After my previous diary, in which I explored the positive side to teaching, and the fact that, despite all of the inherent issues, I do love my job, I had to take a few moments to think about the failure rate in my senior classes...my thought process follows.
My class load includes two sections of seniors, two of juniors, and one of freshmen (was not originally supposed to be this way, fyi, there was a scheduling change on the first day of the school year which took one section of seniors away and gave me freshmen, therefore increasing my work load from two preparations to three, but that's another story altogether).
In my two sections of seniors, I have 58 seniors.
Of those 58 seniors, 19 are currently failing. That's a 32.7% failure rate, just in my two sections. There are two other senior teachers with similar rates in their classes. Of those 19 currently failing, 4 have a striking chance of passing (given that they complete the final two assessments in a satisfactory manner and according to the rubric I will use to assess their work). The rest have percentages ranging from 9.22 to 40.45.
What will happen, do you ask? Well, here's what already happened.
What I have already done - weeks ago, at the mid-point in the semester, when those students who currently have a 9% were hovering around the low 50% range - is place those children on an academic contract. The contract had many requirements, including after-school time with me, perfect attendance in class, consistent completion of assignments, and then, if they met those requirements, I would provide them with additional time after school, in which they would complete the major assignment they missed which caused their initial foray into failure. I would then grade said assignment - curving it to a lower percentage due to their inability to complete it on time - but I would grade it nonetheless. In providing students with the contract, I "went the extra mile" and gave my students a way to redeem themselves from failure.
Why did I even do that? Because, as a teacher of seniors, I am somewhat "responsible" for the graduation rate of those seniors, and my job therefore depends on their success. Also, because if I hadn't done it, the principal - who already came to me early in the year to ask what extra assistance I had in place for those students who were in "danger" of failing - would have "suggested" I do so anyway.
Now, on to what will happen: So near the end of the semester, after providing "redemption" opportunities to those students who did not complete the original paper (or two), I will once again likely receive a visit from the principal, after he takes a look at my online grade book. And what will he say? He'll ask what I am going to do to "help these kids graduate."
And here is my reflection on that question:
What are they doing to help themselves graduate?
When I give students assignments, they are well organized and set out and carefully structured so that there are several checkpoints along the way (writing a paper is a laborious process, kiddos need help). When I tell students I am going to do something (i.e. give them a zero if they don't turn in the assignment on time), I do it. Therefore, I have fulfilled my responsibilities - I set out assignments as I am supposed to, and I hold students accountable, because it is their responsibility to get things done, correct?
So, again, I ask, What are they doing to help themselves graduate?
What sort of culture are we promoting, as teachers, and as principals, if we always are there to bail out kids? Where are they going to learn the responsibility and accountability that are apparently now the watchwords of my profession, but, in reality, have been things necessary to function in society all along?
When I asked one student - failing early in the year, already a father, just turned 18 last week - how exactly he planned to graduate if he never did the work, his response was more alarming than his situation: "Well, we've just always gotten through this way." So what does that mean?
What, exactly, are we teaching kids, if all we ever do is give them crutches to get through life, rather than teaching them to walk on their own? Now back to my role in all this, and my frustration with the situation...because what am I teaching my students (Well, 32.7% of them anyway)?
Am I teaching them, that, when approached by a principal who questions my instruction because of the lack of responsibility of my students, it immediately becomes my responsibility to fix it? Then, when I fix it, and give them assignments (read: crappy busy work that is easy to grade because it's the end of the semester after I tried to get them to work mid-semester) that will "help" them pass, how am I modeling responsibility for my students?
If I don't fix it? What happens then?