theblackdostoyevsky

I used to be a public school teacher. I was fired in May. But don’t feel badly for me; I was glad for it. It was overdue. I was glad because I’d hung in there; I didn’t quit. The system had to kick me out, like Jonah vomited on shore from that giant fish. And boy did they. My last school, a poorly rated elementary in a used-to-be-rural, white district now transitioning into the color-verse, started building a case against me last October.

I calmly told the building principal, who surreptitiously led the charge against me, along with the other admins, that they might bear witness, “At this rate, I’ll be fired by the end of the year.”

“Oh no, it’s just growing pains,” she said. The rest looked at me with blank, expectant expressions.

By April, I was in her office again, laughing aloud as she told me that HR advised that I be non-renewed. I’ll spare you the story. Just know, the public education system needs men, but the women who are increasingly being hired to run it don’t want them. Not real men, at least. They want to use men’s bass and strength for their own purposes. But a man’s logic, his autonomy, his discipline, his essence, his, dare I say, manhood? Oh no, they despise that. It inflames their anxiety. And if there’re two things a man can’t dealt with too much of, it’s anxiety and disorder. Just because you’ve got systems doesn’t mean you’ve got control. Trust me when I say that there are hoards of men hiding within the walls of the school system, too afraid to speak up because they’re a few years too close to retirement, or too vested in TRS to bail and start a new career. I’ve seen them through the rectangular windows of their classrooms, sitting in the dark with their heads in their hands, like inmates locked in solitary.

“Didn’t I tell you this was gonna happen?” I told her. She stayed silent. “But anyways, thank you, Jesus.” And I left.

I spent the last month and a half watching kid movies, putting together the impossible puzzle, and burning through my time off. I left them a day, though, for kicks.

Over seven years, I taught seventh, eighth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth, first, second, third, fourth, and fifth grades. Sounds impossible, right? Nine grades in seven years? It’s possible. Probably shouldn’t be, but it is.  Over seven years: three schools; nine grades; four sports; thirteen subjects (two Advanced Placement, one dual-credit, two honors); two Teacher of the Year nominations (one top three finalist, no wins). By the time I was let go, I had relapsed. I was downing a pint of vodka three nights a week (four-day work week) and smoking a pack and a half of Black & Milds a day, just to decompress from the stress. Thirty days after the last day of the school year, knowing that I wouldn’t have to return, Jesus stanched my craving for drinking and smoking, and my resting heart rate dropped ten beats/minute.

I’m unemployed, right now. One of my old supervisors called me in June to tell me he had a position with my name on it at the first middle school I’d worked in. My favorite teacher is still working there. I turned him down. Every time I tell somebody still in education, with a smile on my face, that I got fired in May, after they recover from the initial shock, they’ve got a job offer spilling from the rivers of their tongues onto the banks of their lips for me. Yes, I was and am a good teacher. I care about my craft, and I work hard every day to be a better teacher than I was yesterday. Yes, still. I’ll always be a teacher; it’s a God-given, spiritual gift. And yet, I refuse to go back into a classroom where I’m responsible for other people’s children. That’s why, now, I’ve time to post blogs at nine o’clock in the morning on a weekday. Pity me, and pray that my unemployment claim gets approved.

But hear this, I can’t recall a more recent, great joy in my life than July 27 when, for the first time in seven years, I didn’t have to report for in-service. Every time I even think about going back into a public school, my heart rate spikes and the flashbang of the flashbacks start up again. That’s PTSD.

There are enough people lambasting the public education system right now; I won’t pile on. I started the August before we never went back after Spring Break; the covid year. I saw six months of what school was like in the twenty years since I’d been a student, before the plague hit, and six and a half years of the fallout. This is what I can tell you: It’s far worse than anyone who’s been a part of it can tell you. They’re all on lockdown, manic and deluded, trying to stuff the toothpaste back into the tube before anyone finds out. That’s why you need an act of Congress to get past the vestibule. Some days, the sound of children wailing in the hallways, adults kneeling beside them trying to coax them back into the classroom, gave me the impression that I was working in an asylum. When folks ask, I give them all the same advice: Go sub. That’s the only way you’ll get an idea of the future we’re on the precipice of. And honestly, we’re more like Wile E. Coyote standing in mid-air, waiting on gravity to kick in. A word of advice: Don’t go trying to be an entrepreneur, because you’ve yet to meet your pool of eligible employees. IJS.

Personally, we’re getting our children out as soon as possible. I don’t care to teach the ABC’s and 1, 2, 3s, though. I can outsource that. But I’ve had enough of folders full of two weeks’ worth of holiday coloring sheets and a half sheet with four multiple choice math problems. Newsflash: Christmas and Halloween are pagan holidays; they ain’t holy. We should be asking ourselves what the gentiles were doing “on every high hill and under every green tree” before we start stamping Jesus’ name on everything our flesh wants to do. But people won’t read. IJS.

But I get it, it’s free childcare. And that’s exactly how they think of it, too, the teachers and the administrators. They admit it amongst themselves and to each other. I had one counselor tell me with a smile, after I complained about yet another student escaping consequences for their actions, either behaviorally or academically,

“But you’re the best paid babysitter in the country, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” I replied, shaking my head as I walked off.

Oh, and the children know it, too. So, can somebody explain to me how test scores are falling but school grades are rising? Can somebody explain to me how teacher pay is increasing but reading proficiency is at an all-time low? I’ve called the names of high school graduates who I know couldn’t read. I know because I’d failed them, and after I was reprimanded for failing them, they did a couple hours on Eduphoria (or whatever), clicked a few boxes and walked across the stage in front of me, anyways. I’ve seen students who’ve never set foot in a classroom, who were on their way out of the building to go smoke on the trails behind the building, chased down by administrators and told they wouldn’t have to pass STAAR this year because they’d already failed three times.

“Will I still graduate, miss? I gotta get outta here.”

“Yes, you will still graduate.”

How Sway? What does “graduate” even mean, then? The word you’re looking for is “matriculate.” Emphasis on the “trickle”.

Maybe I’m bitter. I’m sure you’ve already considered that. Maybe you’re right. Maybe the spirit of rejection always nursing on the insecurities in my soul has risen up in defiance, yet again. But the truth is, I hated the system from the first year. I never wanted to be a schoolteacher. It was expedient at the time. I’m surprised I made it as long as I did. I believe what my grandmother told me when I told her I was working to get certified. An educator herself, and a PhD in Education, she told me, “They ain’t gonna let you teach those kids.”

And they didn’t. At least, not while they were watching. Every true teacher knows what’s up. Close that door, lock it, and do what you gotta do. I used to tell the couple coworkers I would actually talk to,

“I said the thing that’s gonna get me fired my first year teaching. I’ve just been waiting on the other shoe to drop.”

They don’t want real; they want rote. They don’t want learners; they want automatons. They don’t want responsibility; they want victims. They don’t want thoughtful; they want skilled. They don’t want intelligent; they want dependent. They don’t want adults; they want grown children, like their parents. And that’s exactly what we’re all going to get. Look around you, we’ve got ‘em already. Oh. Not you, though. IJS.