Failing

In Hard Times at Douglas High there was a faculty meeting where the principal basically blamed the teachers for failing. I got so angry and frustrated. How can responsibility rest only with the teachers? How could teachers' jobs be in jeopardy when they are trying as hard as they can? Would I have said that 4 months ago? Would I have said, no don't blame the teachers? or would I have said, damn straight, if they were good enough teachers, the kids would be uplifted, ready to learn and learning. Not failing.

But now I am in the hot seat. Today Principal Lang handed out 'Fail Rate Reports' for our classes and gave us a big talk about how if our fail percentages were higher than 70% there was something going on. My fail percentages: 85%, 92%, and 63%. Well phew, at least one of them is below 70.....In his talk, Principal Lang said he picked a doctor to fix the achilles tendon he ripped just before school started because he was an expert. He said it was the doctor's job to operate and get him moving again in a few months. To get him back to new so he could run half marathons. Fine. It is the doctor's job to fix him, to operate, to give him instructions on how to rehab his leg, how to rest it, to ice it, all that good stuff. But if Principal Lang jumps up and down on his freshly operated on leg, if he runs around school in flip flops instead of his boot, is it the doctor's fault if the doctor told him very clear instructions on how best to get the leg well?

So whose fault is it? Here we go with accountability again. There are definitely things I could be doing better. But aren't there things my kids could be doing better too? Couldn't they study? Couldn't they listen to me when I teach them?

Official midterm grades are due next week. I will spend the rest of this week and all of next week finding ways to make up work. Finding ways to catch my kids up. Not just to get their grades up, but also to get their confidence up. If they don't think they will do it, what little effort they put in now will completely disappear.

Maybe, just maybe, small investment efforts (the ones I'd planned from day 1 that never made it to the wall) will get them excited. Stars with their name and stickers on them on Club 85, a Student of the Week, and a word wall. Will that do it? If I give them their Unit 1, 2 and 3 tests again next week, will they fail again, or pass because I have been reviewing everything for a week? I am just not sure. I am really not.

For now, my job is not in jeopardy. My sanity might be. My health definitely is, and my can do attitude, quickly fading. When my first period class leaves my room everyday, I sigh with relief, and then a bit of grief because whatever new thing I tried that day did not work. Do I have the energy to keep trying this? I have all these resources at my fingertips, but sometimes, getting it into a form that works for me and my students somehow seems tough.

I can't keep living day to day, doing tonight what will get me through tomorrow. I need to find a way to get ahead, or have tomorrow's work take less time so I have time for tracking, for figuring out who is missing what work, and to really help these kids pass geometry and algebra 2. And maybe give them some confidence along the way.