Another Reason Why Teaching Isn't Like a Desk Job: Sub Plans

This Memorial Day Weekend, I took my 78 year old mother to the emergency room where, it turns out, she needed a two hour emergency procedure to deal with a ruptured appendix. I am her only family other than a brother in West Virginia, so I officially began this new phase in my life where I am her caretaker if need be.

I waited for her to get out of the OR, still not knowing what her situation was-- they didn't know going in it was ruptured --  and pondered what to do about going to school the next day. There were several factors to deal with. One is that there is a rule about taking time off before or after a three day weekend or other holiday. You can't unless there is an emergency. Well, Mom's prognosis was good, but after thinking about it, I decided it was an emergency and I could take the time off, even if it wasn't my own personal illness. Secondly, I needed to deal with plans for a substitute.

My school has an emergency sub plan set-up: you make up emergency plans and if you can't prepare something for your classes ahead of time to do that is reasonable, you can implement the emergency plans you have created., But I had recently fallen ill myself on the way to school with a Joan Didion Virginia Woolf style true migraine, and had to call from the side of the road and ask the answering machine to please use these emergency plans. This is already a problem. I get migraines, and unless you or someone you know gets them, it is often my experience that people have NO idea that they are debilitating, sudden, and mind and psyche melting experiences. And then, suddenly, like a window thrown open, you are fine. Better than fine, which is suspicious in and of itself. Usually I slink back to school after these attacks feeling guilty for being out a day where I am in terrible pain and quite physically ill. So even before she was out of surgery, I was already trying to figure out what to do about my mother. I know this is crazy on some level, but I also know that leaving your class to sit in a study hall is not ideal. When I taught elementary school, I always got sub plans together in detail no matter what: driving ill, pulling over, calling in favors from friends and my partner,many times while being actively sick. You can't put a class of 10 year olds in a study hall all day -- they have you all day. You need to help them and the sub. The first year teacher who recently took over my class the day I used my emergency plans because I was ill had the nerve to tell me "they didn't have anything to do with the curriculum." The assignment I left was a reading about an ethics dilemma that required the classes to write an essay about whether laptops should be used in the classroom. Not only was this greenhorn insensitive, he was limited in terms of his understanding of education, perhaps understandable on some level, granted. Actually, the kids care much more about the use of laptops in the classroom and the potential distractions they can cause than about the Ottoman Empire. Or even World War II which usually rates far above the Ottomans. (Who can blame them, really?) And it was an exercise in essay writing, a skill needed whatever the topic. But anyway.

So, I called my acting department head, left a message for the sub lady, and then wrote an email to both of these folks plus the vice principal. I will make the 70 minute round trip commute tomorrow (assuming no traffic) to make sure there are materials for my classes in case, god forbid, I need to spend more than full day in the hospital with my mother. I actually feel better making the trip in to do it, and it is better for the kids than having them sit in a study hall. My point is not to be a martyr, but to point how it is not a simple matter of calling in sick or dealing with family leave in some osrt of a vacuum. Most of my colleagues in fact would probably do the same, and will likely cover for me as I have covered for them. It is a little odd, however, to be rating levels of emergency; however, teaching is like this: shifting in a moment, triaging changes in the situation, ever moving, thinking, preparing.

Working it Out

Never have I regretted my decision to become a public school teacher. Well, on less than stellar days I have been known to joke about staying at my job at the accountant's or working at Petco. I am actually not dissing Petco -- I worked at Trader Joe's,another retail establishment, during grad school and seriously, it was the best part time job I ever had, and I didn't mind going to work. I have several pets, including reptiles and fish and sometimes I think it might be easier to deal with customers in that  department of Petco than teenagers. But maybe not.I wouldn't rule out Petco as a retirement job, no kidding. (This schtick I am sure got me a gift card to Petco one year from a mom -- this was before you couldn't take gifts without reporting them to the IRS, saying three or for hail Marys or rending your garment for the sin you were committing by doing so, to throw in some Christian imagery -- absolutely no offense to any other people. Insert your own atonement as needed.)

Not infrequently, however, I run across people who have various things to say about public schools or teaching or something about education that is less than flattering And I'm not even talking about what happens if you open up the newspaper. I wonder sometimes what the motivation behind this sort of thing is, since I of course, like to think of myself as relatively harmless. On my most compassionate days, I think the at-times diatribes are a result of bad experiences they had with school themselves or possibly some experience they had with their kid's teacher. Last night's weirdness may have well been the latter.

I am taking a course about Islam at night and while waiting for the class to start, was chit chatting with people outside. Someone I knew asked me what I was doing for April break, so this prompted a woman to ask what I taught. I knew I was getting into trouble already by her tone (patronizing, including, "Oh you're a high school teacher." As opposed to what? A college professor? I was taking a college course right there wasn't I?) and was starting admittedly to feel defensive when she asked me what I taught. I gave what I wanted to be the short answer: World History, Psych and an ethics class. The Ethics class is really called the History, Philosophy and Ethics of Altruism, known in school as the Love class, but I wasn't feeling any of that from her. Of course it was the "ethics" class she wanted to talk about, and she proceeded to interrogate.

What did it cover? And to her the million dollar question; What age group took it? Juniors and Seniors was my answer. Oh. (That sealed it, apparently.) *Her* kids took it in *public school* in 10th grade. [Insert triumphant trumpet flair here.] I wasn't sure what this was all about. Oh and I *must* be teaching about John Stuart Mill "You know, utilitarianism." Yes, I know about utilitarianism .(I hoped she didn't see my internal eye- roll.)

I thought the whole thing was very bizarre and like I was in a minor sparring match with someone I had just met.  What was her angle? Did one of her kids ace the ethics class, signifying that her child was "gifted", that she was a superior parent, that her kids' school was better than my school???? Did some teacher not think one of her kids was god's gift? Were her shoes too tight and her heart too small? 

I have been on the receiving end of a number of commentaries about public school education, from people who have had kids in a public system and people who put their kids in private schools, to people that say their kid needs to be home-schooled. Rarely are these comments, I am sad to say,  complimentary. Every once in a while people will say "You people don't get paid enough,"but that is uncommon.

We teachers are all kinds of people, which is a credit to the profession and a benefit to the kids. I am very glad to say by and large the teachers I know are working very hard and care about what they are doing. This is a testimony to my district and to the community that supports it, to be sure. It is distressing when someone doesn't take the time to understand what you are doing -- or granted doesn't have the time to -- but is quick to judge or question it. If my estimation of this woman's age is correct, I would guess that her kids are probably out of college now. It was sad that she still had some kind of bone to pick with public education. Or maybe she just building her kids (who I have never met) up. It's sad. I like kids and like my job, and the defensiveness on both of our sides in this brief (albeit civil) conversation was a waste of energy and put a barrier between us that didn't need to be constructed.

An Introduction: About Me

Long ago and far away in another galaxy, I had several iterations of post-college "adulthood" that did not included being a public school teacher. Along the way I have been

•  a house cleaner
•  a personal care assistant for disabled people
•  a church musician
• a bookkeeper
• a massage therapist
• a tax preparer
• a real estate agent (I was even Rookie of the Year!)
• an assistant in special education  classrooms
• a substitute teacher

And I was fairly dissatisfied. When I began working in schools, I started to feel like I was in the right work environment -- there is a culture to public schools, and while they are each unique in their own way, every time I stepped into a school building, a familiar sense of purpose and clarity settled over me. I always loved school as a kid, although I was not immune to some of the cruelty and social trickiness dealing with other students could create. I always thought school was important and it was a place where I was successful. I was a good student, while not being a suck up, and I would consider myself a Life-long learner. I have continued my formal education with graded coursework at a variety of institutions, lately Harvard, and have also studied a variety of spiritual traiditons, martial arts and yoga. And I read everything, pretty much.



The reader's digest of my story is that after 9 years in California, I moved back to the Boston area to complete a Master's program in education. I taught elementary school for 6 years, and am in year 4 of teaching high school. I am not a young woman, but am not old, either. This blog is about what teaching is like from my perspective.