Reactions from Houston

We were supposed to have classes this morning but my curriculum specialist was sick so I arrived and they told us all to leave. I went back and promptly had crazy nap dreams for about three hours. I apologize if the last entry seemed really dark; it can be pretty tough to maintain a positive perspective when one is so worn down.

The last week was pretty tough in my class. Apparently there is a "honeymoon" stage in the classroom just as there is in a relationship. I think my kids finally got out of that stage this week and they have really been testing me. It's tough because I have such a playful personality that my kids like to joke around with me. I just need to establish a framework for appropriate times to fool around and inappropriate times.

I realized a couple weeks into this that I am preparing for my ONE class up until the time that my kids arrive. This next year I will be responsible for three classes and over a hundred kids. That basically means I get better at this or I sink. So I guess I get better at it, eh?

I have been better at expressing my thoughts on this experience to people on the phone than I have been at doing it in writing lately, which is pretty strange given my tendency to write with much more freedom than I speak. Needless to say, I'm gonna give this journal thing a try again.

The most difficult thing about my time here has been the realization that I grew up my entire life not knowing the extent to which this counter American culture exists. I mean, I knew the idea of the "injustice" of growing up in a lower income neighborhood, but I did not fathom exactly what that meant. In my home, college was an expected component of a complete education. All of us may have struggled in school, but we had teachers who pushed our limits and helped us to understand concepts that had previously seemed abstract. We had parents who would spend time with us, siblings in my case, who cared about our success.

The problems these kids are facing are the same I have witnessed in third world countries. They are attending a school that is not serving them and the highlight of their day for many of them is getting a big mac after school. They are involved in gangs and drugs because they are bored. They have been disenchanted with schools because they have always had teachers who pointed out their race and disadvantage, teachers who sat reading the paper while the kids were expected to read and enjoy Odysseus by themselves. These are kids who are sixteen and writing on a third grade level. These are kids who cannot comprehend why I enjoy reading because at fifteen they have the comprehension of a second grader and every word read takes conscious effort. There is no reason that a kid should have gone through our public education system and not received the support I did growing up. I knew my teachers believed in me, but I was one of the lucky ones.

Our schools are sick. A program like Teach for America is a bandaid, but it is not a cure. Our entire public education system, unbeknown to most of us, is tearing apart from the bottom up. Neighborhoods with money continue to have effective schools, but neighborhoods without money are basically setting up poor child care services. And all of this is occurring without most people realizing it. The people who have the power to raise their voices ignore the problems my kids are going through because they do not openly see them. Their kids go to school and to college and the status quo is maintained. Meanwhile, the kids in my class turn to crime and gangs as an outlet. These are smart kids, but kids without hope. This American youth will not pull themselves up by their boot straps because, unlike their peers in wealthier schools, they do not have the tools (education) to do so. This American youth will serve its more fortunate, wealthier counterparts for all their lives and not even realize that their American experience is entirely different from the experience of their wealthier neighbors.

My kids have the same dreams many high schoolers do. One of my students dreams of petitioning the US government to build parks in his neighborhood. They have asked again and again and because of the socioeconomic status of the people who live in that neighborhood, they have been ignored. He wants to do this so his friends and family will stop resorting to gangs--so that they can play soccer and basketball in the afternoon instead of tagging buildings.

One of my kids dreams of becoming a famous soccer player and donating every dollar to less fortunate neighborhoods. He thinks he can start to fix the problems he has seen if he can dump resources into his neighborhood. He sees quite clearly that the problems he sees are related to money. Unfortunately, he will never make it to college because he does not yet understand that a complete sentence must have a subject AND a verb. He will never be recruited to play professional soccer because the team he plays for can barely afford a ball.

The only girl in my class came into my period thirty minutes late, blue and bleeding on Thursday. I had seen her earlier in the day and she was crying because her mom kicked her out. She told me that her dad was in the office speaking with the administration and I told her maybe she should go speak with him to see if she could stay with him for awhile. After school she told me that her father came to school drunk and angry at her and when she went to see him he grabbed her and beat her up in front of the school police officer. I don't know whose house she is staying at, but I can tell you the odds of her succeeding are slim to none. Somehow, I just could not find the heart to tell her to pay attention when she was trying her hardest to gaze at me through eyes that were swelling shut.

One of my kids who has started to come in at lunch for extra work on his writing, one of my brightest, would love to go to college but does not have a social security card. I know this particular sentence will receive a lot of criticism from those who are reading it because he and his family are staying here illegally. But I can tell all of you that he is more talented, focused, and intelligent than many of the people I went to school with. This country is as strong as it is because of its diversity, because people left homes to look for opportunity in a place that offered it. I don't know that our country is that place anymore, I don't know that it is a place where the best and the brightest can rise to change their situation.

This is only a small portion of my class and I can guarantee that each student has dreams equally as noble, idealistic, and naive. Everyday when I teach them I cannot think about where they will be in four years for fear that I will give up, too. I cannot tell them with a straight face that they can go to college or that they will succeed. I do not even know what that means for these kids. I do not know their society or their culture, but I do know they are the ones we ignore. They are the people we prefer to pretend are not living in our backyard. They are the people whose shoulders we stand upon to live the lifestyle we continue to believe is so important. So long as we do not have to see them, our easy lives are easy to justify. We have earned our privilege. Those lazy lower class folk just do not know what hard work is. They have had EVERY opportunity we have. Certainly we have no part to play in this injustice. And if we do, God let us remain blind to it because as long as we do not see we are not culpable for its occurrence or to act in defiance of this injustice. The guilt must remain someone else's, now let me return to my office job where I am responsible for playing internet spades half the day and clicking a mouse the other half. Those lazy others, let them take their siestas while I attempt to reach my three digit salary goal.

I am still trying to figure out why we don't speak about this, why we speak about race, homosexuality, abortion, but one truly tangible problem continues to be swept under the rug. Maybe it would take too much change, too many different lifestyle choices for any of us to be comfortable admitting this is a reality. So many people believe America is a meritocracy, when in reality we inherit a lot of our social standing by being born into a certain economic class.

Having ranted about this for a long while, let me offer some hope. These problems can be fixed, but we need better teachers and our worst schools need more resources. We need to face the problem, to think together about what can be done. First and foremost, we need to realize that there are inequities and then we need to change the infrastructure, perform a complete overhaul of our schools, realizing that the current system is ill.

For now, there are significantly more lesson plans to write. Only a couple more weeks in Hell. Oops, I mean Houston. Only a couple more weeks of smelly third floor and bouches. Then back to beautiful NM and CO for a teeny bit. I cannot wait.