Author: Jennie Scott

Each day as I drive down a certain highway in my hometown, I see a sign advertising in bold black letters, “Girls! Girls! Girls!” As I watched a pseudo-news program on television last night, it featured ‘the sexiest Halloween costumes for women’ and showed a video-gone-viral of a young woman receiving over 100 catcalls just walking down the street. When I opened up CNN’s website just now, the featured headline read, “Women Sold, Raped, Enslaved by ISIS.”

No matter where I look, it looks really bad to be a female.

Maybe it’s because I’m the mother of a little girl who is rapidly growing older, or maybe it’s just because I am growing older myself, but day by day I am increasingly saddened at just what it means to be a female in 2014. Sure, we have the right to vote, and yes, the glass ceiling has begun to crack and shatter, but in many ways it still dangerous and/or a liability to be a female.

Every day at the high school where I teach, I see young ladies violating the dress code and displaying their bodies in a way that makes me cringe. Their tops are low-cut, their shorts are unbelievably short, and their skinny jeans are impossibly skinny. Those 15 year old girls probably don’t understand, but the way they display their bodies says a lot about the way they feel. And the feeling that most of them seem to feel is this: “I am my appearance. My self is my looks.” Maybe, for some of them, they just dress like their friends, but maybe, just maybe, they have learned that even in 2014,  in much of the world, a young lady is the sum of her parts. And those parts need to be shown.

I am not – hear me, please – blaming these girls. I am blaming us – our society. We collectively have allowed females to be ‘less-than.’ We have reduced them to parts and demanded that those parts appear a certain way. We have caused a girl’s worth to be dependent on so many things other than who she really is – the person inside with a heart and intelligence.

I have realized that in many ways, and in many places, girls are a commodity. They are still treated as though they are inferior to males, and they still are fighting for equality. I know that I, personally, have felt this way. I have felt ‘less-than’ simply because I am a female, and I have been told that I cannot do what males can do – even though I am more qualified and would likely do quite well.

When will this end, and how? I wish I knew. The scary thing is I’m not convinced that it will. Seeing females merely as sex objects and pawns in a man’s world has become so ingrained in our culture that a perspective shift will not come easily. Especially as long as we females who know better don’t do better. If we continue to allow ourselves to be demeaned and discriminated against, nothing will change. If we don’t fight for ourselves – and our daughters – no one will.

I want to be able to tell my little girl that she can do anything – and mean it. I don’t want there to be businesses in my hometown where men can pay – in any capacity – for women and their services. I don’t want her gender to essentially be a disability that prevents her from achieving her dreams. I want her to see a world that so far hasn’t existed: a world where being a female is more positive than negative.

Image courtesy of http://www.lettherebeneon.com/?page_id=892

It’s 2:47 on a Friday, this one being a teacher workday. I am sitting down, in my recliner, at home. As we speak, there are still a bunch of teachers at my school logging hours, planning for next week and doing the myriads of unending tasks that teachers have to do. But I’m not there. I’m home.

We were given permission to leave today at 2:15 since we spent an evening at school a few weeks ago for Open House. I had permission to leave – yet I feel guilty. This, my friends, is the real life of a teacher. We never don’t feel guilty about something.

I feel guilty because I was the only person walking out the door at 2:15. The parking lot was still full, and my own to-do list wasn’t finished. My supply cabinet really needed to be reorganized, and the nonfiction unit I’m doing soon still needs some work. My bookshelves are dusty, and I should have emailed that parent. Ugh – yep. I probably should have stayed later.

But I didn’t. I chose to come home to my elementary-school-aged children and spend some time with them. (I’m a rebel, aren’t I?) I chose to try to turn my school brain off for a little while and not be driven mad by the ever-increasing demands placed on me – us – including the new requirements we learned about in the meeting this morning. I chose to go out for lunch with my friends, and I chose to leave today as soon as I could. And I’m trying to be ok with that.

But you know why it’s hard to be ok with that? Because teachers are constantly judged, and the criticism is loud and stinging. We are judged by parents – “My child has never made a C before, so you must be the problem.” We are judged by other teachers – “Ew, I never teach that story. The kids think it’s so boring.” We are judged by administrators – “Mrs. X was at school even though she was sick. Let’s all try to be like Mrs. X.” And please don’t forget the community – “Kids today can’t read and write. I just don’t know what’s going on in that school.” From every direction, teachers are judged, but the harshest judgments are those that come from ourselves.

Yes, we teachers know that we have a million eyes on us. We know that there is nothing more important than influencing the life of a child, so the million eyes have a right to be on us. That’s fair. But the brightest spotlight we feel is the one we turn on ourselves. On the whole, teachers are a group of perfectionists. You might not be able to tell by looking at some of our desks, but we want to do things right. We want to be on the cutting edge of research and technology, and we want to be the teacher that a high school senior remembers fondly. We feel like crying when a lesson bombs, and we hurt when our kids just can’t get it. We have file cabinets full of old lessons, but we create new ones every year so they’ll be just right. We look in others’ classrooms as we walk down the halls, and we feel insufficient because of what we see. We peek at the study guide left in the copier, and we groan inwardly when we realize ours is not nearly as good.

We are constantly judged – but the worst judgments are our own. They bring a guilt that feels inescapable. On a daily basis, I might feel badly about any (or all) of the following:
* I can’t get to school before 7:15 because of having to take my own kids to school. That teacher gets here every morning at 6:30 when the building opens.
* I forgot to make these copies yesterday afternoon, so now I have 46 seconds before the bell rings to get them run off.
* That bulletin board has been up since August. It really needs to be changed.
* The 72 essays I collected three days ago haven’t been graded, and both kids and parents are checking Parent Portal to see if the grades are there. They aren’t.
* Having to say, “We don’t have enough time to finish this story in class, so you guys will have to finish it on your own tonight. I know – I’m sorry. But there’s not enough time.”
* That student from 4th period last year was arrested last night.
* The technology I was awarded through a grant is probably wonderful – but I haven’t had enough time to learn to use it well yet.
* Student X doesn’t have access to the internet at home, and no one in his family was willing to take him to the library. His paper, therefore, isn’t typed. Which was a requirement.
* I forgot to show the school news. Again.
* This poetry packet I need to copy is 15 pages. I know that’s a lot of paper, but the poems in our textbook are really bad…

It just goes on and on. In the course of one class, I feel so inadequate to meet the demands of every student. There are kids with learning disabilities, kids who barely speak English, kids whose baby sister is fighting cancer, kids who have no high school graduates in their families, kids who have no books on a bookshelf at home, kids who did not get enough to eat today, kids who cannot afford the supplies they come without, kids with struggles I can tell are there but cannot figure out… The education system has evolved to hold teachers accountable for students and their performances, and believe me, we feel accountable. I feel responsible for things I cannot change and cannot control, and it leads to a feeling of all-consuming guilt most days. We teachers never don’t feel guilty.

Part of learning to be a teacher is learning to live with the guilt. It’s understanding that at the end of the day, if we’ve done all we can do – academically and otherwise – then we can go home and be satisfied with our day’s work. It’s realizing that we can’t change everything for a child. It’s understanding that no matter how hard we work – or how late we stay – there will always be someone doing more or working later. Part of being a good teacher is going in your classroom, closing the door, teaching your heart out, and then going home to recharge. Part of being a good teacher is getting out of the school and being just you. Even with a little guilt following you as you leave.

Now that we’re back in the swing of school and I feel like I’ve gotten to know my 9th graders well, there are some things I have encountered that disturb me. A lot. (One of which is the way they all use the word ‘alot.’ It’s two words, people. A. Lot. But I digress.)

I pride myself on being a tough teacher. If a student makes an A in my class, it’s because he or she has earned it. I don’t give A’s just for showing up – students earn A’s when they complete and master assignments. What disturbs me, this semester more than any other, perhaps, is how many of my students expect those A’s just for showing up. The first few quizzes, tests, and homework assignments threw them for the proverbial loop. There were many grades far below par, and there were many confused students and parents. There was a confused teacher, too. If the answers aren’t right, then I must mark them wrong, right? If the assignment is only halfway completed, then it cannot earn more than a 50 percent, right?

Yes, my expectations are high, and no, I don’t apologize for it. But what has been on my mind lately is simply this: are my expectations really that much higher than my students have known? Is completing an assignment fully and accurately really such an anomaly? Have attempts without mastery been acceptable in the past?

Don’t get me wrong – I know that high school is a whole new ballgame for kids. The pace is faster, the classes are longer, and the load is heavier. Understandable. But the expectations – shouldn’t they be similar? The demand for responsibility – shouldn’t it be comparable?

A friend of mine teaches across the hall from me, and she had a student ask if they got to have “Free Friday.” Her response: “I’m sorry – what? You get free Saturday and Sunday. We have work to do.”

Free Friday? Is there really such a thing? Are there teachers somewhere who have fewer standards  to teach and lower expectations from their administration? How can this exist?

My mind is always blown when I give back the first test, students see a low grade, and the question is posed, “When can I retake this?” I try very hard to control myself when I answer, “Never. You didn’t take the notes, you failed to turn in the homework, and you didn’t come in for extra help.” I sincerely don’t understand, and I need someone to explain this one to me. Is retaking tests standard practice now? Is getting a second chance when you did zero work the first time somehow helping children succeed? I would argue vehemently that giving multiple chances after initial laziness only perpetuates laziness. Why should a child study or work hard the first time if there’s going to be a second? (Of course, there is a difference for a child with a diagnosed learning disability. That’s a very different conversation.)

Likewise, “Ketchup” Days leave me dazed and confused as well – at least for high school. My students have 5 days after an excused absence to make up any work missed. After 5 days, the missing work becomes a zero, and they are not given the opportunity to “ketchup” no matter how cute the graphic on a red folder is. After 5 days, we have moved light years ahead, and failure to complete missed work becomes a responsibility issue. I fear we are teaching learned helplessness. My take on the issue is very black and white – the missing work was in the folder, you knew the procedure, so your failure to complete the work is a you problem. Case closed.

We are doing students – future adults – no favors by giving them a zillion chances to complete work well and completely. We are teaching them no life skills when we allow them to get away with anything less than the best they can give.

The best thing happened during a conversation the other day with a student. She shared with me that she had fun in last year’s class. The teacher was cool and let them use their phones all the time, but now she realizes how little she actually learned and how far behind she is as a result. She wishes her teacher had taught and demanded more. Isn’t that the point of education? To teach people what they didn’t even know they didn’t know?

I desperately want to be remembered by my students as someone who challenged them daily, teaching them how to think deeply and act responsibly. I want them to look back on freshman English and think, “Man. I really earned that A.”

Dear Jennie,

Today you’re well-rested, having just returned from a relaxing getaway with your incredible husband. The new school year is looming and you’re feeling a little stressed, beginning to make lists of all that must be done. But the stress you’re feeling now is nothing compared to how you’ll feel next Sunday night, when you know that 75 students will be entering your classroom the next day expecting great things of you. The stress will be even greater as you begin to prepare them for the high-stakes testing that will determine so much of their future – and yours. The anxiety will mount, the exhaustion will set in, and around February of this year, you’ll begin to grumble. So I’m writing to you now, before all of it starts, to remind you that the stress, anxiety, and exhaustion are all a privilege. Really, they are.

You see, Jennie, how have you forgotten? You’ve traveled to other countries where education isn’t a given. You have seen with your own eyes children carrying their own chairs to a makeshift classroom in a tin building well over 100 degrees.

You have seen their kitchen, empty but for a few small bags of beans and a jug of oil. You have heard the school leaders say that the kerosene is almost gone and there is no money for more.

You have listened to lessons being taught in another language to children who have to pay to be there.

You have snuggled with a student who had never seen you before but held on for dear life.

You have seen students smiling just at the chance to be at school. You have seen classrooms that are not Pinterest-inspired but are instead – and more importantly – freedom-providing.

So, Jennie, when education in America seems overwhelming both to you as a teacher and to your children as students, remember that it’s education in America! It is not held under a bridge, it is not dangerous for your daughter to attend, and it is not financially impossible. 

Is it perfect? Of course not. But compared to what you’ve seen and where you’ve been, Jennie, it’s a dream come true. A dream that even today, non-American children are chasing by illegally riding trains into this country. A dream that today, in 2014, little girls around the world don’t have to opportunity to pursue. A dream that today, most people take for granted. Don’t be one of them, Jennie. Don’t be a grumbler. Don’t fall into the trap that only complains about education in America. Be a part of making it better. And be a person who remembers just how incredible it really is.