Tuesday, January 10, 2006

"Waiting On A Factory Girl"

So, interesting news from the work front:

Someone new will be showing up next Tuesday, a student teacher for the history classes. This in and of itself is no big deal, except for the way the administration is presenting the situation.

They're making it sound as though she'll be in charge of the history classes.

Now, when I was hired by this school, I was told I and the other teaching assistant would be taking over the history and English classes when the teachers of those two subjects went on maternity leave and that we'd get assistants of our own when that happened.

What they did in English, though, was rehire an old English teacher to lead those classes, and now they're hiring a student teacher to lead the history classes.

The other co-teacher and I are up in arms about this. We've already developed a rapport with the students, we've been in there since September, we know where the kids are, what they respond to, etc. More than anything else, we were told this was how it would work. This is how the original history and English teachers were told it would be. It's how we've told the students it would be. They're almost as upset about it as we are. They've got a natural aversion to sudden change anyway, and they can't understand why--if the other assistant teacher and I are already in the history and English classes--we need anyone else in there in the first place, let alone someone who is going to take over the class. It was kinda touching in a way when the 8th graders threw a fit about it this morning.

Tonight I start my first class for my certification. The first class was technically last Tuesday, but no one bothered to tell me that...or where the class tonight is...or when it starts...

I'm starting to think public school sounds better and better.

~chuck

Song of the Moment: The Rolling Stones, "Rough Justice"

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Ah, the idiotic politics and ploys -- the reason I left high school teaching for good to focus on college teaching. Yeesh.

My sympathies, sir.