david taus

Fanfare for the Common Man

music: Phish- 11/20/98, Hampton, VA

Yesterday was the last day of classes at school. I remember the last day of the year when I was in high school as a loud and raucous occasion with kids tearing down the halls and notebook paper flying all over the place. I expected my kids to be no different when the last hour of the day ticked away but it was really like any other day: kids lingering, hanging out by the window at the end of the hall, some typing on computers, others chasing and being chased (we humans still dance that dance, thank goodness), and a handful of emptying the contents of their lockers into garbage cans. I even had three or four kids stay for around an hour after school patiently penciling their way through make-up assignments. Sure, we have finals next week and I’ll see them again, but the last day of class was so subdued that it was almost disappointing.

It wouldn’t have hit me that the school year ended were it not for graduation. We teachers put on ties and nice dresses and handed out some awards and some pieces of paper and in doing so sent 40 or so human beings out into the ether. The ceremony itself was run just like the school: highly informal, low on ceremony but big on humanity. We are a school of quiet diligence and of overly modest industry. Performance and presentation are not our forte, nor is formal structure and organization. We don’t really speak about the fact that we have two Boston Teachers of the Year on our staff of 18, that two of our staff members (one being the headmaster) are also lawyers, or that about half our staff can drop the H-bomb. I suppose it fits the personality of the public school teacher to be so understated. Nobody in search of fortune and glory goes into teaching. It doesn’t pay all that well, it’s excruciating work, it’s far from glamorous, and it’s a job often taken for granted by the rest of the adult world. Last night, though, as the graduates made their way across the stage, I was reminded that the crap I deal with during the day and the rediculous hours I put in evenings and Sundays is important, and is sometimes appreciated by those that benefit directly.

The graduates are one story; my own students are another. Grades for my own kids this year are more or less in (save the final exam) and things aren’t looking good for the home team. I feel guilty here, as if I could have done more to yank some of these kids up by the collar and smack the sense into them to put forth enough effort to play the school game so they didn’t have to repeat the course and they could get on with their lives. But no, no matter what the Feds say, at some point the kids’ successes and failures are their own. At the end of the day (or year), it is almost all about playing the school game; content is secondary and grading becomes a tool used to sort kids out and ultimately distribute them into society at various strata. The unfortunate truth is that those kids that come out on the top of my heap still have mountains to climb. I shudder to think what might happen to those who can’t muster passing grades. Thinking about the kids I had this year that ended the year expelled, dropped-out, or involved with the juvenile courts (and there were several) still keep me up at night. This teaching thing is certainly an uphill battle, but I’ve always been one to side with the underdog.

Graduation, and the completion of a year of school, is an event worth recognizing and celebrating. Too often these kids get nothing in terms of recognition for their hard work. I’d like to take a moment to recognize and applaud their efforts this year. For most of them it’s a struggle just to get to school every day; that they made it through a year of school and passed is positive. My own academic experience was a foregone conclusion: of course I would graduate high school. Of course I would graduate from college. Of course I would graduate from grad school. Not so for these kids.

There were brilliant moments this year and graduation last night was one of those moments, but for the most part this past year sucked me dry. I managed to scratch out some time here and there for myself, but the majority of my time, talent, and effort went to educating a group of teenagers about the living world. My reinforcement (besides paychecks every other week) was minimal, but I knew it would be. I’m still so overwhelmed by my first year of teaching that it hasn’t quite sunk in that I leave the country for the summer in less than three weeks. I have no perspective. I hope I did alright. I hope that the grades I’m about to bubble in on the Boston Public Schools scantron sheets are not the indicator of my success. The school year, for all intents and purposes, is over and I don’t even realize it. I don’t want money or applause or even that warm fuzzy feeling that you get when you do something good. At this point, I just want my students to be good people. And a decent meal. And a good night’s sleep. And that same sense of closure I had when I was in high school.

Posted by davidtaus at June 17, 2005 09:23 PM | TrackBack