Around here

Sometimes I wonder why education is in such dire straights. Then I look around here at some departments and then I realize, "This is exactly why education is in such trouble." It just amazes me how some programs do next to nothing yet get a majority of the money. Another teacher and I write a grant for a projector to use with our comp class and it gets shot down. But if another department wants something, it's a carte blanche. It makes me damned sick.

But what are ya gonna do about it?

Instead of getting frustrated and burned out, this is what I do -

I think of how a couple days ago in my fourth block American Lit class I was trying to get the kids to analyze John Updike's "A&P," particularly poor Sammie's trouble. Then Jeremy pipes up, "Boy those are some spiffy shoes, mister!" He calls everyone mister.

"Just shined them this morning," I replied and went back to the notes on the board.

Then from the back, Blakely chimes in, "Who are you trying to impress?"

Sensing a moment, I turned around and declared, "Just you, baby!" and gave him a hard wink.

The class roared and I chuckled. So much for poor Sammie's trouble.

I think of how my College Comp kids laughed and squirmed as they read David Sedaris's "Big Boy" essay in class. I think of how one writer, Amanda, pours her troubled personal life out and into her essays. So much potential amongst so little.
I think of Erica who wrote her narrative about being witness to a fatal para-glider accident and how later she was in the same diner as the pilot's wife and she overheard her wondering to her friend why her husband hasn't contacted her yet!

I think of how my fourth block American Lit class sat in stone silence and rapture as they listened to me tell two brutal, and totally true, accounts concerning the Vietnam war (one about how our principal escaped the draft via a knee injury and another told to me by a former teacher whose brother was in Vietnam and what the incredible event that he witnessed). That's the power of narrative.

I think of giving Amanda grief for choosing to take Comp II over my College Comp class. She was amazed that I remembered two of her essays - two years after she had taken my Comp I class.

That's how I'm going to make it through today.