The Great Expectations School (41 page)

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The 2011-2012 school year will be my fourth as an eleventh- and twelfth-grade English teacher at the SEED Public Charter School of Washington, D. C. I'm not a super-teacher, like anything you've seen in Hollywood, but I know how to run a rigorous, engaging classroom. Each year I get better at refining my curriculum, anticipating students' needs, collaborating with parents, and participating in the school
community. I inaugurated a tradition of publishing a senior class literary anthology, and I co-direct students in a Shakespeare play each spring. I'm even a founding member of the school's New Teacher Induction team, designed to help rookies through their treacherous first year.

These successes are possible because SEED is a functional learning community. My classes range from ten to seventeen students, so I'm able to give individualized feedback to each student on each assignment. Teachers at DeWitt Clinton carried workloads of five classes with thirty-four students apiece; it's staggering to consider the time involved in grading 170 essays.

My school leaders are supportive former teachers who know all of the students and their extended families. They clearly care about test scores, but they don't force disproportionate test prep on teachers and students. The principal encourages her teachers to seek out opportunities for professional growth and she footed much of the bill for two other colleagues and me to pursue National Board Certification. This rigorous year-long process—assembling a four-piece, sixty-plus page portfolio and taking six essay tests—constituted the most rewarding professional development experience of my career. I had never even heard of National Board Certification at P.S. 85, where a choking anxiety seized me every time I saw an administrator headed my way.

At SEED, I'm able to shape my curriculum. My classes belong to me to invent and re-invent. When I wanted to order class sets of Sherman Alexie's
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
, I got the green light. When an English department colleague and I sought a partnership with the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to bring authors into our classrooms, my principal gave us a thumbs-up and now we each host three writers a year.

Being a confident teacher is fun. At P.S. 85, I looked to Sonandia as my beacon in a tempest. Now, there's no storm; I have primary control of the atmosphere in my classroom, putting me in a much stronger position to elicit real growth from my students. I teach my
students to lead structured literary discussions and by the time we're wrapping up books like
The Great Gatsby
or
Their Eyes Were Watching God
, there is no doubt that they are becoming stronger analysts and deeper thinkers.

It's not always sunny. Plenty of days, I still come home feeling like a failure; working with teenagers can be heartbreaking. But my lows aren't as low anymore—I've learned to avoid or defuse no-win power struggles with defiant students. My expectations for myself and my charges are higher.

People rise to the occasion when they feel ownership. My children at P.S. 85 had their finest hours—Dr. Seuss day and the
Pocahontas and the Strangers
unit, to name two—when both the children and I felt this sense of ownership over our work. As a clueless rookie operating in a hostile environment, I couldn't sustain, let alone build on that sense of ownership. Now I can, and the palpable progress propels me like rocket fuel.

My daughter Sadie was born during D.C.'s “Snowpocalypse” of December 2009. Now she's toddling around, hoisting herself up wherever possible, and pressing her favorite board books into Colleen's and my hands. At the time of publication,
Hippos Go Berserk
is a top pick.

I obsess over Sadie's education. Colleen and I are both products of suburban public schools and we want to educate Sadie the same way.

Sending my daughter to public school fills me with hope and fear. In my hopes, I see a kindergarten class with fifteen kids with a well-prepared teacher who loves children and sees them as individuals. I envision time to play and figure things out. I imagine that if Sadie is learning something quickly—say, her numbers from one to ten—then the teacher will notice and help her learn about numbers up to 100 and beyond. If she's having difficulty with a concept—like patterns—the teacher will notice and give her some different strategies and extra attention to help her get it. I want her teacher to model curiosity, kindness, and passion for learning. Basically, when I think about Sadie's education, I think about her classroom: who's in it and what's going on.

But then the fears creep in. If she were assigned to a class like 4-217 with a twenty-two-year-old version of me as the teacher, I'd have a heart attack, break out of my hospital room, and camp out in the principal's office until new arrangements were made.

Every successful adult I know can name at least one teacher who made a significant, even life-changing impact. Of my great teachers,
none
were rookies. My mentor, Mr. Truitt, had taught for three decades when I took his film appreciation class for five straight semesters.

I want Sadie to learn from passionate, experienced teachers—professionals who know their craft and speak the language of young
people. My fear is that so many would-be-great teachers aren't choosing the profession because of the mediocre pay, low respect, and increasingly mechanistic conditions. Perhaps even more would-be-great teachers try teaching but leave after a few years, creating a perpetual staffing crisis.

Attracting top college grads to teaching is essential; retaining them for the long haul is what matters most. Compensation is
the
prohibitive factor. No one wants to move down the socioeconomic ladder. I'm an example: I grew up with my own bedroom, occasional vacations, and a college savings fund. It's very important for me to try to provide these things for Sadie. On a teacher's salary, I really can't. Candidly, I could not commit to teaching if my wife didn't have a lucrative job. (Colleen left teaching in 2008 after five years.)

The altruism that recruiting organizations like Teach For America harnesses lasts for a while, but not the long run. Affluent new grads may leap at the opportunity to earn $40,000 a year for doing public service, but it's much less attractive when they're nearing thirty, wanting a house and family, and seeing their peers earn much more.

On top of that, teaching is increasingly becoming a profession of suspicion, disrespect, and warped priorities. Teachers are constantly wondering if they will be marked as deadbeats, with Michelle Rhee holding a broom and glaring out from the cover of
Time
magazine, ready to sweep you away like trash.

Some Republican governors have mined political gold portraying teachers as welfare queens with easy jobs and cushy benefits. This has opened the door to shredding collective bargaining rights and ushering in reform policies abhorrent to teachers. “Accountability,” a universally accepted term above reproach, has been co-opted to provide cover for ramping up testing to extraordinary levels. Preemptively dismissed as corrupt defenders of a despicable status quo, teachers' voices are drowned out. Of course, teachers are the ones who actually have to implement these policies that overemphasize testing, depersonalize education, and strip ownership from the classroom.

Democrat leaders, apparently unable to come up with any better ideas, have ceded to No Child Left Behind's oppressive assessment regime.
Expanded high-stakes testing—more often and for younger children—appears imminent.

Meanwhile, on the ground, would-be-great teachers are straitjacketed by out-of-touch bureaucratic mandates and then running for the hills before they can master their craft and make a real difference.

How can Sadie's public school classroom be a haven for learning and discovery amid all this? I fill with dread when I think of Sadie being taught by someone terrified of losing her job over a teacher evaluation based on high-stakes test scores.

And yet when I think about the people doing the hard work in classrooms, my spirits lift. In my journey across the education landscape since the crazy NYC Teaching Fellows placement fair in 2003, I've taught alongside educators in elementary, middle, and high schools, in public, private, and charter schools, in New York City and Washington, D. C. Overwhelmingly, they are talented and caring individuals. Since my P.S. 85 initiation, I've worked with excellent school leaders who toil relentlessly, often thanklessly, to develop their staff and to educate their students. Kind, smart administrators can pump vitality through a school community like a beating heart. Parents I've met want fiercely for their children to succeed. And most of all, students—young, curious, vulnerable, hilarious, heartbreaking, sensitive, posturing, growing people—provide the fire that fuels all of the work.

I want Sadie to be in the classroom with them.

Many people who choose inner-city teaching burn out and leave. Others burn out and stay. But some teachers, like Trish Pierson and Carol Slocumb and Marnie Beck, are warrior-poets for their students. Surrounded by disharmony and heartbreak, they do not slow down, quietly blooming into supernovas behind classroom doors.

“It's never as good as you think it is, and it's never as bad as you think it is.” I think Barbara's words are right, but not how she intended them, as a mind-easing crutch about how all experiences gravitate to the middle. If you teach, especially in the hostile, neglected inner city, you
hold children's hopes and empowerment in your hands. It's true that it's never as good or as bad as you think it is; it's much better or much worse.

On my last day at P.S. 85, as I was boxing up my teacher's desk, I found a jagged paper scrap, ripped from a worksheet about Finding the Main Idea, containing a message I had written to myself at some dark moment that winter:

#1: I care.
#2: Because of #1, I am not a failure.

Footnote: Caring is more than hoping; it is acting and being a constant, relentless agent for Good Things
.

I think about these things often, and about how to mitigate the personal toll of inner-city teaching and create a healthier academic and social experience for students. I remember little moments, like when Seresa used the word
ludicrous
. And big moments, like when Sonandia fought to stay in my class.

And I think about disappearing before I could correct my mistakes.

I left P.S. 85 and moved on to another community where I've found my footing as an educator. As ever-prophetic aphorism fan Barbara Chatton once reminded me, one door closes and another opens. I have enough open doors to be alright. For the out-of-sight, out-of-mind children of the Bronx, there are still many doors to wrench open, many doors to build.

I am indebted to each of my colleagues and students at P.S. 85 for playing a role in a life-changing experience.

During the process of writing this book, I was sustained and encouraged by many extraordinarily generous people, particularly my parents, my sister Amanda, Colleen, Mr. Joe Truitt, and my friends who read early drafts and offered constructive criticism.

I am also indebted to my tireless and resourceful agent, Linda Langton at Langtons International Agency, as well as my dedicated, insightful editors, Cal Barksdale and Tessa Aye at Arcade Publishing. Many thanks are also owed to Dick Seaver and Jeannette Seaver for believing in this story and helping it to find a place in the world.