Yesterday morning I am sitting in my classroom around 7:45 doing paperwork when GR, a senior to whom I taught AP Government when she was a sophomore, comes into my room with a huge goodie basket and and even bigger smile upon her face. I ask what's up and she tells me to read the card. Knowing I had written college recommendations for her, I asked if she had gotten in to college. Again she tells me to read the card. So I do.
Yes, she has gotten in. She applied early decision to Johns Hopkins University. My Masters in teaching is from Hopkins, so I wrote as an alumnus who understands the univiersity. She had applied early decision, and made it. She thanked me not only for the recommendation, but for having taught her, challenged her, supported her.
As I begin my Saturday morning reflection, I start with this because of its importance. It was supported when later in the day S, a junior whom I taught last year, came in to ask me for a recommendation for a summer program. That was also in the morning, during my planning period.
Those two events remind me of the words of Henry Adams,
“A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell, where his influence stops.”
It is upon this I reflect this morning.
One possible frustration for teachers is that we do not always see the impact we are having. Oh, we can see a student become more confident in her writing, a young man who struggles suddenly get a gleam of recognition on his face. grades improve. Those of us in high school can see the excitement of those who get into chosen post-secondary institutions and win scholarships. Even then we do not fully know the impact we have had.
At the end of the day a former student, C, who is now a junior at a university in upstate NY majoring in public policy, stopped by with her mother to say hello. She was part of our American Scholars program, in which I teach the Government class. At times she had resisted what I asked her to do, and I had had no contact with her since graduation. She had a big smile, she wanted to thank me for having challenged her.
Yesterday was a day of affirmation for teaching, for trying to make a difference. It was a day when my students took their midterms. My non-AP students did well, my regular students did okay, some doing better than their normal work and thus saving passing grades. What it means is that for the first time in my 13 years at this high school, I will have no students failing this quarter. Yet I have not lowered my standards in any way.
When I finish this reflection I will turn to two tasks. One is to complete my proposal for a very exciting panel on education for Netroots Nation. I am very hopeful that it will be accepted, even though it will mean going to Providence on the Thursday evening, and leaving by mid-afternoon to return home to Virginia, since the following morning I have to get on a plane to Salt Lake City to serve as a Reader (grader) for the AP Government exam.
The other is to work on my application for a very prestigious program. Were I to be accepted, i would be the first educator in the history of the program, which is why I have important people seriously urging me to apply.
Both of today's tasks are related to my experiences of yesterday. When I want to be silly, I tell my students I am still at almost 66 trying to figure out what I want to do when I grow up. Or to put it another way, I am struggling with how I can best make a difference for students, not just those who may pass through my classroom.
American education is in crisis. So is America as a whole. For a number of years I have argued that public schools are the canary in the coal mine of American democracy - if we lose them, we will know democracy is at serious risk, as the dead canary in the cage warns underground coal miners that the level of gas is so high they need to get out now.
A part of me feels we have already lost the war on both fronts. I have had conversations with prominent people in both education and politics who wonder the same thing. Yet we all determine to act as if the war is not yet lost, and to do what we can to make the final result less devastating.
Some of these people urge me to get more involved in matters of educational policy, which is hard to do while teaching 170+ students a day. As a classroom teacher, they are and will remain my most important priority.
But what if I could do them - and students I will never meet - more good by being involved in policy?
I also have people urging me to write books. I have found that almost impossible to do while teaching, even were I to go silent on blogs for 6 months. I have come up with one book I could do while teaching, but it would require me to know it was my last year, and to eliminate almost all else except teaching and working on the book. People I greatly respect have told me they would love for me to do a book on Teaching: The Final Year.
I am conflicted. I know there are opportunities outside of my current classroom. I could teach in a setting far less demanding of my time. I could work in government or politics. I could work for a non-profit. I would work part-time (all I would need with pension and Social Security) and do more writing. And there are the two very prestigious programs to which I have applied or am now applying.
A day like yesterday reminds me how much I benefit from the contact with young people, even if I do not always see the results. And no matter how much crap may be happening in educational policy at national, state, district and school levels, I know I can make some difference for those students who pass through my classroom. But might I make more by writing, or by being involved in educational policy on a full-time basis? I don't know.
My writing here has opened up the door of opportunity. In the past week I have been contacted by the Oprah Winfrey Network because they would like me to write about the first of their new shows. I have received two more requests to write about books, one in education, one not. I have been asked to write about the new special issue of Rethinking Schools (to which I have committed), and contacted by 6 political campaigns in five different states : TX, CA, VA, MD, and MI. With the exception of free copies of the books, I would receive no compensation, but in each case I would have an opportunity to make some kind of difference.
Yet strangely most of these do not provide the kind of deep satisfaction I get from working with young people, even on days when I coming home upset, because I feell as if I not being an effective teacher.
What I received from the three young ladies yesterday very much outweighs even a bear hug from an elected public official of some note thanking me for helping ensure he did not lose his position in a recent election. Being entrusted with a young lady's future in being asked to write a recommendation in many ways matters so much more than being told I can make a difference in a Congressional election in another state because the candidate so much values my support and my words - and that would be for a personal friend.
On the surface, that should make my choice about next year easy. From what I have written it should be obvious how much of my purpose in life is to teach, especially young people.
For me to teach is to challenge, provoke, support, empower, annoy . . . .
Someone I greatly respect, Parker Palmer, has told me flat out he sees me as a teacher, but offers the following thought: even as much as I love teaching young people, perhaps now it is time for my classroom to be filled primarily with adults, sometimes those with great power over education, over government. And if I can make positive difference by doing that, might that be the more important and productive thing for me to do?
Or would I miss the classroom, as frustrating as it can be? I don't know.
I may get neither of the opportunities to which I will have submitted formal applications. If I am offered either or both, I will have to seriously consider - does either 'fit?" How do I feel about accepting knowing it means leaving the classroom?
This has been, and still is, an exploration of possibilities. I am at this moment still inclined to follow a path other than remaining in my current classroom. Yet a day like yesterday provides such satisfaction it is hard to leave.
Yet is it not better to leave when one can do so by choice, not because one recognizes he can no longer properly fulfill the responsibilities of the position?
This year I have no bad kids.
This quarter i have no students failing - 171 students, 171 will pass.
Might it be better to go out on a high note?
The school in which i teach is changing. Last year 7 senior faculty members took advantage of the systems buyout offer and retired. This year at least 4 more have already made that decision, and - including myself - another 5 are considering also doing so.
I have worked at this school for longer than anyplace else, school or non-school, has been my place of employment.
Perhaps I also need the challenge of doing something different?
I don't know. I recognize conflicts, which I consider as part of a larger picture.
I do know this - as a teacher, as a human being, yesterday was a very satisfying day.
And now I must get on with other writing responsibilities.
Thanks for reading.