The following is an excerpt from a book I haven't written yet. One day, one day... (general warning: this is not a cozy, heartwarming, family friendly blog entry. Just sayin'.)
Everything started out so well. The year was full of promise. I was going to be a third-year teacher, and everyone in teaching knows that your third year is supposed to be your best. The first year is a mess for a number of reasons. The second is where you make several calculated corrections, improving your teaching skills and quality of life enormously. But the third year is where you really hit your stride…at least, that’s what they tell me.
I can't say that I was taken by surprise when things started to go south. In fact, there were several tangible warning shots fired across my face early on that should have awakened my fears and brought out the survivalist in me. There was the fact that we lost four teaching positions due to massive state-mandated budget cuts, increasing the average class size from seventeen to twenty-eight. There was the fact that our new science teacher was new to America, new to teaching, and had a Jamaican accent so thick that even I could hardly understand him. But the most foreboding telltale sign of them all was the fact that Mr. Fenner, the former Marine Corps drill sergeant-turned-principal, was going to "take care of the 8th grade personally," rather than have one of his assistant principals do the job.
"If you have any problems with any students on your team, Mr. Olsen, you send them to me." Mr. Fenner's rough and booming voice sounded like it still belonged on the exercise fields of a military base.
"Sounds good," I said. And it did.
Now I understand how confusing this may sound to an outsider, especially an outsider unfamiliar with the inner workings of Henderson Middle School. When the head honcho of the house says he's going to personally handle all disciplinary and academic issues for your grade level, that sounds like a good thing. However, it's the exact opposite of a good thing when the head honcho of the house decides to spend 80% of his time out of your class, out of your school, and for all intensive purposes, out of your world. Instead of having a watchful, helpful administrator on our side, we 8th grade teachers were marooned to a desert island in the middle of hurricane season.
After the first two weeks of school, I didn't think we'd be needing Mr. Fenner's help. The students were working hard, behaving well, and I was personally teaching the pants off American history. Students came into my class smiling, and left smiling even bigger. The other teachers on my team seemed to be doing okay as well, but somewhere in week three, I began to grow increasingly concerned about the students. They started to slip. Their homework got neglected. Their scores dropped. Worst of all, they started to get sassy. Then rowdy. Then downright disrespectful.
I knew things were reaching a critical point when our new science teacher brought a stack of discipline referrals (pink slips, write-ups, call them what you will) and dropped them on my desk after school one day in early October. There must have been about twenty of them.
"What's this?" I asked.
"Dis is jus' from dis week, Mr. Olsen. I'm not sho' what to do."
The referral on top of the stack detailed the story of student telling the teacher to "go f***" himself. The second referral resulted from a student telling the same teacher that he was going to "shoot him up." As I fumbled through the stack of referrals, I got sicker and sicker as they got worse and worse.
"Wow," I said in disbelief after reaching the bottom of the stack. "Have you told Mr. Fenner about this?
"I've tried, Mr. Olsen, but I can' seem to evah catch 'im in 'is office."
I told the teacher I'd take care of it. Wearing my frustration on my sleeve, I stormed out of my room with the referrals tucked under my arm like a football, and headed straight for the office of the head honcho himself. It was high time we taught these kids a lesson.
When I arrived at Mr. Fenner's office, I was understandably miffed to find his door closed, his lights off, and his office silent. He was not there. That was the second day in a row I hadn't seen him at the school. I walked to the front office and asked the school secretary when he'd be back. She didn't know. Dejected, I returned to my classroom and put the stack of referrals on my desk. They'd see Mr. Fenner's desk first thing in the morning, I vowed.
Three weeks later, the referrals were still on my desk. Mr. Fenner had only been to a full day of school three times in fifteen school days. He was always at a meeting, or somewhere else that would produce the broken record of "I don't know" from our school secretary. I did happen to see him in the hall one day, and was able to tell him about the referrals, and how his urgent attention to the matter was needed. He assured me he'd process the paperwork to punish the responsible students that same day.
"Bring the referrals down to my office at 2:00 and we'll go through them, one by one."
"Thank you, Mr. Fenner. Thank you."
At 2:00, I arrived at his office with the referrals in hand, except now the group of twenty had multiplied into a group of over thirty. I knocked on the door to his office, and as sure as the sun rises, I was stood up.
Meanwhile, it seemed like the entire school was beginning to fall apart at the seams. The students were starting to impose their will on an inexperienced faculty and a spineless administration. Students could be found running through the halls without passes, cursing in front of teachers, and getting into fights without remorse. Each day we teachers wondered when, not if, fights would occur. One particularly creative rebellion came in the form of two students jumping on the hood and roof of a teacher's car. The teacher's crime to deserve such a punishment? He wrote the students up for cursing.
While many of us learned to roll with the punches, several teachers had had enough. The first quit the first week of school. Then one in September. Then one in October. Then two in November. Our numbers began to dwindle, and the students were emboldened by their victories.
But don't worry. There's a silver lining to this story. Mr. Fenner finally reappeared in the midst of his mutiny last week, and kindly, lovingly, and respectfully informed the staff and students that he, too, was quitting. Tomorrow is his last day.
It's not always true what they say about that Third Year. Sometimes it's better. Sometimes it's worse. Sometimes I'm grateful for these challenges, and try to turn them into lessons learned for someone who will spend the rest of his life in education. And then sometimes I think things can't get any worse. Of course, then I simply remember one thing: it's only November.
