 1950's, was torn down and replaced with a structure to support the "Greek" magnet concept -- this meant that the students were trained to become athletes (after all it was for the Black Community) so they needed a swimming pool that the instructors could walk under and watch the swimmers. Also during this time every single school in the district became a magnet school and the neighborhood schools were a thing of the past.

Today a new superintendent took over the KCMOSD, Dr. John Covington. He is reported to be guaranteed a $250,000 yearly salary for the next three years. He was hired in from the outside. His inaugurial speech was all about how he was going to be open and communicative with the people of Kansas City. He is the 24th superintendent in the district in the last 40 years. In the last 20 years nearly all of the superintendents have had their contracts bought out by the district.

I left the Kansas City School District in 1990 and I'm sure they were thrilled to see me go. Along with my students and their parents, we had sued the district in federal court to stop the destruction of Paseo High School and to ensure that those students, 100% African-American, would not have their last years of high school destroyed by a magnet plan that was sure to fail. We lost our case after a nine-month fight that was the #2 media story of Kansas City in 1989/90-- everybody likes a David and Goliath fight.

Today, the district's magnet plan is history. Funny that neighborhood schools are now the hue and cry of the parents. The billion dollars in construction? Today the district cannot afford to maintain the schools they built or rehabbed. Once Dunn and Freedom had taken all the money they could from the district, they had no interest in the educational fate of the students. This month the district has announced it is closing 13 area schools. Southwest High School stands empty except for occasional attempts to find a private sponsor to take it over. Both Westport and Central Middle Schools are being closed for the next school year.

Today I work in a district across the state line. I said I'd never cross over -- but then I began to hear about an urban core district that had their act together (and yes, they asked me to come). They were actually educating inner city students. Test scores were going up. Teachers were treated like professionals -- and though we don't make a heap of money, we sure make more than $32,000 I made from 1983 until 1990 when I quit KCMO. Even better, this district promotes its own. The superintendent was a teacher, then a principal, then an administrator in the district. She lives right around the corner from my high school. She shows up for celebrations and in times of trouble.

Here's an antidote I like to tell about the differences I see in the two districts, just from a teacher's perspective:

An arson fire was started at Paseo during the mid-1980's. It was in the office, did little physical destruction but there was water and smoke damage. The school shut down for three days but the teachers were required to be on site. During the first day, I was in my room, salvaging papers and generally examining the damage when the superintendent of schools showed up -- in a three piece white suit with his chauffeur (you got that right -- he had a driver, paid for by the district with the worst test scores in the state!). Of course, dressed all in white he couldn't sit down but he walked through first floor of the building (gingerly) and then had the teachers meet with him briefly in the auditorium. There we were told it was our job to make sure our rooms were cleaned of all damage before school opened in two days time. We were the cleaning crew.

During my first year across the state line, we had a vandalism event at my beautiful, historic, well-preserved, and beloved school. Students came in, took fire extinguishers and threw them through the beautiful historic panes of glass in our doors. They shot the foam up and down the hallways. In some rooms they threw things out the windows. When the teachers arrived in the morning, the police were still in the building, with the superintendent who had come over from her house in her bathrobe. We gathered in the parking lot. Soon the superintendent came out and told us we could enter the building and examine our rooms and see the damage, but then we were to go home and relax for the rest of the day. The district hired crews to come in and clean the building from top to bottom -- 24 hours of work -- while the teachers got a paid day of vacation. The next morning, when we gathered at school, the superintendent and her staff were there to greet us and tell us how sorry she was about the damage to our lovely building and to encourage us to have a good day despite the trouble. We could not tell that any problem had even occurred in the building. Everything was back in place, ready for business.

How vastly different are both approaches. In one setting the teachers were janitors, maids, and cleaning people. In the other, we were respected and valued professionals. In one setting the superintendent showed up to lord his suit, driver, and power over us. In the other, the superintendent was there for support, both physical and moral.

The district I work in now is improving test scores with the same student population, but possibly even more diverse (we have a larger Hispanic community) than in Kansas City Missouri. Do we face problems? Of course. But we handle them as a team. The staff is seen as professionals who want to do a good job. The administration is there to support the teaching and the teachers are there to provide a quality education.

I love teaching. I never knew how much until I finally came into a world where teachers have a value and students are the reason for our existence.

I believe with all my heart that the reason the Kansas City Missouri School District fails is because the city leaders want it to fail. Nothing is as frightening to closet bigots as having an educated minority population -- because you might actually be creating someone like an Obama -- and dear God! we don't want "those folks" in power.

So I still live in Kansas City -- and yes, I live east of Troost (white eyes are rolling now!) -- but I would NEVER, EVER entrust a child to the Kansas City School District. The people that run that show (and it's not the superintendent or the teachers, I promise you) are devils. But they are rich devils, for sure.

Are You Sick of High Paid Teachers?

I "stumbled" into this little piece on a blog called "Wat da Wat;" it was posted on Feb. 22, 2008. Here's the URL: http://watdawat.com/2008/02/22/are-you-sick-of-high-paid-teachers/

Are you sick of high paid teachers? Teachers’ hefty salaries are driving up taxes, and they only work 9 or 10 months a year! It’s time we put things in perspective and pay them for what they do - baby sit! We can get that for less than minimum wage.

That’s right. Let’s give them $3.00 an hour and only the hours they worked; not any of that silly planning time, or any time they spend before or after school. That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 to 3:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch and plan — that equals 6 1/2 hours).

Each parent should pay $19.50 a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children.

Now how many do they teach in day…maybe 30? So that’s $19.50 x 30 = $585.00 a day. However, remember they only work 180 days a year!!! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.

LET’S SEE…. That’s $585 X 180= $105,300 per year. (Hold on! My calculator needs new batteries).

What about those special education teachers and the ones with Master’s degrees? Well, we could pay them minimum wage ($7.75), and just to be fair, round it off to $8.00 an hour. That would be $8 X 6 1/2 hours X 30 children X 180 days = $280,800 per year.

Wait a minute — there’s something wrong here! There sure is!

The average teacher’s salary (nation wide) is$50,000. $50,000/180 days = $277.77/per day/30 students=$9.25/6.5 hours = $1.42 per hour per student–a very inexpensive baby-sitter and they even EDUCATE your kids!)

WHAT A DEAL!!!!

I wish I wrote this but I didn’t. This was sent to me by one of the teachers in my school. It sure does put things into perspective…What you guys think?

*Disclaimer* I’m a teacher.

Springtime

The cold, the snow, the ice, the wind, the wind-chill-index -- downers.

Today my best (and one of my favorite) students was arrested. Why? He attacked another student. Walked up and hit him in the face. The other kid deserved it, honestly. Everyone agreed. So the other kid got a 10 day suspension and a B hearing -- which means he's potentially facing expulsion from school. My kid, because he struck the blow, only got a five day suspension.

Until. My kid's mother showed up. Walked out of the school with her boy. Sat in her car with her kid. They waited until the other kid and his mother left the building, bolted from their car, and the mothers jumped each other. On the school grounds, right outside the front door windows with the student body watching.

When security showed up, my kid and his mother ran to their car and peeled off -- but five blocks later the cops caught up with them and everyone was arrested.

The temperature outside was 15 degrees. The skies were cloudy, overcast, and gray.

My kid, the one I've invested 12 months rescuing, is in jail -- with his mom. He won't be back this year at our school.

The skies got darker. The weather got colder. We need some springtime. Soon.

Teachers and the Idiot Parent Blogger!

Every August a group of very foolish bloggers suddenly think it's their right to trash teachers.

"Oh, I had such meanie teachers they made me quit school in the 11th grade!" Whine.

"I went to parent teacher's night and the stupid, crazy teachers couldn't even run a PowerPoint presentation." (this particular one wants to make me bite nails on a regular basis - http://www.plain-jane.com/ -- which is why I don't read that whiner much -- and she lives in my home town!). Whine! Whine! (I don't feel bad about linking to this one -- she is always complaining about other bloggers . . .fair's fair).

"Why should WE respect teachers who are lazy and incompetent -- AND then they get three months off EVERY summer?" Whine! Whine! Whine!

And on and on they complain and groan and moan.

All this carping -- by folks who have never stood for 90 minutes before a classroom of 15 year olds right before lunch -- makes me want to puke.

Here's the thing -- and I've been on both sides of the world (business vs. education) -- when you walk through the school doors at 6:30 a.m. (not 7:30 you dweebs!) until you leave at 3:00 p.m. (if you're lucky) you are on call. You don't get a coffee break. You don't get a bathroom break. Elementary teachers don't always get a lunch break. High school teachers get 20 minutes for lunch -- NOT an hour. The day IS intensive and that tension does NOT let up because you need (want) to sit down for minute.

In business, you work for 15 minutes (on your butt -- not on your feet) and someone stops by your cubicle to chat. You work another 15 and you head down the hall for coffee or a coke. You feel the urge to pee, you go to the bathroom when you need to. You can call your spouse to arrange for dinner that night, or call your child and see how his day is going, or arrange for tickets to the ball game. Ask a teacher if any of those things EVER happen during his / her day!

I teach 90 minutes blocks. It's intensive the entire 90 minutes. I don't sit down. I dance. I cheerlead. I provide instruction. I offer up examples. I give individual attention. I meet with five different groups during a ten minute time-frame. Kids touch me all the time. They touch me physically and mentally, pulling out my energy and absorbing it like a sponge.

One 90 minute block with a five minute passing period, followed by a second 90 minute block, another passing period -- and finally a 105 minute block. All of that's before my 20 minute lunch. Then I get 45 minutes for planning -- and because I'm a cooperative teacher I actually do use my planning period for meetings. I end my day with a 45 minute block of teaching study skills. The I have 30 minutes to attend content area meetings or prepare for the next day.

I walk 1.62 miles a day to do this -- inside a huge old building that is somewhat air-conditioned and even less heated. I'm usually either hot (summer) or freezing (winter). The only elevator is a freight loader at the back of the building and school is three stories tall. I stand during most of the 90 minute time-frames -- or I walk around, touching kids, keeping them focused, using my body as a tool in my teaching.

I counsel kids that others want to kill. Tell me, business people -- just how many people DO YOU work with that can get killed by just stepping outside the building? I work with pregnant 16 year olds. I counsel students with severe learning disabilities whose parents (you! you folks who are out there complaining about teachers) haven't provided the kids with breakfast, the proper meds, or a good night's sleep. I walk the halls after a Code Red has been called -- looking for the intruder that may come armed with a gun or a knife or a bomb.

The parent I listed above skipped her Advisory meeting at her son's schools because she was pissed that the teachers she had visited with couldn't produce PowerPoint presentations for her to view (and to be fair, because she was feeling guilty). Gad. This is wrong on soooo many levels. First -- Advisory. These classes meet once a week in our school and are designed to make a connection between the school, the child, and home. The Advisory teacher should be the one the PARENT wants to meet -- and if you haven't learned that yet, then you, yes - YOU PARENT -- the one constantly carping about MY profession, haven't bothered to know about your child's educational day.

Secondly, no PowerPoint presentation in my classroom? Lady -- I MADE MY LIVING doing PowerPoint for the senior executive level of the #3 telecom company in the world! I make better PowerPoint presentations than you EVER thought about -- but I have NOTHING to show them on! What! You think every classroom is filled with media software right at our disposal! I wish! We'll raise your taxes, idiot -- then maybe I'll have the right materials so you can view MY PowerPoint presentation. And I'll blow you away with all my animation and slide transitions and rising and falling music! Hell, lady -- I don't even have a white board or an overhead projector. I'm glad to have chalk and a blackboard!

So get off my back! Get off teachers' backs. Stop your carping. Pull your whinny self out of your depression and quit blaming teachers for all the problems you've faced in life. Just like every other profession -- we have great ones, good ones, mediocre ones, and poor ones.

Honestly -- nobody you had for 10 months of the year for 60 or 90 minutes five days a week along with 30 other squirming bodies ever ruined your life, unless they met you after school and did something unspeakable. Your own parents may have ruined you -- or you might have ruined your life by the choices YOU made (dropping out of school) -- but your English teacher barely dented your exterior. And if she did make an impression on you for the good -- hurrah! She really WAS a miracle worker! Praise AND respect her!

As parents you owe teachers the same respect you would offer a co-worker or the janitor in your office building. Nothing more or less. But you owe them the common courtesy to stop griping about how they "ruined my life" -- because they honestly DID NOT! Quit complaining because you wish your life was different -- and quit blaming the teacher because it isn't.

Rant over. For this August. Go to last August, though, and the same woman set me off.