Dear Students:

The following are the things I WISH I could say on your essays, but I can’t, because they are 1)mean and 2) not helpful.

1. How is it that you’ve gotten through 11 years of education and you still can’t write a coherent sentence?
2. You’re a senior.  Shouldn’t you have figured out commas by now?
3. How can you be so arrogant when you make so many elementary errors?
4. What is WRONG with you? What part of you thought that was okay to say in an essay for school?
5. I feel like I could understand this sentence if I was drunk, but as I’m not, it makes no sense at all.
6. When your professor next year asks who your English teacher was, please lie.
7. Why do you hate me?
8. I used to believe that most students were basically decent people.  Your story has convinced me I was wrong.
9. You just crossed one of the “Things nobody has ever seen a student claim before” off my list.  That’s not a good thing.
10. Your argument reads like a kindergarten fight.

I am so completely and utterly furious at my school administration and the district.

At 9:15am, my classroom door was opened by security, who said we had to evacuate to the gym. The teachers of D wing did our best to ensure the students moved to the gym as orderly as possible.

Fifteen minutes later, a school monitor walked into the gym and, without saying anything to the teachers, told students on one end of the gym to move out to the main building. Since we didn’t see him, we tried to stop the students from moving until he finally told us what was going on.

I have given thought, in recent years, to leaving teaching.  It’s not that I hate working with teens, or hate the job itself, but I do hate a lot of the nonsense that goes with teaching:

• Administrators who are more concerned with looking effective than they are with actually doing anything to improve the school.
• The tendency these days to let kids get away with murder, but slam teachers for the slightest issue or mistake (hasn’t happened to me yet, but to colleagues, yes).
• The social scapegoating of teachers as the problem in American Education, rather than focus on actual issues.  Do you have any idea how demoralizing it is to see people shit all over you and your coworkers day in and day out?
• The relative low pay (sure, I get paid ok, but seriously, for the education I’m required to maintain, and the stress-level of the work, it’s not great).*

The last few years, I’ve had awful classes, which piled more and more stress on top of the usual job-related load.  This year, my classes aren’t so bad, but for other reasons I can’t get into in a public place with my name attached, the job isn’t going great for me.

So I’ve tried to look at other job possibilities, and you know what?  They’re terrible.

I’m 45 years old, and I’ve been a teacher for eleven years.  I’m qualified for a great deal of jobs who won’t even give me the time of day, because they don’t want to consider that eleven years of teaching writing is pretty much equivalent to three years of writing low-level brochure text.  Or they don’t want a middle-aged guy when what they’re really looking for is a twenty-something who will devote 99% of his time to the job.

Added to this, I can’t really take a job where my pay would be less than I earn now without causing my family a great deal of stress.  And we’d like to move in the next few years; upgrade to a better place in a better location.  Not going to happen if I leave for even worse pay.

So, option two: Sell some books.  Except that isn’t working out so well, and may never change.

Anyway, this is why I’m pretty unable to seem upbeat lately.  I feel like I’m carrying too many loads.

*If you’re tempted to get all high-and-mighty and inform me that I do get paid well considering I “only” work ten months, let me point out that I have a BA and three years of post-grad work, and I get paid half of what my wife makes with no college degree.  If it were just because I don’t work for two months of the year, I’d make more.  Also, quite frankly, what I do is much more important to our society than what most people do. Why are we paid so little?

Most of the time, teaching in the US is one of those thankless jobs where everyone pretends to respect you, but the prevailing cultural attitude is one of derision and disrespect.  I’ve written about that side of it a lot.

But sometimes there’s the other side of it.

On Thursday, the last day of school, in the final moments of one of my classes, a student, Ethan (not his real name), slipped a sealed envelope addressed to me onto my desk as I was talking to a colleague, and then quickly scuttled out of the room.

Ethan’s one of those kids who is super quiet, but a smart kid.  He’s always been respectful, and we’ve only occasionally talked outside of lessons or when he needed something explained. A ton of my energy in that class went to trying to keep the peace; it was a very difficult class to teach thanks to behavioral issues–my 48 year old, nearly seven foot tall and very large instructional aide had to leave class often to rein in his anger, and he often asked me how I can cope with that level of disrespect.  So it’s a hard room to deal with.

Anyway, during fourth period, I had a chance to read Ethan’s note. Here’s what it said:

Hey Mr. Johnston!  I know you probably couldn’t care about this stupid, arrogant letter from me to you so I won’t make it long, you’ll probably just tear it up or throw it away anyways, but I just wanted to tell you that I really really appreciate what you did and what you taught us, especially me, throughout this tough year, and I’m sorry for it being tough, for the both of us.  But you helped me a lot through this year, and even though I didn’t, I want to let you know that I felt like I could tell you anything.

I’m choking up a little while I write this, because you’re the hardest teacher to say goodbye to, even though we didn’t talk to each other a lot.  I want to thank you for making my first year in public school so memorable and valuable to me!  I appreciate what you did and what you do so so much Mr. Johnston!  You taught me a lot and not just in the English academic field but in life.

You are the best English teacher and I wish with all my heart I can be your T.A. someday.  I don’t want to say goodbye but hopefully I’ll see you around next year.  I hope we can be friends someday!  😀

Oh, Ethan.  That note is going into my desk drawer–the one at home, not in the classroom–and whenever I need to remember why I am still teaching in these days of slashed budgets, disrespectful classes, and right-wing hatred of what we do, I’m going to pull that letter out, along with a few others like it I’ve received over the years, and I’m going to read it.

And “Ethan,” just in case you find this post: If you’d said all this to my face, here’s what I would have told you:

Thank you. That was one of the nicest notes I’ve ever gotten. Know that you are one of the kids in that class that I looked forward to seeing every day.  Your quiet, stoic demeanor in a class full of (let’s call it like it is) idiotic posturing was a breath of fresh air, and Mr. McLaren (the instructional aide) and I talked often about how you were one of the good ones.

If you ever find room in your schedule to be a TA, you will be more than welcome in my classroom.  For that matter, kid, you stop in any time if you need anything.  Even if you just want to say hi at lunch, or talk about things that are bugging you, you’ll always be welcome.

And despite what you wrote on the other side of the note, you were NOT a bad student.  You did your best, and it paid off: you earned a B in the class.  Now work that hard in your other classes; I can see you’re having trouble.  Come talk to me next year and I’ll help you out.

1. “That sound you hear?  That’s the sound of grades plummeting.”
2. “How can you raise your grade?  Build yourself a Time Machine, go back in time, and slap the hell out of yourself for not turning in your work.”
3. “Writing does not require the use of your mouth.”
4. “Focus, young padawan.”
5. “When I said ‘Times New Roman 12 point font,’ I did not in fact mean ‘Comic Sans 20 point.'”
6. “I am arresting you for crimes against grammar.”
7. “You do understand what teacher means, right?  I’m not just standing here for fun.”
8. “English does not mean reading.  There’s more than one skill I must teach you.”
9. “Yes, you are writing an essay.  Welcome to high school.”
10. “… yeeeeah. No.”

One of the things people say often when they find out I teach High School English is that they can’t imagine teaching “kids today.”

To some extent, that’s generational–in many ways, students today are very similar to the students of the past.  There were always disruptive clowns in class, and there were always arrogant students who thought they were smarter than the teacher, and there were always kiss-ass students and students who wouldn’t pay attention to the teacher if you paid them to.  But there are some differences between students of the 80s, when I was in school, and students today, and they can make the classroom fairly challenging to control.

To be fair, I also went to a nationally-recognized good school in an area that, at the time, was solidly middle class (we had poor students, and we had rich students, but most of us were in the middle to upper-middle of the socioeconomic strata), so my perceptions of then and now may be a bit off–but I’ve spoken to many other teachers who grew up in different circumstances about this over the last few years, and most of us are seeing the same things, regardless of where we came from.

When I was in school, we knew and accepted that it was our responsibility to bring paper, pencils, and our backpack with books.  Sure, sometimes we were out of paper, or we forgot a book, but for the most part, at least in the classes I was in, we all had our supplies.

By contrast, today’s students often come without anything other than the clothes on their back, regardless of their socioeconomic status.  When they do have backpacks, they’ll refuse to put them on the “dirty” floor, but insist on keeping them on their desk.  Girls, I’ve noticed, often won’t put their purses down, but keep them on their desk, using up valuable space and then complaining they don’t have enough room for everything on their desk.

When I was in school, cell phones were virtually unknown, and mostly limited to car-phones.  My aunt had an early mobile phone in her car, and later one of the brick-shaped handhelds, but no students had one.  Some had pagers, but those weren’t generally allowed in school.

Today’s students are always on their phones.  The official school rule is that all electronics need to be shut off and put away, but kids will pull them out the second they have a spare moment, no matter how many times you’ve taken their phone from them.  If they get a text, they want to answer it NOW, and they use the phrase “It’s my mom” as if it’s some kind of magical passphrase that allows them to ignore rules.  I’ve caught kids playing games during activity times, sexting, taking pictures, and even watching movies–including porn.  And even though they were suspended, they do the same things when they return to class.

Very few of my peers read as much as I did, but many of them read, both for class and outside of it. If they didn’t read the assigned pages, they at least pretended to be ashamed that they’d blown the assignment.  Today’s students don’t read at all, and more worrying, they’re proud of that.  Where my friends might have said “This book is boring,” today’s students declare that all books are boring.  To be sure, I have a few bookworms in my classes, but very few compared to the classes I remembered in my own high school days. Getting them to read even the shortest of stories is a pain; novels are often excruciating, even if they claim to like the story.

This lack of reading shows itself in numerous ways.  Because they don’t read, their grasp of grammar is atrocious.  Many of my students are writing several grade levels below what they should be capable of based on their general intelligence.

Then there’s the laziness.  For example, this picture is 100% accurate, and I fight it all the time:

I mean, can you imagine?  I try to explain to them that studies have proven that we remember what we write down far better than things we’ve only looked at, but I might as well be telling them that my father was born in 1949.  They just don’t care.

And, finally, the most insidious change–and this one isn’t the fault of the students.

This one’s on their parents.

When I didn’t do my homework, or got in trouble in class, my teachers called my parents, and I caught merry hell.  Sure, it didn’t always work–teens are teens, after all–but my parents tried. 

Today’s parents–well, there’s a mixed bag.  About half of them are on their kids all the time–the other half either say they’ll deal with it and don’t, or they outright don’t bother.  I once had to call a mom to explain to her that her son had been clearly high in my class (don’t get me started on why I had to call; that should have been an admin job. Suffice to say the admin wasn’t doing their job).  Her response was “What do you want me to do about it?”  Other parents have told me their kids are my problem when they’re in school; one parent told me to never call him again and that if I couldn’t handle his kid, I shouldn’t be a teacher.

Fortunately, that sort of thing is rare–but many teachers have the experience of parents blaming them for their kids’ terrible grades.  One of my colleagues just this week was accosted by a parent who came on campus without signing in to yell at her.  Parent drop their kids off in areas where there are huge signs asking them not to.  They bring their kids pizza or McDonald’s for lunch nearly daily.  They get them out of class because the kid texts them that they’re bored and want out.

In all fairness, however, I have to say that it’s not always the parents’ fault.  I’ve talked to parents who are at their wits’ end, desperately trying to help a child who doesn’t want their help.  I’ve had a student who was the son of a school district superintendent who wanted desperately to be a gang member, no matter how many times he got his ass kicked.  I’ve listened to a mother talk about how many times her son had been in jail and heard the quiet fear in her voice that he wasn’t going to live to adulthood if he didn’t get a clue.  I’ve sat there in impotent rage when a kid called his mother a “stupid bitch” to her face, and seen the tears in her eyes.*   I once called a father to talk to him about his daughter telling me to “fuck off,” and he laughed, then got very quiet and said “I’m sorry.  It’s just that that’s mild compared to what she says to her mom and I every day.  We’re trying, but we can’t get through to her.”

And that’s the last thing–respect seems to be a thing of the past in many of my students.

All in all, it’s an interesting job–sometimes it’s amazing and cool, sometimes it’s death.

* We did call him on that, but there was little we could do other than tell him that was unacceptable.