Economic Crisis + School Uniforms = Teen Angst

Today I had a meeting with the principal about students who want to use the library while they're off track. (For those of you out of the loop, our school is year-round, with three tracks that go four months on and two months off. So, there are always two tracks on, and one off.) In the past, we've allowed off-track kids to wander onto campus and come to the libary as long as they could show their school IDs at the front entrance. Sadly, some young darlings have chosen to abuse this arrangement, bypassing the library entrance completely to visit teachers in their classes, go to the PE field or locker room, or just randomly wander. It makes sense that the principal needs to tighten things up a bit, and we came to a decent enough agreement that kids could visit the library from 8am-11:30am while off track. They still need to sign in at the front entrance, show their IDs, and (this is new) wear their school uniforms.

This is the part that really interests me. They're off track. They are coming from home for maybe as few as 10 minutes to return a book. Why do they need to change clothes? I'll tell you why. According to our assistant principal in charge of security, our uniform policy is going down the tubes fast and we need to save it before there is mass chaos at the school (Oh no! Cute shoes! Funny t-shirts! Personal style! Aaahh!).
More and more kids are showing up every day completely out of uniform. What is the reason for this? Is it defiance, protest, civil disobedience? Nope. It's the economy. I really wouldn't have thought of this, since I just assumed that kids who bought their uniforms at the beginning of the year would still be able to use them. Then I remembered that, of course, kids grow. So some of our families can no longer afford to buy new clothes for their kids. Or at least not two sets, one for school and one for home. But there are other, less obvious reasons for this too. Our kids and their families are moving, and moving quickly, into and out of their homes. We have kids coming back from Riverside and other outlying communities where their families hopefully bought houses and then could not make it work, or had ballooning mortgages, or lost their jobs and came back to live with family. We have kids who are evicted and actually have to leave their homes without being given the time to pack all of their things. Perhaps some of them even come home to a house or apartment where the locks have already been changed and their things have been lost in the shuffle.

So what does the school administration do in this situation? Is there some kind of precedence? They can't very well punish a child in these circumstances, nor can they abolish the uniform system. As of now, I believe they are using a two-step process to fix the situation. Step one has some interesting implications.

Step one: Have the parents sign a uniform waiver so everything is on the up-and-up. You see, the school district has a very secret uniform waiver that parents can request that allows their student to come to school without a uniform. At most schools, the administration will try to talk parents out of this, listing all sorts of scary security reasons that justify uniforms in the first place. Every once in a while though, one meets a cool kid in cool clothes and asks, "Why are you not in uniform?" The cool kid will coolly reply, "I've got a waiver, miss." And then one can share a short moment with the cool kid where the following is communicated telepathically: You have cool parents who thwart the system, therefore you too are probably cool, and you should know that I am cool and thwart the system, only I can't really do so openly because this is a school and I am a teacher, but you should know that I dig it, man.
In terms of this current uniform and economy crisis, however, the waiver serves a different purpose. It's just there to make sure that everyone's i's and t's are properly dotted and crossed, and I'll bet that it is presented to the parents in such a way that they walk away believing it is only available as a temporary measure and not as a permanent choice. The danger for the administration, obviously, is that some of these kids and parents will uncover the truth and decide they want to continue the waiver for good. I'm really hoping that happens, if only to observe the hands-tied reaction of those who will undoubtedly hate it.

Step Two in the process to get these kids dressed is to send a very nice man to the home of the student and (I believe) begin some paperwork to get uniform clothes for the family that are paid for by.....and here I just don't know. The school, the district? It's anyone's guess. What I heard today is that it takes a few weeks to make this happen, so I assume paperwork is involved. And who is this nice man? None other than our Pupil Services and Attendance officer, known to most of us as the Truancy Officer. Usually when you see him coming, it means someone has missed a lot of school and the school demands answers! He's actually very kind and nothing at all like Edward Rooney, but nonetheless, his job can't be easy or uplifting. Going into homes to discover the root of trouble that causes kids to miss school or not have proper clothing must send him home at night with knots in his shoulders and a heavy heart.

So there it is. Direct and visible impact of the GEC (global economic crisis, pronounced geck). It must be manifesting in other, more discreet and sneakish ways. In part I am extremely curious about them, and in part I dread knowing.

Jehovah's Witness Meltdown

The entire school district in LA slowed down on Tuesday to watch the Inauguration, which I believed was an obvious and reasonable thing for the schools to do. I would never, ever have questioned this activity as one that might possibly disrupt a child's world view in any way. Until N.

N is a boy that stands out the moment you meet him. His pants are pulled up very, very high. His eyebrows blend together in a fluffy, soft looking unibrow. There are often beads of persipiration on his upper lip. N is not tall, he is constantly in motion, and he rarely makes eye contact. He loves to read, loves to play computer games, and is often so deep in his own world that he doesn't hear his name being called over and over and over again by his patient, kind, friendly school librarian.

When Obama's speech was nearly over, I noticed that N was preoccupied. He was in and out of his backpack, knee bopping quickly up and down, looking for a pencil, looking everywhere but up at the screen. When I caught his attention, N shook his head back and forth, mouthing something that I couldn't understand. I crooked my finger at him (pleasantly) and he got up and stumbled over his pile of belongings to join me away from the crowd of kids watching the speech.

"What's up, N?" I asked.
Foot tapping, he replied, "I'm not comfortable with this. I'm a Jehovah's Witness."
Huh? So, I ask, "N, I don't understand. Is there something about watching a president speak that isn't ok with your religious beliefs?"

Does that sound harsh? I didn't think so, but that's when the waterworks began. From that moment on, it took thirty minutes, many tears, a call from N to his father, another teacher, and a lot of confusion on my part to finally come to these understandings about N and maybe about Jehovah's Witnesses (but I think N has got to be confused about some of this).

- N was made uncomfortable by the invocation. Ok. So was I.
- N was not able to make much of a distinction between the invocation and Obama's speech.
- According to N, the Jehovah's Witnesses do not recognize the president as a true authority figure, and so having the school stop to watch the inauguration was in some way a violation of the separation of church and state.
- According the N, he has no interest in voting (ever) because man's laws do not really matter, that people will do what they will do, and the consequences will be what they are.
- Because N was distracted, because he is often distracted, he is negatively representing the entirety of the Jehovah's Witness population. He commits "bad acts" and is ashamed. (In fact, N has ADHD and is 11, but apparantly that is beside the point).
- Boys in N's class make fun of him for his religion.
- N used to be bothered by the many religious activities in school, but he says he has mostly gotten used to it.

In the end, N elected to spent the remainder of the inauguration (what amounted to about 5 minutes at that point) sitting in the main office waiting area.

The questions this interaction brings up for me are ones that both surprise and infuriate me. My first reaction is simply HOW CAN ANYONE DO THIS TO THEIR CHILD? HOW CAN ANYONE CHOOSE TO CONFUSE A POOR KID INTO TEARS? The boy seems not to know exactly what is going on, and clearly his religion is being used to make him feel ashamed of his behavior. This makes me both angry and sad.

Upon further reflection, however, I think there are some issues here that I wouldn't have expected. First, of course, is that N has a point about the invocation and benediction. They don't really have a place in school, but I don't know how we would have easily worked around them to watch the speech.

Second, N and his family have the right (although I feel a little uncomfortable saying this) to reject the idea that any living person has authority over their lives. They have the right to stand away from politics and rely only on the ten commandments to rule their lives. Don't they? During our discussion, N mentioned that one of the commandments says that one should not worhip false idols. In N's mind, we were worshiping Barack Obama on Tuesday. He has a point, does he not? It may be as close to worship as I've come in, well, my whole life. So that fact that I do not see this worship as religious does not mean that someone else, like N, might be bothered by such an open display of reverence, sanctioned (even required) but the public school that he attends.

Now, I am going way out on a limb here. I do not actually believe that having kids watch the inauguration in school is anything like asking them to observe a religious celebration. But I can see how N would be confused. I can see that we blur these lines to such extremes on a regular basis (Halloween, Valentine's, certainly Christmas; all of these have religious and secular followings, and all of them are permitted in schools to a certain extent) that a child whose parents may not be clarifying things well would cry in frustration and fear of offending his god, or his mom, or his dad, or his whole congregation.

I am grateful that my parents never put me in this position. I am sorry that N is so confused, and that he was unable to see the greatness of what happened on Tuesday. I am sorry that I know nothing about his religion and therefore could not be a comfort to him. I am sorry that my immediate reaction was a biased, judgemental one that condemned his family's beliefs to the realm of kooky extremism. I hope he can one day reconcile his religious beliefs with his ADHD, with his responsibilties as a citizen of this (or any) country, with his peer group, with his parents' expectations. How will he manage it?

Failure to Launch

In my role on the Technology Use Committee, I have worked hard to provide countless professional development workshops for teachers who would like to advance their basic technology skills. We've held sessions on Microsoft Excel and Powerpoint, Windows Movie Maker, Google, using Databases, creating web pages, using document projectors, using LCD projectors, using instructional videos, and the list goes on. At times, I feel we are making great progress. Many of our students are even mastering these skills, which makes me hopeful for their futures.

At other times, I worry that I/we are failing our students miserably....and in this case, the students I'm talking about are the teachers. After years of technology workshops (which include very specific advice about how to frame an assignment for the children), the teacher I will highlight today has managed to create what I feel is an extremely confusing and incomplete sheet of instructions for his students who are to make a Power Point slideshow about Ancient Egypt.

A few details about this assignment...
These are 11-year-old kids in the 6th grade. This is their first time using Power Point (probably) and for many of them, their first time using any Microsoft product. This teacher has asked them to make a 15-slide presentation about Ancient Egypt. That's a lot of slides. A whole lot. A real lot, as they say in Decatur. As an added bonus, these students have not actually started studying Ancient Egypt yet. When they first visited the library to use the computers, they were asked to simply "set up" their slides. I don't even know what that is supposed to mean, and I've made a hundred Power Points.

Ok, so, on a plain, white half-sheet of paper is written the following:

How to do a PowerPoint/Slide Show

Start by going to start and left click (L C.) on the mouse.

Then go to bottom left and lick on All Programs

Then go to list and click (L.C.) on Microsoft Office

Then slide mouse over to Microsoft Office Power point and (L.C.)

Now, I suppose these directions could be followed well enough by someone who knows what they're doing. I do find the (L.C.) instruction bewildering in all of its forms. First of all, who calls it Left Click? It's just Click, dammit! Also, the first time it appears, the words "left click" are followed by the acronym in parentheses. Fair enough. The next time, however, the acronym for Left Click follows just the word Click. And finally, the words Left Click are left out entirely, but the acronym is still in parentheses. The words Left Click were shed one by one, until there were none.
Another problem I have with this is that this is not, in fact, the instructions needed to "do" a Power Point. To open the application, yes. To use the application? Not in a million years.

I would like to be the kind of person who is brave and cruel enough to directly address these problems with the teacher, but I am not. After all, I am not an administrator. I do not have true supervisory powers. Also, I am a yellow, clucking chicken.
As I prepare for today's Technology Use Committee meeting, I am reminded that being a teacher is a lot like being Sisyphus. That stone just keeps on rolling back down the hill, and I/we keep charging down to get it and to start over again. Maybe we know more about the hill we're climbing up; we can avoid divots and gravel. But that stone doesn't seem to get easier to push just because we recognize the terrain. What does it say about me, about the other teachers, that we choose to do this? Are we unrelenting optimists who believe in the promise of all people? Or are we just quirky, foggy-brained, and strange?

In the end, I have to give this teacher credit for attempting to do a Power Point with his students for the first time, right? I do. I really, really, really do. Really. I do. Right?

Fear of Rejection

Below is the trancript of a note I found today in the library. It is written on a mint green index card. There is no way to know exactly when one girl stops writing and the other starts, so I will simply transcribe what is on the card, true to the girls' punctuation, spelling, etc.

U shuld not have 2 say that I sed it...Heez gunna stop talkin 2 me fine then I tell him that I was just kidding! Do you feel much better !? no dont tell him tat....Jus tell em 2 not stop talkin 2 me lyk utha guys okay I will -----> So u n yvette tell Daniel that jus becauze I like him to no stop talkin to me MAN ULISES DOESN'T STOP SHARING dumb of Jimmy N.

So, my best guess at interpreting this is that Girl A likes a boy and maybe she actually said so to her friends, which is pretty much the kiss of death in middle school. Girl B and Yvette told the boy what Girl A said. For some reason Girl A often finds herself in these situations; her honestly about her affection towards boys does not appeal to them. Are they too shy? Do they dislike her? Whatever it is, she can't take the rejection this time. Girl B doesn't seem to concerned about all of this, if you ask me. Some friend.

Bad Decision Making

At the end of lunch yesterday, I hear a ruckus in the stairwell that leads to the library exit. This happens a lot; kids hang out there and must be kicked out so they're not late for class. So I went to do the kicking out. On the landing between floors, I saw Noe (the lisping boy who believes we are made of dirt) being shoved around by a surly group of at least five. I made my presence known, they fled, I followed. Outside, the harassment continued. Noe's collar was tugged, he was elbowed, he almost lost his balance. At first I assumed that this was your average bullying, that these were your average bullies, and that I would need to make an average intervention. Noe is, after all, a kid that most people would not be surprised to see bullied. I am sorry to say that anyone is bullied, but it is a solid fact of middle-school life.
I intervened to find a complicated story that took some time to unweave. It goes something like this. Boy 1 (let's call him Miguel) brought twenty dollars to school. Why, no one knows. That's a lot of candy, even in today's market. After PE, he put his things in his locker and went to take a shower (again, why? Ew, those showers cannot be nice), but he left his locker open. This is his second Bad Decision by my count. The money fell out, or so we think. To think otherwise is to assume Noe is devious and criminal, which I choose not to think. Noe walks by Miguel's locker and picks up the money, keeps it. Bad Decision three. Someone sees this happen and at lunch in the library, Miguel's gaggle of followers attempts to retrieve the money through the art of intimidation. Noe sticks to his story, claiming finders keepers.
Enter Boy 3 (let's call him Juan). Noe tells us that Juan reached into his pocket and took the money back. Juan says no. Juan says he did, but then he put it back. Juan says Noe is a liar. Juan says he took the money and gave it to someone else. Juan says a lot of things.
Suddenly, Miguel's gaggle is suspicious, but no longer of Noe. Now they are looking to Juan and saying things like, "Man, where's the money?", "Man, you better tell where the money is!", and "Man, you spent it, didn't you?". Juan stammers. Noe looks hopeful. Miguel just hangs his head in total disappointment.
Noe is redeemed, Juan confesses, they all go to the dean to record statements. You see, Juan only has seven dollars in his pocket. He must have treated all his buddies to snacks at lunch, because that money is gone.
You would think that all of this would cause some lasting tension among this group of boys. Maybe Miguel would hold a grudge against Juan for lying. Or Noe would be angry with the rest of them. Twenty minutes later, I see Noe, Juan, and Miguel crossing campus together, returning from the dean's office. I say, "Is everything ok with you boys?" Smiling and laughing, practically linking arms and skipping, they tell me yes. Miguel says, "He'll bring me twenty dollars tomorrow and that'll be the end of it". All is forgiven. Perhaps the final Bad Decision, at least on Miguel's part.

The First Few Weeks

Well, so much for writing every day. These last few weeks have been some of the most hectic I've seen at this school. Hectic in a good way, because our school seems to be breeding nerds, which means that the library (their kingdom) is getting more play than ever before. This is wonderful of course, but exhausting. How and why is this school breeding nerds, you ask? I don't know for sure, but I suspect a few specific changes over the last couple of years are at the heart of this transformation. One is that we are now heavily recruiting students in gifted programs at their elementary schools, and our gifted program is growing in size and prowess. Another is that we have full blown electives now, so drama kids, art kids,and tech kids have a place to thrive. The third is that were are pushing reading pretty hard, the staff is visibly reading, and books are now a little more cool than they were. The nerds are establishing their space, their superiority, and their right to exist. More and more of them are maintaining their nerd personas all the way through 8th grade, or if they shed the nerd skin, they only do so in favor of becoming intellectually cool, meaning they wear black, listen to rock 'n roll, smear on eyeliner, and talk of living downtown, or in Hollywood, or somewhere that is not here.

It's the 6th graders who are really funny though. One recently came to me and said "Ms. Murphy, I would like to discuss with you the possibility of starting a Young Authors club". He has since returned several times, once to show me a book he has written (incomprehensible), and another time to write out plans for the establishment of this club. Another boy recently told his teacher that evolution has been disproven, and that there are those who now believe that we are all made of dirt. Two others orbit me like satellites or moons during lunchtime. I could hold my arms out straight and smack either one of them in the head at any time. Yet another recently passed me a note during a busy time. He was recommending that I post a sign on the door of the library about the rules for borrowing chess boards.

I am so pleased that these little smarty-pants kids are here. I am worn out by them, by their questions, their ideas, their need for my attention and perhaps my approval. The line to check out books exceeds thirty people most days during lunch, and stays that long even though we are checking out books at a rate I find astounding. I have to turn them away at the bell for class. They look so sad that they aren't going to get to take their dinosaur, solar system, baseball, dragon, horse, puppy, ghost, and UFO books with them. It's all I can do not to laugh.

For Staff Use only

We have a serious problem with bathrooms at this school.

Our school is organized into several free-standing buildings (the California way) that the students roam between throughout the day for their classes - the gym, the office building, 5 classroom buildings.... Four of the classroom buildings are grouped together in a spoke-like arrangement around a small, round, cement courtyard. They are numbered the 1000, 2000, 3000, and 4000 buildings. Only the 1000 and 3000 buildings (which face each other, sort of) have bathrooms, and only those bathrooms on the first floor are kept unlocked. During class time. Before school, after school, and Nutrition, and at Lunch, these bathrooms are closed and the bathrooms in the 6000 building (way on the other side of campus) are opened for students. Do you find this difficult to keep straight? Let's throw this into the mix - students are not supposed to leave their classes for the first and last 15 minutes of class time for any reason (to prevent hooliganism, I believe), and during these times ALL of the bathrooms are closed and locked. Do you have it now? Will you remember this easily, after having been given the rundown? Would your 11-year-old self with bladder control issues remember it? Or be able to abide by these clear, sensible, reasonable urination guidelines?

Neither can the students at my school.
The library, of course, has its own single-sex bathroom. It's a gift, a treasure, a hot commodity. That is, until the students begin to find out it's there. They do find out, and pretty quickly, because who am I to deny a wiggling, red-faced youth who will probably not make it down the stairs much less across campus before ruining his life and his day by having an accident? So I let the emergencies sneak back to the Staff Only bathroom, because I am a kind person who is concerned with the prevention of urinary tract infections and all other varieties of torture inflicted by our school's riot-proof setup. Once in a while, though, I cruelly turn on the poor dears, put my foot down, and scream, "No more!". No more will I find paper towels stuffed into the bowl of the toilet (why? really. why?) No more will there be shredded toilet paper trailing out into the library's comfortable sofa and magazine area! No more will a droplet belonging to someone else find its way onto the back of my leg! Enough!

I am in one of these I've-had-it phases now thanks to one particular young man whose name I do not even know. This boy, this insane little boy, has come to the library every day near the end of lunch for 2 weeks. I am always happy to meet a new student and we have become friendly, discussing the video games secret codes book he has been saving up to buy from the Scholastic book orders I provide. Once or twice he has started to leave, realized he blew his chance at an unlocked bathroom, and asked to use mine. Once or twice I have allowed him to do so. He's a little out of it, pretty sweet, and I was just doing a good turn. Then one day I told him it was the last time. He needed to get a grip on the school's bell schedule, on his own time, on the bathroom situation - tomorrow I would not allow it. He agreed.

The next day, young no-name reappears, and when he's told that it's time to go, he leaves with the parade of students storming out...or so it seems. A few minutes later, there's a rustle coming from back by the magazines. No big deal. Another few minutes later a definite clank can be heard from the teacher work room where the bathroom is located. I figure there is, what else, a teacher back there making copies or laminating. Several long minutes later, a flush. Not out of the ordinary at all, until my new nemesis comes slinking out of the room, hoping he will not be seen. A renegade bathroom user! Enough. No more. Staff only. Don't even ask. Don't even think about asking. Learn to hold it, that's my motto. I am done.
I used my best librarian finger-waggle as I shooed him out the door, and I haven't seen him since. Oh wait, that's a lie, he came back again today. I think I might scream.