In the Best Interests of the Students . . .

There’s this young man who has been in my class for several months who does not wish to do anything. He has potential, but he requires constant one-to-one attention. Multiple conferences with me and his other two teachers, guidance counselors, the dean, — nothing has worked.
I spoke with his mother a couple of weeks ago, and I was really hopeful, despite what she told me. She said he has received special education services since he was little because of a classification of “mixed reception disorder”. She said this was his “last shot,” and she would work with him. I should send his work home; I should e-mail her about anything.
I sent work home with him. He came back and informed me he left it on the bus. I contacted his mother and requested a conference. Suddenly, the communication is now cut off.
Our program calls itself a program when it suits its ends, but demands that we implement a school environment when this suits whatever purposes the powers-that-be have. It suits their purposes, you see, that we are not a school when it comes to providing special ed services. It enabled administration to get rid of two special ed teachers from my site alone, and throughout the program, special education services are nil, inadequate, virtually nonexistent.
When young people come into our program, they and their guardians sign a waiver “opting out” of special ed services. So, despite the fact that we are run by the Department of *Education*, which receives state and federal funds for implementing special ed programs and services, and despite the fact that these young people are entitled to a free appropriate public education, they are receiving nothing of the kind. Their signed waivers are not fully informed. The solution they’ve now hit upon for this particular young man is to transfer him to a single class, rather than have him go to three classes a day. Wow! Such brilliance!
But you can be damn sure that supervisers are running around with checklists to catch teachers with lessons that do not fit the scripted ideas they can recognize as teaching, that follow the latest teaching fad, that have been determined by RESEARCH to be the BEST PRACTICES and the WAY IT SHOULD BE DONE. Wonder if they’ve been reading any of the research on special education students and what a “least restrictive environment” means any time lately? Yet another sound victory for reorganization!

A Little Department of Education Holiday Jeer

Unfair U’s Are Making the Rounds

You better watch out
You better not try
To teach them without
A great lesson plan. Why?
Unfair U’s are making the rounds.

They’ve made up a list,
Take my advice;
They think teaching’s a script,

Skill is a vice.

Unfair U’s are making the rounds.

They hate it when you’re thinking,

It’s a no-no to create,
A single day could be bad or good,

Your reputation is at stake.

O! You better watch out!
You better not try.
To teach them without,

A great lesson plan. Why?

Unfair U’s are making the rounds.
Unfair U’s are making the rounds.

Wreck School Halls

Wreck school halls with boundless folly,

Na na na na na na na na na.

‘Tis open season on our colleagues.

Na na na na na na na na na.

Don they now their deep denial,

Na na na na na na na na na.

Stroll right in and destroy a file.

Na na na na na na na na na

See the brazen fools abhor us,

Na na na na na na na na na.

At P.D. they patronize and bore us.

Na na na na na na na na na.

Follow every inane measure,

Na na na na na na na na na.

Or reap the hell of schoolwide pressure.

Na na na na na na na na na.

What’s Going On In the Classrooms of GED Plus?

Today, I had an “education converence” subsequent to my receipt of an undeserved Unsatisfactory rating on an “informal” observation which nevertheless will be placed in my file. I am revising my response, but will be posting it here once it has been sent out in its final form.
My superviser started off (as they are trained to do) with something positive: “I walked into your class last week and saw notes on a projector. I never saw that before. Tell me about that.”
I explained that because I do not have access to materials in the school, I sometimes use the projector to give information to the students or have them read, since I do not like making so many copies and wasting paper.
Then, we moved on to the real shit.
She assured me that she understood that receiving a U was unpleasant, and she understands. She said that if she couldn’t see, she doesn’t know what she would do. She said she wanted to support me and find ways to make it at least a little easier. She said she didn’t want to say that this U meant I would receive a U for the year, but that it meant I could be in danger of receiving an Unsatisfactory for the year.
I said:
“I don’t want to come off as combative or overly strong, but I want to tell you that in the six years I’ve taught in this district, I have received recommendations, suggestions, and support, but never an Unsatisfactory, or any warning that indicated it was a possibility. I do not think I’m a master teacher, but I am a good teacher. Can I improve? Of course. Everyone can. But there are a few things I am certain of:
First, I firmly believe that a lesson plan, which is an outline and guide written by the teacher for his or her own benefit, is not what makes what goes on in the classroom as far as teaching good or bad. You can write fantastic lesson plans, and be a poor teacher. You could write a few words on an index card and be phenomenal. Teaching is far more than a lesson plan, a referenced standard, or an objective aligned with that standard. I don’t think a checklist is fair assessment of quality instruction.”
She disagreed — she has to, because these people who spend as little time in the classroom as possible, then escape to administration where they can tell us how to do what they apparently couldn’t, or didn’t, want to do, only know how to judge us by a little script. Your average border collie could probably do it with some work, and certainly your average chimp. (This latter point was shared with me by a man who has been in the system for a much longer time than I.)
I continued:
“A few weeks ago, you gave what I thought was a fantastic talk about your two non-negotiables: you want quality instruction, and you want staff to treat each other and students with the type of respect which demands that no one ever leaves a conversation or situation without his or her dignity intact.”
She said, “Yes.”
I said, “Given that it was your choice to come in and perform an observation on the day after I returned after four days of a documented illness, and given that you know that the playing field is not level for me, you still chose to do an informal observation, write it up, and place an Unsatisfactory in my file. To me, that is not indicative of a person who believes in leaving a situation with everyone’s dignity intact.”
“I hear you,” she said, “I understand where you’re coming from, but on October 15, (when she popped in for ten minutes), I chose not to write up the fact that I didn’t feel your objective was met, and I sent you a memo with suggestions, which you didn’t read.”
“You didn’t e-mail it. You put it in my mailbox.”
“But you have Ms. Kaur to read it to you.”
“Thihngs in my mailbox often get overlooked because Ms. Kaur and I are swamped. That’s why I make it clear to all supervisers that e-mail is the best means of sending things to me for access at any time that is independent.”
She insisted she didn’t know this, that we hadn’t had a discussion about this until November!
I added, “Regardless of anything else, I can say with certainty that there hasn’t been one day when quality instruction of one kind or another has not taken place in my classroom.”
She said, and this is a direct quote, “I do not doubt that teaching is going on in your classroom. What I didn’t see is that learning is happening.”
!!!

Let us digress, dear reader, and let me tell you what *is* happening in the classrooms. Here’s a little example.
Earlier this week, a very troubled young lady who is in my class and for one period a day in the classrooms of my two cohort teachers got pissed off at one of those teachers. She proceeded to curse her out, turn over her garbage pail, and turn over desks and chairs.
Later this week, she erupted into the same behavior.
Surely, the teacher who was in the classroom thought, this young lady would be suspended — better yet, discharged.
This afternoon, after being absent for a day and a half, she paraded into my room.
“Hey, Ms. Grassman!”
I am no longer surprised by things like this, because they happen all the time, so I wasn’t shocked or startled.
“Hi there, honey. How are you? How’re you feeling?” (She’s a couple months pregnant.)
“Good. Good.”
She sat down with some other students to have her lunch — students from various classes have lunch in my room, because I allow it.
The teacher who had received the brunt of this young woman’s outburst came in when she noticed she was there. She came over to me.
“Why is she here?”
“Don’t know.”
“I’m going to find out.”
The young lady said, “She’s going to make trouble for me, isn’t she?”
“I think she thought you might not be in the program any longer,” I answered.
To this, the eloquent lass interjected, “She’s lickin’ my clit! She’s lickin’ my clit and suckin’ me dry!”
“Yo,” a young man said. “Look, I know she can be a bitch, but you go too hard. You have to back off.”
“You know what?” she replied proudly. “What you say is going in this ear and out the other. My mom can’t stand my mouth and she has to deal with it. So everyone else does, too.”
I said her name, and said, “I think the concern is that if you can’t find a different way of expressing how angry some people make you, it might carry over to your being a mom. That could be dangerous for your baby. Babies aren’t always cute. They can be tiring, irritating, and a lot of work, and if you become mad easily, it only takes a split second, one slightly out of control flash of anger, to hurt a baby very badly, or worse. I think you’re smart enough to learn how to show how angry and upset you are with someone without going overboard, and that will help your baby.”
“Miss,” she said, “I’m not going to hurt my baby.”
A few moments later, she noticed that the teacher against whom she had hurled such vitriol was back in her classroom across the hall, on her computer. She got up and zoomed in, cursing at her, and stating, “I’m going to spit in her face! I’m going to spit in her face!”
She was removed, and later I asked the dean for an explanation as to why she had not been suspended or discharged.
“We’re looking for an appropriate placement for her.”
“In the meantime, she has twice turned furniture over in a classroom with a teacher and students present, and has broken into severe outbursts. What has to happen for removal to occur?”
For some reason, he didn’t answer me.
But — my lesson plan is unsatisfactory.
We are spending money on coaches, Smart Board training, and movies for the class which brought in the most cans for the food drive, for disastrous, disorganized field trips . . . but we have no looseleaf. No erasers. No new board markers.
We paid for an expensive, fairly good educational software program, which indicates in its literature and during the training that students had to have at least two sessions per week — but classes are only being permitted one period in the computer lab. We have old books, many of which have pages torn out, are all marked up — and forget about the lack of recent history. I have found multiple errors in the science book.
But as long as our lesson plans meet the criteria on a checklist, and we go through the appropriate motions, and have window-dressing on our bulletin boards, and can manage a classroom no matter who or what populates it, none of this other stuff matters the tiniest bit. As long as we have successes (students making good test scores) it’s a sure sign that the teachers are real educators. After all, just think how phenomenal we must be if we can do this with all of these unnecessary handicaps.
We don’t have a SAFE room, a room we are supposed to have for students who disrupt class, and where they can be taught. We have a “ladder of referral” but no student removal process. When we call the guidance office to request intervention, no one picks up the phone. When we seek the dean or the assistant principal, he or she is in a meeting, currently unavailable . . . but we are supposed to unnecessarily start something by stopping our lesson plans to insist that students remove hats and do-rags, put away headphones, cell phones, stop talking, wake up, and so on, no matter how often, while the students who are serious, who come regularly and punctually, who want the help, who struggle valiantly in this cesspool of poor implementation and ridiculousness, become ever more frustrated in an environment not conducive to effective learning — not because of inferior lesson plans or poor teaching — but a poor program model, absurd assessment tools, substandard materials, and an “us and them” mentality that administration does nothing to ameliorate.

Thoughts On My “Unsatisfactory” Observation Letter

The response has been written, and I will place it here once it has been sent. I will also post the observation letter, as it’s only fair. When a colleague asked me, “You want people to know?” I answered, “Why not? If I felt I deserved it, I would be embarrassed and probably hide it, and lay low. But I don’t, so I am perfectly comfortable telling people.”
Part of my desire to post it, however, is because I want to display the errors in mechanics and grammar which run through it. Hmmmm. Perhaps I’ll grade it, and write a lesson plan as per its direction to have my students fix the mistakes. LMAO!

The Tragic School Muss Part Three: A Singularly UNSATISFACTORY Student Trip

Yesterday, a trip a month in the planning took place. Students were invited to bring in permission slips for a trip into Manhattan to have their eyes tested for free and to receive designer eyeglasses gratis, if it was found that they required them. It was sheer chaos as the attempt to leave got underway — my students were told to come to the designated meeting spot, then sent back to class. One student was told he could not go, while another was told she could, while neither had a permission slip. Finally, most students who requested to go along were granted permission.
They took buses into Manhattan. They were supposed to take the buses back or be dismissed from the location. However, not a single student was ever seen. Students from Manhattan were seen first. Our students sat around for three hours. One of the guidance counselors took it upon himself to distribute the lunches to his busload of students, and there weren’t enough to go around. The people from my site who were “in charge” had no clue what was going on. One told a colleague, “I’m embarrassed.”
Many of the students did return on the buses, returned to their classrooms where students who did not go were doing classwork, and proceeded to rip apart the entire experience. So, they lost a day of instruction — for nothing.
Gee, more money wasted on disorganization, slipshod implementation, and resulting in nothing of value of either a concrete or intangible nature. Hmmm, now how can they blame the teachers for this one?Where there’s a will, or a Mike, or a Joel . . . there’s a way.

And So The Persecution and Punishment Begin: My Very First Unsatisfactory Observation

Well, well, well. Let’s analyze the
situation, shall we?
I begin teaching at insanely chaotic, poorly implementet, alternative programs for so-called “at risk youth”. . Despite having absolutely no access to the materials to which my sighted colleagues have access, (substandard, inadequate, and too few in number as they are), I bust my ass seeking appropriate materials, rewriting them when necessary for learning-challenged readers. You may not believe this, but low literacy material is geared toward children. Imagine!
I endure police intervention and lockdown environments, extremely volatile students, (successfully, I might add, and calmly, which is probably why they were ready to give me a teaching position at Rikers five years ago); I am threatened by students, deal with buildings with no heat, carbon monoxide scares, mold problems, horrific and thoroughly inadequate services and response to serious health and safety issues for my students — essentially act as surrogate parent, social worker, legal advocate . . .

After the “reorganization” of District 79, I cynically, but hopefully, wait for the atmosphere and lunacy to shift, to change; I endeavor to convince the powers that be that teachers need to be involved in the revamping of policies, plans, and procedures.
I donate my time as a borough liaison, often spend my prep time and lunch period hearing teachers’ complaints, attempt to dialogue for positive change. I meet with the same old, same old, so the pugilist emerges, for the sake of the many young lives that are being negatively impacted by the insanity that cloaks itself behind smarmy, pseudo-sincere lip service to the good of literacy-challenged students.
Letters to editors, speaking out on forums, listservs, and professional development days, bluntly calling a spade a spade . . . and voila!
I just received my very first, undeserved (need I even say so?) Unsatisfactory.
Wow! I’m no longer a virgin in the Department of Education. OK, that’s not true. Teachers are fucked daily in this system. Now it’s rough sex. Without a condom.

Despite never hearing a single hint of disapproval regarding my lessons, and despite this being a supposed “informal observation,” (performed the day I returned after nearly a week absent due to documented illness), it is going in my file. There will, of course, be a response from Yours Truly, one facet of which shall be a request for my superviser to model a lesson. Think I’ll get it? Hahahaha.
Go figure. Let’s roll.

Hahahaha! ROTFL! LMAO!

One of my serious students said to another who does close to nothing: “You’re going to be here until Ms. Grassman can see!”

Balls In More Than One: My One and Only Response to the Tiger Woods Silliness

Could someone please explain to me why this fiasco is anyone’s business besides the Woods family? I am so tired of musicians, actors, and athletes being thrown into and kept in the spotlight because of highly personal situations. Unless the couple deliberately pushes the issue into the media, everyone should respect privacy when the situation crosses a line.
When it involves the family, particularly spouses and children, or a physical or mental illness, drug rehabilitation, and so on, why can’t we just mind our own damned business? If you do not care about Tiger, give a shit about his wife.
These women who cream at the idea of bagging an athlete just because he’s famous are pathetic. It’s not that they like the person, or feel a connection with him. I don’t care if they screw him for five minutes or “31 months” — (gee, honey, two and a half years wasn’t good enough? Do you have a log with the days, hours, minutes, and seconds as well, you pathetic loser?)
If you’re a groupie who just wants to bag a famous person, learn to keep your mouth shut, and learn how to refrain from using technology and leaving a whore trail. There’s no reason for someone to get hurt because you and your latest trophy are careless morons.
If you genuinely care about the guy (or woman) and your relationship or fling goes beyond the simple fact that he or she is famous, rich, or desired by many others, then it should never occur to you, no matter what happens now or in the future, to release cell phone messages, texts, or intimate details of your time together. Why do that? Revenge? To get your fifteen minutes of fame? Ooooh, congratulations — you were in the right place at the right time to *have sex with someone with name recognition*. Aren’t you so special? The equipment doesn’t work any better or worse just because it belongs to someone famous.

Hey, ladies, go out there and try to meet a famous dude once or twice, and if anyone accuses you of anything unsavory, just think how awesome things could get if you deny anything unsavory, but then hire a high-powered lawyer and schedule a press conference to discuss your insignificant part in the life of the icon in question.
Sounds like someone with some serious self-esteem issues, who needs to attach herself to a famous person to give value to her life. Stupid bitch!
If you admire someone, if you are fascinated by someone, if you respect someone, and most especially if you love, or believe you love someone, and you and that person are indulging in what many would perceive to be unethical behavior — if your said indulgence would cause serious harm to another, as well as harm to the reputation of one or both of you, keep your trap shut, learn how to communicate in person, not through texts and messages, and be smart when you cannot do so. Otherwise, you get what you both deserve, while a spouse, significant other, family members, friends, and others are sucked into a hell and public scrutiny they *do not* deserve.
We’re sending more Americans to Afghanistan. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce doesn’t want women working for defense contractors overseas to have the right to bring charges when they are raped or sexually harassed by coworkers. People’s homes are being foreclosed. So many significant issues surround us, and should garner our attention. Yet, what bullshit splashes across the headlines and has everyone talking at the office, on the subway, on the talk shows? Grow the hell up, already! I’m done with this crap . . .

Shame On You, Senator Fuschillo

(Below is my letter to Senator Fuschillo regarding his vote against marriage equality. It is followed by the Senate vote results.)

Dear Senator Fuschillo:

As a person clearly devoted to the family, I am astounded that you believe it is acceptable for archaic prejudices and misplaced fears to be preserved in a vote against marriage equality. I certainly recognize that many in the legislature and among New York state’s citizenry feel that the budget, taxes, and other issues are far more significant than the rights of a minority. Additionally, I am cognizant of the fact that misguided, discriminatory, and tremendously hurtful legislation is nothing new in our United States: recent history demonstrates that there were many who felt the same way about mixed-race marriage a mere few decades ago. (In fact, there are still Americans who would greatly prefer that their communities, their places of worship, and especially their impressionable children were sheltered from the reality that people of different races and/or faiths have the unmitigated gall to love, and even worse, commit to one another).
Perhaps this issue only touches deeply those of us who have family members and friends who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender, and who are aware that they are neither agents of some unsavory agenda nor individuals hell-bent on crimes against Mother Nature, God, or the universe, but average human beings who want to have the freedom of love and commitment which the vast majority of us take for granted.
Sincerely,
Christine Faltz Grassman

New York State Senate Votes on Marriage Equality, December 2, 2009:
Eric Adams (D) — YES
Joseph Addabbo (D) — NO
James Alesi (R) — NO
Darrel Aubertine (D) — NO
John Bonacic (R) — NO
Neil Breslin (D) — YES
John DeFrancisco (R) — NO
Ruben Diaz (D) — NO
Martin Malave Dilan (D) — YES
Tom Duane (D) — YES
Pedro Espada (D) — YES
Hugh Farley (R) — NO
John Flanagan (R) — NO
Brian Foley (D) — YES
Charles Fuschillo, Jr. (R) — NO
Martin Golden (R) — NO
Joseph Griffo (R) — NO
Kemp Hannon (R) — NO
Ruth Hassell-Thompson (D) — YES
Shirley Huntley (D) — NO
Craig Johnson (D) — YES
Owen Johnson (R) — NO
Jeffrey Klein (D) — YES
Liz Krueger (D) — YES
Carl Kruger (D) — NO
Andrew Lanza (R) — NO
Bill Larkin (R) — NO
Kenneth LaValle (R) — NO
Vincent Leibell (R) — NO
Tom Libous (R) — NO
Elizabeth Little (R) — NO
Carl Marcellino (R) — NO
George Maziarz (R) — NO
Roy McDonald (R) — NO
Hiram Monserrate (D) — NO
Velmanette Montgomery (D) — YES
Thomas Morahan (R) — NO
Michael Nozzolio (R) — NO
George Onorato (D) — NO
Suzi Oppenheimer (D) — YES
Frank Padavan (R) — NO
Kevin Parker (D) — YES
Bill Perkins (D) — YES
Michael Ranzenhofer (R) — NO
Joseph Robach (R) — NO
Stephen Saland (R) — NO
John Sampson (D) — YES
Diane Savino (D) — YES
Eric Schneiderman (D) — YES
Jose Serrano (D) — YES
James Seward (R) — NO
Dean Skelos (R) — NO
Malcolm Smith (D) — YES
Daniel Squadron (D) — YES
William Stachowski (D) — NO
Toby Ann Stavisky (D) — YES
Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D) — YES
Antoine Thompson (D) — YES
David Valesky (D) — YES
Dale Volker (R) — NO
George Winner (R) — NO
Catherine Young (R) — NO

If It Weren’t for Palin, I Would Be Thinking That I Should’ve Just Voted for McCain

What a surprise! As my “About Me” page indicates, I knew it was a distinct possibility that President Obama would be corrupted. I did not expect it to happen so quickly.
Where is the change again? Did I miss something? The Nobel-Peace-Prize-winning President has committed thirty thousand more Americans to an unwinnable war. Some feel the war was “necessary and legitimate” from the beginning. It would have been, had an actual state been responsible for the 9/11 carnage. Declaring war on a country that is an actual victim of the same extremism, however, is absurd. What have we accomplished? Is Al Qaeda destroyed? No. Did we find bin Laden? No. We found and hanged Saddam Hussein, which is lovely for George W. Bush, but I don’t know if you have noticed, but Iraq doesn’t seem to be better off since, does it?
If you’re going to commit troops to a country until it is “responsible” enough to take care of its own affairs, setting a timetable makes no sense whatever, for so many reasons (which are available everywhere, so I’m not going to regurgitate them here). I am absolutely, completely unhappy with the man I worked so hard to get into the White House.
I realize that we cannot simply pull everyone out of Iraq and Afghanistan. We simply cannot do that. However, to commit further to these exercises in futility and human tragedy is irresponsible, an irresponsible reiteration of Bush doctrine. At least if McCain were President, he would have done this more realistically. Then again, since it appears that President Obama is appeasing the war hawks, it shouldn’t take too long for him to realize that we’ll never be out of there by mid-2011. He’s a smart man. He’ll catch on.
I think it’s fair to say we can kiss any hope of meaningful health care reform goodbye, too. The times, they ain’t a-changin’. Politics as usual.