Relentless Pursuit (36 page)

Wells asked for Chad's advice: “How do you think I can get the good ones to stay?”

Chad offered his opinion: “There are some teachers who are going to go, and I don't think you should waste your time trying to get them to change their minds. You are better off giving personal attention to the ones who are still deciding.” It was a cordial meeting. Chad was relieved. Wells had not pressed him. But the day of reckoning was fast approaching. Sooner rather than later, Wells would know that he'd been screwed.

The rumors had been flying for weeks. Finally, at the end of April, Hartford and the others could wait no longer. They wanted to give the school enough notice so that their replacements could be found. And they were tired of keeping secrets. At SE's weekly meeting, right before the beginning of open-house night, Hartford told the group that he had had to make a very painful decision. He had been given an opportunity to help start a brand-new school, and he had decided to take it. Then he said all the things they knew and felt themselves—that he was frustrated by a district and administration that wouldn't allow good teachers to make necessary reforms, that he thought the world of his colleagues at SE, that he was sick of fighting. After Hartford spoke, they went around the room and, one by one, the five others announced that they were going, too. There were twelve full-time general ed teachers in the School of Social Empowerment. Six of them were leaving. The news was met with stunned silence.

They told Vanessa Morris next. After all, three of them were science teachers—arguably the best teachers in her department. Hartford and the others filed into her room and just laid it on the line. She was shocked. How and why did they keep it secret from her? Hartford and Chad and the others meant a lot to her—personally and professionally.
We have been side by side in this quest! We were in this war together; we were leading the charge, and now they've decided to retreat. How can I advance without my generals?
Morris couldn't help herself. She started to cry. The next day she stayed home and cried some more. Very few things faze her, but she took the defections personally.

When the kids found out the next morning, there were more tears. Like Morris, they felt orphaned. Hartford and the others cried right along with them.

Wells learned the news from one of the other administrators. He had been off campus when their letters of resignation were left at Mrs. Jauregui's office. He was furious. It was bad enough that he was losing a core group of teachers, but the way in which they were leaving troubled him even more.
It was an abandonment and a violation of ethics.
It had all been done on the hush-hush; and they had shown no remorse, no regrets.

Of course, he had known it was a possibility—Chad was a leader and he had his groupies, a faithful following of excellent, hardworking Locke teachers who were clearly unhappy with the pace of change. That's exactly why Wells had raised the ethical implications with Chad earlier; there was a risk that his leaving would have a domino effect. The thing was, he thought he had gotten through to Chad, whom he knew to be a good and honorable man. Then, to have them all resign at once! On a day when he wasn't there! With no warning! Now, that bothered him.

He confronted Chad immediately. “I'm hearing rumors that these teachers are going with you, and I said, ‘No, that can't be true. I see Chad every day, and he would have told me.'”

“Well, actually, it is true,” Chad said, just like that.

Wells couldn't believe it. He had gotten a lot of stink from the rest of the staff about SE ever since he set foot on the campus. His take was that the black and brown teachers at Locke thought of SE as a racist school—a pretty much all-white group of teachers who wanted special treatment, a group of elitists who walked around with their noses up in the air. He knew a lot of Locke's teachers, when hearing the news, would think,
Good riddance!

But there was another group, a smaller group, among which he counted himself, that knew that the defection was a devastating loss. The truth was, SE had more committed teachers than any other small learning community. They were hardworking and their hearts and souls were in the right place. The impact on the school's instructional program was going to be huge. The science department alone had lost three top teachers—teachers who kept the numbers inching up and the state at bay.
These charter schools like Green Dot are committing highway robbery. Chad gets to take the best teachers, and Frank Wells gets to take what the district provides—which sometimes is a person with nothing more than a heartbeat and a pulse.

Wells got on the horn to the district right away. LAUSD was sick to death of Steve Barr and Green Dot. Barr not only got the best teachers, he also got to lure the best students from the crappiest schools. Locke had to take whatever kid showed up at the door. The district was looking into taking legal action. Maybe the teachers could be barred from leaving. At the very least, Wells decided, he was going to change the name of SE. Next year it would be known as the College Prep Academy, or something along those lines.

Though he didn't know Chad that well, Hrag Hamalian probably took his leaving the hardest. He was bringing Vanessa Morris a sub sandwich the evening of the school open house when he walked right into the middle of her meeting with Hartford and the others. It was one of those moments. When they saw Hrag, they beat a hasty retreat, leaving Morris alone with Hrag, crying, minutes before parents were due to arrive. Hrag told Morris to go home, that he would tack a note on her door explaining her absence. But Morris said no. She dried her eyes and got through the night. Hrag couldn't believe that the SE team had handled things so badly. It was terrible seeing Morris in so much distress. He didn't feel too cool about it, either:
If they were leaving, the best teachers in the school, what the hell are the rest of us staying for?

The next day the Green Dot exodus was all anyone could talk about. There was a great deal that had not been explained. Why would they leave a school that they had worked so hard to create? SE wasn't even two years old; how could they just pick up and say they were done? What did this say about where the school at large was headed? If you can't keep your best teachers, what are you doing? The skeletal crew left behind at SE were really confused. Hartford had told them they were the best group of teachers he had ever worked with. If he really believed that, why weren't they all invited to go? And second, why weren't they told this was in the works?

For Phillip and the others, it was hard not to feel like they were just the SE leftovers. The resignations had caused a visible rift in the small school. The Hartford crew was always together; it seemed like their conversations stopped whenever anyone else approached them. The others naturally huddled together, too, trying to figure out how to proceed. Three of the teachers who would be staying were TFAers. Phillip thought that this might be an opportunity to make a distinct TFA school within Locke. SE wasn't going to collapse. He and the other leftovers were not going to let that happen.

When Hrag arrived on Friday, he was still pissed off. But no one else seemed to be angry. He didn't get it. There was such a sense of complacency at Locke. Everyone was supposed to be a martyr and just take stuff. Maybe he was just too volatile. But he felt like the Chad move was going to screw everyone at the school, even more than they were being screwed now. There is a point where you draw the line, especially with your own colleagues. Chad had guided Morris and the new School of Math and Science team through the proposal process, and there had been a clear expectation that he would be there for them when they launched. Hrag told everyone he was going to talk to Chad. Did anyone want to come with him? They looked at him like he was crazy.

Chad was taken aback by Hrag's visit. It hadn't occurred to him that the mass resignations would have an impact on anyone beyond the SE folk. But Hrag's anger was real, and Chad agreed to come Tuesday to the next meeting of the School of Math and Science, to explain his departure and to field their questions.

Mackey started the meeting off by asking Chad to explain to them what had happened. Chad gave them the tick-tock, but the bottom line was, he didn't believe in Locke anymore.

“But you are the light, the visionary,” said Taylor. “If you don't believe in Locke, how can I? What's going to happen to us when you leave?”

“The same thing that happened to us when we first came,” he replied. “You'll move up into leadership positions, work your butts off, and after three years leave. Like everyone does. Sorry, but that's the reality.”

Chad was surprised to find himself justifying his departure to that group, because no one else at the school seemed to care. Nobody had said a thing to him. Not a single person.

After his emotional meeting with Chad the previous Friday, Hrag had nothing left to say. He had already spoken his mind; to say anything more would make him look like a fool. So he zipped it for the meeting. And Chad handled it like a pro. But it didn't change the way Hrag felt. He wasn't comfortable with Chad sucking all the best teachers out of the school. And he still didn't know if they had gone about it the best way. But as he thought about his reaction, he wondered:
Maybe I'm just really tired—emotionally and physically. I don't mean to, but I get in people's faces. You have to at this school or you get totally walked over. I am so sick of things changing.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The Road Show

They said it would happen. The rejuvenation phase would kick in—most likely after the winter break. And sure enough, Rachelle started feeling more comfortable once the second semester was under way in early February. It didn't hurt that a dozen long-stem roses were delivered the first day of the new term. The office called and said there was a delivery for Rachelle. Martel volunteered to pick it up.

“It was a black man, Miss Snyder!” he announced to the whole class as he offered her the flowers. “Ohhh! You got jungle fever!” There was no card attached, so Rachelle called her mother and grandmother—the usual suspects. Neither one claimed credit.
Maybe it was a mistake.

As the month progressed, the gifts kept coming. On Valentine's Day, she was showered with teddy bears, candy, and a single rose. Her birthday was four days later, and she drove home to San Diego to spend it with her parents and her best friend at a performance of Cirque du Soleil. She enjoyed the rest of the long Presidents' Day Weekend in Los Angeles—playing soccer in a league she had joined and hiking in the Santa Monica Mountains. On Tuesday, when she arrived at school, there were another dozen red roses on her chair. This time, a card was attached. The flowers were from Luis, one of the Latino boys in period four. Luis was a big bear of a kid; at eighteen, he was reading at a third-grade level.

She loved her students. During a lesson on reproduction, Jaime, a Locke soccer player who insisted on being called by his American name, James, said, “You got kids, Miss Snyder? You hidin' something? Ever date anyone?”

“No, never,” said Rachelle, smiling, her hair tied back, her gold loop earrings dangling.

“You know that a lie,” said James. “Is it true? The ding-dong come to her stomach like that?” he said, pointing to a picture of the reproductive process.

A week later, the boys were on a quest to be “doctors.” Like much of what Rachelle did in the classroom, the idea for this had come from Hrag. She had figured out pretty early in the year that her best bet for success was to take the general ed bio curriculum and adapt it to her kids' slower pace and skills. Even then, she spent a great deal of time planning, since she didn't have expertise in special ed, biology, or teaching. It was such an obvious problem:
I'm not the first person to ever teach biology to special ed students. So why is there no established curriculum, no set rules, no lesson plans? It's a joke, a mess.

The idea behind the doctors unit was that once the kids had mastered the complexities of genetics and understood prenatal testing, they would be awarded doctor certificates. As part of the day's lesson, students were going to act out a couple's trip to the doctor for genetic testing. Luis volunteered to be the doctor. James was the father. And Jesse, one of the toughest kids to control, wanted to be the pregnant mother.

Jesse was a natural. He stuffed a balloon into his shirt and, with one hand on his back, waddled into the room. “I am so damn tired of carryin' this baby!” he exclaimed. “This baby is killin' me!”

“So, how is your pregnancy goin'?” asked Luis, dressed in a doctor's white coat, his brow furrowed in concern.

“It's goin' so good!” Jesse squealed in a loud falsetto. “So, what's it called? This test? Give me that test! I want it for my baby.”

Luis was stumped, and he wasn't getting any help from the gallery. Rachelle pronounced the word “amniocentesis,” prompting the next question.

“Are there any risks?” Jesse wailed. “My baby ain't gonna die?”

“If I don't touch the baby,” said Luis soothingly, with James looking on.

“Thanks for lettin' me know that,” said Jesse, now calmed. “Sure, let me do this.”

James stood behind the bulging Jesse, hiding a Ziploc bag that contained some water (faux amniotic fluid) and a plastic baby doll. Luis inserted a turkey baster into the plastic bag and put the liquid he had extracted into a test tube—squirting Jesse in the process. The kids hooted in delight. Rachelle reminded them that the amniotic fluid that Luis had just collected contained DNA, which determined the gender and health of the baby. By then, Jesse had burst his balloon and was holding the baby doll in his arms: “My baby is so nice!” he cooed, rocking the light-colored plastic doll back and forth.

“You been messin' with a white lady, Jesse! You got yourself a light-skinned baby!” they teased.

The lesson ended in gales of laughter.

Things got even better as the semester went on. Maybe it was because the course material—genetics, evolution, reproduction—was so interesting. Or maybe it was because she and Stephen Minix were dating. Finally, Rachelle felt supported at Locke. She had someone—a little older and much wiser—to go to when she had a problem. He was especially helpful with her undisciplined boys. Whenever someone was out of line, she reported the kid to Stephen and he handled it later, during PE or at practice, if the kid was on a team. Stephen would work the kid's butt off, and Rachelle's problems would disappear. It didn't feel like a serious relationship because it was so easy and comfortable. But by April they had made plans to fly first-class to Seattle so that Rachelle could meet his family and friends. He was so nice, and she felt so happy, more content than she had in a very long time. After spending the entire first semester trying to figure out what to do with her life after Teach For America, she stopped torturing herself. She liked teaching at Locke. She would stay for at least a third year. After that, maybe she'd look into counseling, or literacy, or something more specialized.

But there were still plenty of down times. Like Valentine's Day, when Rachelle agreed to take on a general ed biology class after another science teacher abruptly quit. Rachelle wasn't qualified under No Child Left Behind—she hadn't taken the CSET exam in biology to prove mastery. And she had enough to do with four special ed classes, her IEPs, and graduate school. But she felt like she had to say yes, because how could she say no? Hrag and the others were so nice to pass their lesson plans on to her; she felt like she owed them. Besides, Vanessa Morris had promised she'd get paid extra. Rachelle said she wanted to think about it overnight. The next day at the biology department meeting, she told Morris she guessed she could do it.

“Good,” replied Morris. “You start tomorrow.” Rachelle almost started to cry. Hrag took one look at her and gave her his syllabus. Rachelle crossed out his name, substituted her own, and handed it out the next day. There were forty-eight kids on the roster, more names than chairs in the lab. But a lot were regular no-shows. One girl, seeing Rachelle at the front of the room, said, “Hell, no. I don't want no female teacher,” and walked out.

Rachelle had promised herself she would never allow the job to make her cry. But, man, did she come close. Later in February, her advisor from her graduate program at Cal State, Dominguez Hills, came in to observe her fourth-period class and left in shock. The boys were out of control—shadowboxing, singing rap songs, hurling insults. Rachelle barreled her way through a lesson on mitosis, but she did so over a chorus of expletives running from “nigga” and “fuck you” to “homo faggot.” The advisor ended up keeping several of the kids after class and lecturing them.

The next day, when the bad behavior continued, Rachelle sat them down for a chat. “I am embarrassed for you,” she said. “I'm not gonna get fired over how people behave, but when she makes her report, do you think that behavior reflects well on me—allowing that kind of disrespect? I'm not mad at you. I don't take it home. I'm disappointed. I'm an adult. I don't need to argue with little kids who are disrespectful. I think you guys have a lot more going for you than maybe you even realize. It's okay to be good at something.”

No one was paying attention. The more she talked, the more they acted out, with Kenyon and Deangelo slapping each other while the others continued their swearing. Finally Rachelle announced, “I'm done. Pack it up. Your behavior sucks.” Then, as the room quieted, she said, “In all seriousness, what do you think we need to do to improve behavior?”

The answer came from Francisco, a Latino boy with a speech impediment: “Behave better.”

Good behavior and good grades became the price of admission for the trip to Catalina Island Rachelle had planned. Though she hadn't been very good about getting her data to Teach For America, she had tracked her kids' progress. She put a chart on the overhead of the first-semester grades for the six kids—out of twenty—who were regulars in period four.

“All six of you got a C or higher,” she said. “But my big goal for the entire class was to have eighty percent pass with a C or better, the grades you need to get into college. Did I reach that goal? No. So I need to work harder to make sure all the people understand the material we're covering. What hurts in this class is that the people who don't come bring down the class average. The only ones who failed were the ones who did not come to class.

“Remember,” she continued, “Dr. Wells put the payment down for our trip. This semester is really important. I am going to bring the people with good grades and good citizenship. Dr. Wells will not let me bring people with bad grades in other subjects. If I took a bunch of kids and they ended up acting like you guys in period four do, there would be no chance we'd get invited back.”

“But we don't act that way on trips,” argued Malik, a new addition to the class. “We ain't gonna act like that.”

It may have been a moot point. They weren't sure they wanted to go.

“What if somebody gets hurt?” worried James.

“We're goin' to sleep on a boat?” asked Deangelo.

Rachelle explained that the trip was planned for the end of May, a few weeks before school let out. There were going to be special science programs for the class, plus hiking and swimming and snorkeling.

“I don't wanna come back in pieces,” said Martel.

Shandrel agreed: “It's not for us.”

“Ah, you guys are not adventurous,” teased Rachelle.

“You got that right,” said Shandrel. “Give us a couple of guns. We go hunting.”

“For bears!” said Martel. “They had a movie about some guy who went into the woods at bedtime and he never came back. I'm gonna need a pistol, an AK-47.”

“Do you know what snorkeling is?” asked Rachelle, to silence. “It's when you go in the water with goggles and something attached that sticks out of the water that lets you breathe.”

“I ain't goin' in the water,” said Martel. “You come back with blood all over you. I can't do water. Sharks and that stuff.”

“You better kiss your mom before you go away,” cautioned one boy.

“What if you don't come back?”

         

Just weeks before they were due to go, Dr. Wells still hadn't signed off on the journey. Rachelle feared he was avoiding her. But there was no way she was going to break her promise to the kids. So she and Jill Greitzer took all the paperwork out to the corner of 111th and San Pedro and tackled Wells during dismissal. He whipped out the school checkbook and paid the fees that day.

Rachelle and Jill had connected at the beginning of the second semester, when Jill had called Rachelle to commiserate about behavioral problems. Jill was a math teacher, and she and Rachelle shared many of the same kids. Rachelle was so happy to get her call. She had wondered all semester long exactly who this Miss G was. The kids often confused Rachelle with her, though they looked nothing alike. The only possible explanation for the mix-up was that they were both white.

On May 31, Rachelle and Jill took twenty special ed students on the three-day trip to Catalina. For many, it was the first high school field trip they had ever been on. The kids all got to school early that Wednesday morning. Rachelle's mother, Lynne, went along as a chaperone, and there was another teacher, Corey Baker, a full-time, uncredentialed special ed sub who had agreed to help out. The kids called him Bake a Cake. He was subbing at Locke while trying to set up a practice as a hypnotherapist specializing in sex therapy. Baker had a way with the kids, especially the males. His theory about classroom management could be summed up in three words: the fear factor. Baker believed kids could smell fear in a teacher and acted on it. He wasn't afraid of them, and they could smell that, too. He had the ability to read their body language and talk them down when they were careening out of control. He prided himself on not sending kids to the dean's office, because for many, that meant jail.

It was a brilliant morning, and the kids were almost subdued as they stood beside their sleeping bags and backpacks awaiting directions outside the front gates of the school. Kenyon stood apart, do-rag on, black hooded sweatshirt pulled low over his head, obviously apprehensive. They were all teenagers, some as old as eighteen. But they may as well have been in grade school. And they may as well have been going to the moon.