Three Letters, Two Perspectives: The Consequences of an Acronym

 SHE SAYS:

A little background is necessary before beginning the story of the infamous “abbreviated cursing” incident:

First: I worked at a private CHRISTIAN school.  Teachers were expected to have a Bible reading and prayer time with their students daily before each class started.  Cuss/curse words of any kind were not to be tolerated.

Second: The funding for the school was DIRECTLY connected to the ENROLLMENT. You can imagine what this meant for discipline.  There was none.  Discipline was so lax, I would send students to the Principal for defiance or disrespect or disrupting the class (the most frequent)  and they would be back in class, continuing their antics within minutes.  I can only assume that teachers complained about this issue because …

(Third) … on the morning that this now infamous incident occurred, the staff had just had a staff meeting in which the Discipline Principal stated in no uncertain terms that he would not accept any students on referrals to his office for “vague” reasons like “disrespect” or “defiance.”  If we teachers wanted to send students to the office, we had to be SPECIFIC about the reasons. He stated: “If a student says a curse word, I don’t want to see ‘cursing’ on the referral. I want the word/s written out.” 

THE INCIDENT:

The morning of the now-infamous incident was like any other.   I knew Mike had issues going on at home – a parent was ill (with cancer I believe).   He was generally a good kid, but had a short fuse - no doubt due to the stresses of the situation at home, not to mention the everyday pressures of being a teenager, trying to figure out life and your future.  

I actually don’t remember the specific reason why he got upset at me. From my recollection, as he was walking into class, I said something to him – maybe asked him where his book was – and he exploded:   

“WTF MacKenzie!” and he stormed out of the room.

I was stunned. From the sharp intake of breath from the other students I knew they expected a reaction from me. I just wasn’t sure why or how I should react. Quickly I went over in my head what he had said: “WTF” What was that?? I couldn’t figure it out.  “WTF” What did that mean? I could tell by the students' expressions they were waiting to see what I was going to do, how I was going to handle this situation.

I was a relatively new teacher. It was only my 2^nd year teaching high school. I had had no teacher education classes (besides, no teacher’s book tells you how to handle situations like this).  I was also teaching students who were privileged, used to getting their way because of the money, position, or influence their parents or grandparents had.  The fact that I was young (barely 25) and that many had older siblings my age or older, and the fact that I looked much younger than I was, meant that I felt that I had to always assert my authority. I always felt like I was walking a tightrope between being “the boss” and just being “me.” 

“WTF???” I puzzled over this for at least 30 seconds as I took out a referral, initially intending to write him up for … for what? What is the “specific reason” that I could write?? Anger issues? Yelling at the teacher??

Suddenly it flashed on me .. what “W.T.F” meant...

Always a dutiful follower of instructions, this is the referral I wrote:

I have a picture of it, because, Mike and his friends found my Very Specific Description of why I was sending him out on a referral to be hilarious – a fact that I didn’t know until the yearbook came out, and I saw just how funny they found it to be.  He had designed his whole entire “senior page” around my referral.   To say that I was mortified would be an understatement. On the other hand, I felt misunderstood.  I was simply doing what the principal had asked teachers to do if we wanted troublesome students out of the classroom. 

I believe Mike later apologized for his outburst.  At any rate, I didn’t have any other issues (that I recall) with him for the rest of the year…

HE SAYS:

On the morning of the WTF incident, I had forgotten my book in my locker. I hated going to my locker. It was the bottom locker of a stack of three, assigned to me (I theorized at the time) because I am vertically-challenged and they figure, “Eh, less distance for the kid to travel.” As such, I carried a lot of my books with me in my bag. I found it easier to break my back than squander those precious ten minutes between classes. I wasn’t doing anything particularly important during those ten minutes. They were just MINE and I WANTED them.

Anyways, as a result of my decision to become a pack mule, I would sometimes, but not often, leave books I needed in my locker, and on this day I had forgotten to grab my first period book out. I didn’t think much of it when I got there. Ms. MacK (as we lovingly referred to her) had two spare books in the room. No biggie. Class starts and, sure enough, it’s a day where we’re using the book, as opposed to days where we were in groups planning for our next project or working on our essays. I raise my hand and state that I’ve forgotten mine in my locker. She states, “Go get it, that’ll be a lunch detention” (for those not in-the-know, lunch detentions are when you come in during lunch and, instead of eating and conversing with peers, you have to do menial chores around the teacher’s room like clapping erasers or wiping down desks).

I was instantly furious. I hadn’t recalled any previous instance where a student had been disciplined in her class for forgetting their book. I was normally so GOOD about bringing it, too! As the words escaped my mouth, I remember instantly regretting it. “WTF, MacKenzie?!” As I stood up to go out to my locker, I knew I was in it. Jokingly, I tried to cover it up by putting a Christian-like spin on it by saying, “Where’s the faith?!” I could tell when I got back, by the look on Ms. Mack’s face, that she did not buy my ruse. My lunch detention got upgraded to a two-hour afterschool detention. I was even more livid, but had nobody to blame but myself. After class, I apologized and let her know I meant no disrespect. She told me she understood, and then handed me the detention slip.

My god, that detention slip. I literally had to hold back the tears of laughter until I got downstairs and out of earshot. “Abbreviated cursing – WTF”. I was CRYING. This was EASILY the funniest thing I had ever read on a detention slip (and trust me, I had read PLENTY of things on detention slips). I show all my friends. Tears. Every single one of them. Not only did my friends find it funny, but that week, the teacher proctoring the detentions, Mr. M, came running up to me in absolute hysterics over it. He immediately demanded to know the story. I told him. Tears. This story and slip were comic GOLD to not only students, but now FACULTY. I knew what this would be: this would be my LEGACY. But how would I commemorate it for future generations to see and enjoy?

Enter the Senior Yearbook Pages. As Ms. Mack stated, my father was dying of cancer at the time (he later passed on during my second semester of college). I had as many pictures of him as I could get, along with pictures of me and my brother when we were kids. Problem was I didn’t have a lot. The bulk of my childhood was, photographically speaking, lost to Hurricane Andrew. I had to come up with ways to make it work and fill the space. And then it donned on me. The slip. I had previously scanned it and posted it on my website I had during high school to much acclaim from my readers. I printed it out and submitted it, smack dab in the middle of the page. Mr. L, the yearbook coordinator, who had heard about the incident months prior, had a similar reaction to everyone else: tears. It was meant to be. Two years later, when I would take part in an internship at my former high school, Mr. L even stated to me and Mr. M whilst in the Teacher’s Lounge, “Mike Papadopoulos? An English teacher? WTF?!” A good laugh was had by all over teacher’s lounge coffee. Fun fact: that stuff tastes HORRIBLE.

Postscript:

I had no idea that I was the laughingstock of the school (faculty included) until I asked Mike - a good 10 years later - to share “his side” of the story for the blog.  We had gotten in touch again via Facebook and had joked occasionally about the “WTF”incident, but I did not realize that my detention slip had (as Mike put it) “Viral” in days when this wasn’t even a term.   Ah well.  Live and learn. And laugh at yourself. 

Cheater, Cheater, Pumpkin Eater

I have been disrespected and cussed at. I have endured abbreviated cursing (a later post, I promise).  I have been mocked and teased. I have had to talk to condescending and rude parents and endured the condescension of co-workers.  I have been belittled, ignored, and outright disobeyed.   I even had a student walk out of class to talk to his “agent” on the phone, and then another walked out of class because he was upset about taking a test.   All things that usually get teachers upset, however, not me. Not really.

For me, there really, there is only ONE thing that burns me up as a teacher. REALLY gets me angry.  Makes me want to retire. To quit right here, right now. To give everyone an “F,”  or hold a “burn the papers in front of their eyes” party.

That one thing that REALLY gets me upset?                     

                                                          

                                                                 CHEATING

Nothing gets me angry like cheating.  An inexplicable feeling of rage, combined with intense disappointment in the student and despair over the whole of the future generations comes over me whenever I catch a student cheating. (And catch them I do. Thanks to handy inventions like turnitin.com, or a recent little start-up "google" ... or when students turn in the same paper. Or hide papers behind books, under other papers, inside notebooks. Or write on their hands. Or have answers on erasers that they erase as I pass by ... or have answers on phones....)

I hate cheating so much, I start to get angry just thinking about it - my face flushes red, my blood pressure rises, my heart starts racing. I can’t even talk; I lack the adequate words to express just how much I detest it.  (I can’t even describe my current emotional state just writing about cheating)

To me, cheaters are no different than drug dealers and other lowlifes. They are taking the “easy way” out. Trying to manipulate the system. Using others to advance themselves.

If I had my way, students who cheated would immediately fail the class. If I had my way, students who cheated would have to serve community service house - picking up trash, or painting buildings, or cleaning lavatories - show them their future occupations if they continue down the path of cheating ...   

Suffice to say, I NEVER cheated as a student. NEVER.   And, I never let others cheat off of me. (A fact which earned me the nickname of “school girl.”  My retort to the guy who started calling me that, was to call him “Manuel” because – I predicted – he’d be dong manual labor in his future if he kept cheating)

So, I don’t understand why a student would be compelled to cheat. I can't have any sympathy or empathy having never "been there" myself. It baffles my mind. I can only imagine reasons why a student would cheat: perhaps the pressure to be perfect … or not understanding the assignment … or having waited too long to get started on an assignment and then just taking the easy way out.  (Or maybe just sheer laziness. a lack of morality. a lack of character) 

Lame excuses in my book.  Not a good enough reason. There is never a "good enough" reason to cheat in my opinion.

Cheating is the one thing that WILL catch up to you one day.   It shows such a lack of moral character. I always tell my students that it’s not worth it – sacrificing your integrity, your character, your reputation for a grade. A measly grade that won’t matter in 10 years. A grade that no one will remember in several weeks. A grade that has really no lifelong impact or significance.  (Especially in my class where no one grade carries enough weight that a student will fail or not graduate due to not doing well on any one assignment.)

But your character – who you are, what you do when you think no one will notice – THAT will remain with you forever. What you do when you think no one will notice will matter in "real life" - when what seems so important in high school is just a memory.

What you do when you think no one will notice is what I remember about my students. And, trust me, I never forget who cheated. Never. If no one else remembers, I remember that kid who tried to get away with it.  I might forgive. We might be able to move past it, to have a friendly relationship – but I will remember that very telling fact about your character – what you willingly sacrificed in exchange for something that in the end, doesn't even matter. 

To quote Emerson, "Character is higher than intellect. A great soul will be strong to live as well as think."  I can only wish that more of my students knew and lived like this.

"The Students I Deal With" - A Guest Blog Post by an Alt. Ed Teacher

The students I deal with in our “Alternative Ed” school are just normal, everyday kids- they have hopes and fears and ambitions and likes and dislikes. On the surface they all kind of look the same, just like every other high school student. They tend to wear the same styles, talk the same slang (maybe have a bit more saltiness to their language. OK, maybe a lot more). But inside each one is unique, each one has a “story”. They won’t always tell that story, but each one has had a very unique life- just like all other high school kids.

                The one big difference is that they have been failures, for the most part, and the reasons for their failures are as varied as the kids themselves. They may have moved from school to school, dragged along by parents or guardians from state to state.  They may have been forced to miss lots of school days- to take care of an adult, or for a sibling- to work in the fields- to care for a parent- to care for their own child. They might be school failures because their home life was one of drugs and alcohol and they were caught in the middle. Maybe their parents are in prison in another state and they live here with grandparents or relatives, or in foster care.

                Maybe they come from great, loving, caring homes- and they themselves are to blame for turning to drugs.

                Maybe they have been allowed to play X-rated video games for 5 or 6 or 10 hours a day, and now, after several years of it their sense of reality is warped.

                Maybe they are caught up in the gang life.

                The list goes on and on. Sometimes it can be overwhelming, not to just them, but to the teachers who try and try to help them out of the darkness they are in.

                But some of them are great students! Many are ultra-creative: that right-brain, mentality that doesn’t quite mesh with “mainstream”.  Many get caught up and seem to go back into the big school and on with life very well.

                The story that grips me most is one like today’s. I could see it coming from afar- a cute little girl, hanging onto a guy last year- and he hanging all over her. This year, no guy around and the cute little girl is now hugely pregnant. The single mom parent speaks only Spanish. Who knows how they pay for the household expenses.  She starts Independent Study classes and excels! A smart kid! Then she doesn’t show up to Independent Study for a week. Then two weeks, then three. No phone calls, no contact. No one answers the home phone. Then, after three weeks the mom finally answers.  The baby came early, complications, all are in San Diego at Children’s Hospital. The smart, cute little girl now has a very complicated life, full of medical terms and doctors and big city trips on a bus and welfare forms and no support and no boyfriend and a very sick baby.  School is the last thing on her mind now.

                Some people tell me my job is a ministry. I think they are right.

True Confessions: My Most Embarrassing Moment Teaching

You might think it would be the time I inadvertently wrote a sexual reference on the board for all to read whilst explaining how various words are spelled (or not) phonetically. To make matters worse, I didn’t even realize what I had written until well after the class (being too involved in my instruction) ….  the fact that just about every boy in the room was snickering should have been my first clue.  17 year old hormonal boys have one thing on the frontal lobe of their brains - and it isn’t how to spell words correctly

Or maybe it was the time that a student made sexual innuendos the entire class period - innuendos that I didn’t realize or understand  (yes, I am THAT naïve). In fact, I had no idea what he was talking about or referring to until I got home and asked my husband why that student kept saying that word over and over in class… 

You could think that it was the day that the students kept referencing drugs and I had no clue. Literally. No clue. 

Maybe the time my top button of my button down shirt popped open for only God knows how long (and I was in the front of the class) before a female student whispering pointed it out to me?  Nope.

As cringe inducing as those moments in my teaching career are, they were NOT the most embarrassing.

The most embarrassing moment of my teaching career was the time I met The Man, The Myth, The Legend:  Alex Rodriguez.

Yes. A-Rod. THE Alex Rodriguez of the Yankees baseball club. Previously of the Texas Rangers. Previously of the Seattle Mariners.  The $250 million dollar man.   THAT A-Rod.

I met him.  Shook his hand. TWICE.

You see, I had been crushing on Alex Rodriguez since my early college days when he first burst onto the baseball scene.  Being only a year older than me, and the fact that I was (and still am) an avid sports fan, I paid attention to the single (“eligible”??) young, good looking, sports figures.   The $275 million helped  a bit... And the piercing blue eyes… The natural tan… The tall athletic build …

So I had drooled after this man, followed his career for YEARS. YEARS before I got hired to teach at his high school alma mater.  By this time I was a happily married woman. The fact that he was still single went largely unnoticed by me … I mean, I was happy he was dating a teacher (his priorities were in the right place, obviously).  

My first year teaching there, he dropped by the high school a few times to visit old teachers, but, much to my disappointment, I never saw him.   Of course, with a few key questions, the students had figured out my “celebrity crush,” which, naturally, they found highly entertaining.

So there I was, hugely pregnant with my first baby (at least, in my mind I was huge. Looking back, I couldn’t have been more than 5 or 6 months along in a pregnancy in which I hardly gained any weight) … So there I was … FEELING hugely pregnant ... greasy with excess oils in my already oily-prone skin from excess of hormones (thanks pregnancy), hot (again, thanks pregnancy hormones) and in the last period of an average school day, when a knock on the door interrupted the class.   Like a scene from my best dream and worst nightmare, Alex Rodriguez walked in, followed closely by the Superintendent of the school.

I blushed to a slight shade of deep purple. It was all the students could do to not break out into laughter.  To their credit, they held it in and acted as cool as 17 year olds who-know-their-teacher- is-freaking-out could.  A-Rod was there to pitch some basketball  tournament he was involved in at the school for his Foundation.  He was stopping in to various classes to encourage the students to come out and play.

He shook my hand, was friendly, extremely polite and pleasant.  And all I could focus on was the fact that #1. His clothes were mismatched (Canary Yellow pants and a Hot Pink shirt … I remember thinking: “Well I guess $275 million dollars doesn’t equal fashion sense”) and #2. He was a LOT taller and broader than I had ever imagined and #3. His eyes really WERE that shade of blue/green.

I felt faint. I was dizzy.  I started to sweat profusely. (I’m sure it was only the pregnancy hormones) I kept wondering, on a scale of 1-10 just how unprofessional would it be to ask if I could get a picture with him?  I probably would have asked for one, except for the fact that my Superintendent was still there, standing by the door, smiling at her prodigy.  (Because of which, I decided a photo op with my college –era crush just wasn’t worth my job … a decision I regret to this day)

All told, he was in my class for about 5 minutes. It felt like 5 hours. 

When the door shut as they left, the class literally ERUPTED in laughter that could have been heard on the moon.  I have no doubt A-Rod knew what the deal was.  Of course, I turned an even deeper shade of purple. I was beyond red.  I can only be thankful that this event occurred in the pre-Smart Phone Era as I am 100% sure my reaction would have ended up on Youtube.

I never saw him in person again. I’m told if I had gone to the basketball tournament I would have been able to see him, to take pictures, to possibly regain some of the dignity I had lost during his class visit.  But… I didn’t.  I didn’t have the nerve to face him again.   

A-Rod in the high school glory days

A-Rod today on the big stage in the Big Apple

"My Son Is A Genius" ... or ... "The Top 3 Craziest Things Parents Have Said To Me"

#1.  “My son is a genius”

“You don’t understand; my son is a genius” the mother lecturing me said. “No, really,” She continued, “He’s probably smarter than you. We had him tested in the 4^th grade. He tested at the genius level.”   Little Einstein had gotten caught cheating on a paper. And mom was angry, spitting fire, that he had gotten caught. By me:  a teacher who obviously wasn’t smart enough to recognize a Genius when he sat in the front row of my class!  She was determined to correct the error in my judgment – her Genius of a boy didn’t know he had to cite sources for the research paper because I had never told him to do so.  Of course! How could I have been so dumb to forget a key piece of information – kids, you can’t just buy/copy a paper off of the Internet and turn it in as your own.   Any genius knows that.  Or … maybe not.

Sadly, this was NOT the only instance I’ve seen of what I call the MCIAG or “My Child Is A Genius” Syndrome.

Many parents do not want to hear that their precious baby might not have the intellectual capabilities that they thought they did: “But she’s won AWARDS in writing” or “He’s ALWAYS gotten straight A’s in English” are insinuating accusations that the ONLY reason their child ISN’T doing well THIS time, in THIS class, is because of the you - the teacher.  Don’t you DARE be the expert and try to tell them that your child isn’t really ready for the rigor and challenge of the AP course you teach. What do you know? You’re only the teacher!! We’re dealing with GENIUS people!!!! And then … when the kid is struggling to make a “C” in the class … well, it must be the teacher’s fault.   The teacher must be doing something wrong – WHY??? Because ....“My Child Is A Genius”!!!!

#2.  “You are NOT going to ruin my son’s acceptance to Duke”

He didn’t realize that turning in the same exact paper as his friend was considered “cheating.” – Another doozy of an excuse a mother (why is it always mothers coming to the defense of their children?) gave me when her son and his best friend got caught turning in the same exact paper.  In the parent teacher conference, she said (quite condescendingly to me) “You are NOT going to ruin my son’s acceptance to Duke.”  This grade, which would have made the difference between a “B” and a “C” for the semester, was absolutely NOT going to be the deciding factor in his life. He absolutely WAS going to go to Duke to become a Doctor and there would be Hell to pay if a little cheating got in the way of that!! 

They didn’t know that it wasn’t a “group” assignment.  How dare I expect a high school senior to do his work, on his own, without being explicitly TOLD to do so?  How dare I assume that he has the intelligence to know that after 7 months of being required to his own assignments in my class, that he wouldn’t need a specific guideline as to how NOT to cheat on THIS particular one?  Again, my fault.

Now I didn’t go to Duke, or any Ivy League school right out of high school, and, some of my students probably did score higher than me on the SAT – but I was still smart enough to know that  you do your own work.  Period. 

#3.  “You changed So-And-So’s grade because the Coach came into your classroom and FLIRTED with you”

Yes. Yes. Yes people. These are all true stories.  This was an accusation an angry, angry, angry, ANNNNGRRRRY mother hurled at me in a phone call I answered in the middle of one of my class periods.  I had no idea how to respond to her (and to be honest, I wasn’t given much of a chance before she cursed at me and hung up the phone. I really don’t know that I said much other than “Hello” and “What?!”) Mind you, I was in the middle of teaching a class and had 30+ students listening to my side of the conversation.  I had NO IDEA what she was talking about THEN, and I have NO IDEA what she was talking about NOW!   She was upset (obviously) because she thought her precious child’s grade should have been changed to be higher one, and, in an earlier meeting, I had refused to do so. My principles are that I don’t “give” grades, students earn them.  He hadn’t earned a higher grade. I wasn’t going to give him something he hadn’t earned.

I CAN say that in my 13 years of teaching, I have NEVER had a coach ask me to change a student’s grade, with, or without, flirting. I have actually never had a coach ASK about a student’s grade other than questioning if the athlete turned in the assignment he needed to.  Behavior? Yes. Absolutely.  Coaches have asked how a student has been behaving, but not grades. I’m sure it happens in some schools, but not in mine, or at least, not to me.

It was a weird and strange accusation and to this day I am puzzled and bewildered by it; and flabbergasted that somewhere out there in the universe, someone honestly and truly probably believes this to be true. 

It goes without saying that NOT ALL my students’ parents are crazies.  I truly don’t think that I would have as great of students as I do if their parents were mentally unbalanced.  Obviously my students are a product of their home environment to a certain extent, and by and large, the parents that I’ve had have been supportive, encouraging, and pretty respectful of me as a person and the position of authority I hold, and their kids are the same.  

Students Are The Real Teachers ... Part 1

He was one of the kids I had been warned about: Rowdy. Wild.  Undisciplined.  Rumor had it he was the sole cause a previous teacher had quit.   If I was going to survive the year, I would need to be firm. In control.  The boss.   As a novice teacher, I was nervous.    Would I be able to handle the challenge? Did I really want this stress? What if I couldn’t control the class?

What I encountered the first day of school was a boy: Energetic. Eager. Excited for a fresh start.  He didn’t know what I had been told about him. I didn’t tell him.  New school year, New teacher = Clean Slate.

He was sweet, funny, playful, inventive.  He was wiggly, talkative, quick tempered, easily distracted.  He forgot homework that I had seen him working on in class. He lost important papers, notes that needed to go home. His desk was a disaster zone.  He would get frustrated with me and my rules, and with himself.

Sometimes when he was hyper, I would send him out to run a lap (or two) around the playground field, to work off his extra energy. Come in when you can concentrate.  Sometimes I invented excuses for him to leave the classroom for a few minutes, to walk to the office to drop off a “note” to the secretary, or to deliver papers to a teacher down the hall.  I kept a special folder on my desk so he wouldn’t lose his classwork between the classroom and home and his return to school the next day.  

I worried that my “help” was really going to hurt him in the long run.  I wasn’t teaching the “life lessons” he needed to learn.  I wasn’t forcing the personal responsibility he was going to need for school later on, or for a successful life … but for the first time, he was succeeding. His grades were improving.  Kids in the class volunteered to help him with classwork so he didn’t have to take it home.  They helped him clean his desk out, organizing it and re-organizing it when it got messy.   I worried I was teaching the other kids to enable. 

People commented on what a changed boy he had become.  His attitude was different, they said. He isn’t a terror, they marveled.  I wondered what they were talking about.  He was the same sweet kid he had been the first day of school.  Who was the monster they all described?

Report card time came.  He made the Honor Roll.  The whole class cheered as he went to receive his award.  They told me it was the first time in his life he had ever made Honor Roll.  I had no idea that this was his first time experiencing success.  His mom thanked me later, with tears in her eyes, for all that I had done to help.  It was and still is the most fulfilling moment of my entire teaching career. 

At the end of the year ceremony, I predicted a bright, successful future for this boy.  I hoped that he felt like someone, at some point in his life, believed in him.  I married, moved away, lost contact with the boy and others who knew him.  I have no idea where he is or who he has become. 

I often feel discouraged and frustrated with my job.  The expectations are so high and really unrealistic.  “Teachers Inspire” we are told – but we rarely hear or see the results of having been an “inspiration.”   I don’t know if I have made a difference in the lives of my students in the years since this boy. But I do know that for one boy, for one year, I helped.  He is the reason why I stayed a teacher.  He is the one I think about when I feel like giving up.  I don't know if, or who the next one will be, or when, or how, but I do know the clichéd saying is true: Teachers DO make a difference in someone’s life … sometimes.