alterin

Today is the senior grad walk at our school. Seniors are going to go through a rehearsal graduation, and then they’re going to walk through the halls of all of the buildings. All of our classes are going to be in the hallways cheering them on.

Couple of days ago, graduating students who were in my freshmen class started looking for their “freshmen letter” which I kind of did, but not really. It was optional, but this was also the last year we did blogs and then was an introduction post, so there are those words of wisdom.

All around it’s just a heightened sense of nostalgia, looking back, and reflection.

Typically around this time of year my emotions are in overdrive. I’m so very angry all of the time. I don’t think I take it out on anyone, but my showers are longer and I’m seething with fake conversations in my head with people who have wronged me or people I care about or ideas I care about.

Anger Issue #1

It’s a great time to have the Supreme Court decide that the Votings Rights Act is irrelevant. It’s just nightmare fuel for my anger.

There’s this “guy” online that seems to be the top comment in every post about this issue. He says, “That’s not what they did! They just said it has to be colorblind! We can’t get past race if we keep looking at race” which is the typical bullshit of angry white conservatives, and it’s so frustrating because on the surface, sure, yes, okay. But it’s also so sad and scary and pathetic that we can’t look just a little bit deeper than that.

Because, sure let’s thought experiment it out, let’s draw up maps just based on your partisan bullshit. (Oh wait, they already did? Oh wait, they’re stopping “democracy” just to put these in place as we speak? Oh wow.)

Okay cool, we have these race blind maps. Cool. Now, let’s look at the racial demographics of these non-racially defined maps. OH LOOK IT’S FUCKING RACIST AS SHIT. Maybe we should think about why? Maybe a certain political party should be identified as the fucked up hate group that they are.

Anger Issue #2

One of the hardest things about education, and it’s something that’s probably very much a regular office space issue (but under a different mantra). The mantra for education is “you can only control what happens within the four walls of your classroom.” And it’s oh so very true, but it’s also so very difficult because all of those issues that happen outside of your walls; they’re still happening; they’re still affecting you; they’re still affecting your students; and they still affect the work that you do. But they are what they are, and you just need to accept them and move on. Mitigate them the best that you can, but they are what they are.

I like to think that I’m a damn good educator. I reflect on my practice, and I change what I can. I’m also a very strong advocate for public education and educators.

But real talk: not all educators are great. Not all teachers are great. When it comes to factors or indicators of who is actually great, the most important one is time in. If you show me two educators with varying levels of the experience, it’s probably the educator with more experience that’s better. (I have a very biased opinion and probably unpopular opinion as well here: the teacher with the least number of degrees is also probably better.)

And if we’re looking at which teachers have the “best” evaluations or are getting the most accolades, there’s probably not much if any correlation between the two.

Data for education is mostly bullshit, and the evaluations for educators is complete bullshit. Data is only as good as the inputs that you get it from. There is no such thing as good educational data. The number of outside variables is too great. It’s all outside of the four walls of the classroom.

Anger Issue #3

This kind of goes with #2, and it’s all just in a general “State of Education” type of thing. But I’ve been looking at student work from this graduating class when they were freshmen, and the answer isn’t that they were so much more special or anything like that. But, the quality of the work from my 9th graders (currently 12th graders) is superior to the work that my 11th graders are turning in today.

Honestly, I wish it was closer. But I don’t even think it is. And if I were to identify the biggest change from this class’s 9th grade: new curriculum. Holy crap, it’s so freaking bad. I’ve tried. We’ve gone through multiple iterations of following the curriculum.

We did the we’re going to follow it faithfully, and it sucked. We did the we’re going to follow it mostly, and it sucked. We did it the we’re going to try to claim to follow it but put in as much of our own stuff as possible, and it sucked (less). It’s incredibly frustrating because, yes, I can only control what’s within my four walls. But with this curriculum, you’re now interfering in exactly what happens within my four walls. You’ve broken my damn walls.

And to break the walls even farther and go back into my issue #2 even more: what’s the rational behind it? The horrible freaking bad data that the curriculum publisher has used to justify its own existence by showing how the data shows that continued use of this specific curriculum helps students score better on this specific test designed to show how this specific curriculum will revolutionize and fix education. And it’s oh so bullshit and frustrating.

Anger Issue #4

My Golden Knights are sucking so bad. They shouldn’t. On paper, this should be a freaking amazing team, but they just don’t gel together correctly. There’s just something missing.

And I know some jaded sports fans of shittier teams are going to be like, “Well, you’re still in the playoffs? You’re still probably going to make it to round 2? Why are you crying? Our team has been horrible for 7815753198 years.” And then there’s some kind of joke about new hockey fans, but I’m not a new hockey fan. I’ve been a fan of hockey since I first saw a Coyotes game (in their first season apparently). And we all know how that turned out until the home town got a team.

So the Golden Knights sucking when they shouldn’t is just all kinds of weird and annoying.

Okay, this isn’t nearly as big of an issue as the other issues. It’s probably the healthiest one because it’s completely external from anything that I have anything to do with, and the stakes are so infinitesimally small. They just do not matter. And that's okay.