It's a funny thing - to find yourself writing in oblivion and then being acknowledged as part of a larger...oblivion. In The Death of the Liberal Class, Chris Hedges asserts that, because there is no real voice for dissent in this country, intellectuals have receded into their own veritable caves, with their own Platonic ideals as comfort. For a long time, I have wondered if the world would eventually transform into a place in which people stayed inside and did nearly everything virtually. Apparently E.M. Forster had this vision in 1909, in a story called "The Machine Stops," which Hedges also cites.
(You can read it here: http://archive.ncsa.illinois.edu/prajlich/forster.html)
Most teachers I have met are already in this stage of existence. They come home exhausted from the battle with their students, administrators and parents. Most of the discussion is about language - since you cannot own your own words anymore, students, administrators and teachers are free to re-define the terms for the courses you teach at any time. What is English? Is it spelling? Shouldn't my son spell? Shouldn't we stop all discussion of reading comprehension until every student can spell? What about penmanship? What about the names of literary devices?
I'd defy anyone to bring these kinds of questions into an academically respected classroom. Ask a professor at Harvard if he or she marks off for spelling? Do the students have to count off the literary devices in Shakespeare or is their interpretation what matters? The need to categorize is something I've encountered in friends who felt out of sync - who felt on the margins. I understand that. Why do we have to teach our students to present themselves as if they, too, are on the outer rim of culture? We are not only creating two classes of students - the kind who are allowed to think "independently" at Harvard and those who must "address the task" - but we are setting up a world in which most of the former will find themselves instructing the latter to their incredible dismay.
First, I wonder why everyone insists so much that students who are loathe to read in the first place have to dissect texts dryly. Why not invite them to comprehend what they read, discuss what it means and inspires, and stop asking them to prove their rights to do so by calling something an image, a metaphor or a symbol. What matters is their ability to understand when something can resonate in many ways, and not the training of their reflexes in the art of slapping down a pen and writing in a label. What it does is limit their response to what they read and make them constantly in search of approval. It is exactly what Hedges describes: they put literary works "in their place" in the hierarchy of things, which places the reader at an even lower rank than what he/she reads. It leaves the intellectual/teacher the task of further slamming down the students and he/she becomes a kind of grand inquisitor of mechanics.
Second, I recognize that I have become the "Underground Man" which Hedges points to and I am to frightened, sometimes, to leave my lair. Like the figure in Dostoevsky's story, I am bilious.
All of this keeps our country in a kind of stasis that we couldn't possibly want for our children. Or, more selfishly, for ourselves. We are a society of lonely people.
Our separateness makes empathy harder to come by. In our caves, we re-invent ideas which wisdom could teach us to re-consider.
How do we face 2012 and not be afraid of each other - of listening to each other and sharing our ideas? How do we refuse to be bullied by a society which has made most people feel powerless because they don't have the money that those in power possess.
The lesson of Chanukah was that the few conquered the many. It was a few rebelling against an oppressor. It is easy enough to spend time rebelling, though not to win. But what do we build after?
28 December, 2011
25 December, 2011
Refugees from Santa
Last night, Christmas eve, at about 8:30 EST, a group of about 50 people ranging in ages of 35-50, huddled in a kind of "L" shape across from the row of restaurants at the heart of the East Village's Little India. Certainly they were not waiting to enter one of the many establishments which are decorated in gold and silver tinsel lit with all patterns of hanging lights, in colors ranging from pink and green to white and red 365 days of the year, not just on Christmas eve. The irony of the desire of these restaurants to try to induce the feeling of an extended Christmas party is poignant, too, on more than just this specific night. Even on this cold night, teenagers and young men dressed in black and white beckoned to passersby across the street to "Come in, have dinner, no waiting, Miss? Mister?" Across the street, the increasing curl of bodies held its faces in wraps, alternating between the support of the iron gate and the warm light of the street.
As I joined the end of the line, I interrupted a lively conversation between two couples, with a brusque and perfunctory, "Are they not letting people in?" An equally arch response came back at me, "They've JUST started, but it's very slow," Then, the shorter woman in the couple whisked a hair upward in the same motion with which she rolled her eyes, "Good timing." I tried to unleash my hokey, "Well, I do my best, ma'am," smile, but it was no use. The sarcasm had no place in the group I eagerly joined tonight. For, it seemed, practically every New York Jew I could have gone to Hebrew school with (was not only on this line, but would file in all evening) to the exuberant, "Nittle Nacht" celebration at Sixth Street Community Synagogue, packing the place with a few hundred people. As the crowd grew, the age range extended broadly to include those who would have gone to Hebrew school with my parents, grandparents and my grandchildren.
Of course, the reason the doors were just opening had to do with the end of the Sabbath - there hadn't been that much time between sundown and show time to get over to the building and set-up. Nevertheless, they should have known that the audience would be eager to come inside - the evening promised to be a novel take on the yearly escape from Christmas eve made by Jews worldwide. Traditionally, this ritual involves things like Chinese food (some of it Kosher, some, well...), movies, cheesecake and card playing. This isn't to say that we don't like Christmas. Pop culture is replete with Jews hosting Christmas specials, producing albums of sacred and fun holiday music - with the most famous, glaring, and ironic example being "White Christmas," written by our own Irving Berlin The holiday begs the "Jackie Mason"-like remark: "If it weren't for Jews, there would BE no Christmas."
The star performer at the Sixth Street Celebration, John Zorn, has also produced a Christmas album. On this night, Zorn and a group opf talented Klezmer musicians did a rip-roaring rendition of "Winter Wonderland," that had the audience snapping it's fingers. If there had been room in the aisles for swing dancing, I'm sure that some people would have leapt to the dance floor, and everyone else would've been envious of their courage. The music throughout the evening was a fantasia on the traditional "Jewish Jazz" sometimes switching from electric guitar to one stringed lutes, but always keeping a wild, euphoric beat. Only a crowd of over-educated, hyper-self-conscious, post-modern, and self-referential New Yorkers would JUST SIT THERE, bouncing their heads to it and not actually dancing - there was sufficient room in the aisles for some kind of rhythmic movement. I've never felt more comfortable in my whole life.
The desire to dance, to sing, and to be a part of our own wild traditions was what drove both those who stood outside and those who waited for the precise moment when they thought the streets would be quiet to make the pilgrimage. It wasn't for lack of things to do downtown. The streets were not as crowded as they usuallly would be on a Saturday night, but they were filled with rich eavesdropping experiences. At St. Mark's Bookshop, where, I'm afraid, I was NOT the first person to think of this as the perfect night to buy a book by the late Christopher Hitchens (sold out), as I tried to decide whether I needed left wing exhortation or Mallarme, the tapping of a pen against a cell phone diverted my attention, "No, Alexander, no. Bubba (Yiddish for grandfather) cannot turn the car around now! If you were well enough to go this morning, you are not suddenly SO SICK now. You are meeting him in front of the opera and I don't care ....We've had this planned FOR WEEKS. You made a commitment. Alex, I'm being reasonable with you....Just, NO...Yes, I'm sure." There were about five of us in tears as the woman tousled her vines of red ringlets away from her face and pretended that she was not, in fact, in a store full of Jewish people who had a pretty good picture of Alexander, Bubba and all of the conversations that her family has had for the last two generation, perhaps more.
The "Nittle Nacht" celebration provided a place for all of us to confront and rejoice in our heritage in mor than just the fact that we were surrounded by people whom we all vaguely recognized. (There were a fair number of possible members of the Goyishe persuasion in the audience, by the way, though I cannot be sure) Rabbi Greg, a gifted saxophonist who leads his own, Ayn Soph orchestra (which sadly came on at midnight when half the audience had already left for the long subway ride and the LIRR) encourages musical exploration that is as intense as prayer. The highlight of the evening was John Zorn whose music unleashed the celebratory Hasid in all of us - the whirling dervish dancing to the delight of god. But, all of the performers were incredible and ambitious - one band interpreting Shlomo Carlbach through the lens of Fela. At intermission, there was a staged reading by 24/6, a theater company in residence at the synagogue. The play was a kind of SNL skit with the aim of teaching the audience the meaning of "Nittle Nacht" - the Jewish reaction to Christmas eve. For centuries and even now (I learned about this in Hebrew elementary school) Jews have made a habit of not engaging in any religious study on Christmas eve so as not to seem to be advocating in any spiritual way on Jesus' behalf. "Santa wasn't such a popular character until Coca Cola revived him! Christmas eve has meant pogroms for us. We have to honor these memories." When the husband claims never to have heard of this tradition before, despite being observant his entire life, the wife exclaims, "You're a Litvak, what would you know about it!" "Oh, some local Rebbe said it," counters the husband. With that debate, the couple shook much of the audience back to a corner of a room in their childhood home infused with the traditions and gossips of their forefathers and in which the rivalries between Jews of different sectors of Europe felt as palpable as those between Yankees and Red Sox. Any minute, I could see my grandmother mugging the high mannered ways associated with the academicians of Lithuania. Although my grandmother's town was one of the early centers of Reformed Judaism, she retained her regional respect for the Shtetl synagogues of Poland and the words ot the reigning local Rabbis.
After intermission, there was more Klezmer, though the crowd began to thin, worrying about transportation on Christmas eve/early morning. Those who waited were treated to two really good numbers by Ayn Sof which performed starting around midnight. Even later, there was a mix of music and spoken word which, perhaps because of the thinning crowd, was especially acerbic. At past midnight, it wasn't necessarily fair to ask an audience to enter into debate about which escape from the floods of Santa-colored windows and packaging was THE SMARTEST choice for the evening's refugees. I was feeling good - shaken by the music into a wish to talk, but not to debate with other Jews about how I should have spent my evening. It was a naive urge, certainly, but one I needed to follow out of the synagogue.
When I left the synagogue, I felt a strange desire to tell everyone about my evening. Since it was well-past midnight, and I really should have left with the crew taking the train back to affordable housing, I grabbed a cab. Unsurprisingly, but to my delight, my driver was a devout Muslim. "Obviously neither of us is celebrating Christmas,," I announced smuggly, as if I could just high-five my long-lost cousin and declare peace in the Middle East. I went into my well-rehearsed monologue about the irony of killing a tree and putting it in your house in honor of the birth of a savior. But, while he chuckled, my driver was much more solemn. "Jesus was killed because he wanted to teach people the right way, and the Romans wouldn't allow him to do it. Just like Moses and Muhammad. Human Rights have never been respected in this world." His comment brought me back to Egypt - 2011 and all the issues throughout Israel, the West Bank and Middle East. And everywhere. While I had huddled with a happy audience to escape the Yule logs and kids everywhere tracked Santa on Google, it seems obvious, but it doesn't go without saying that most of the world is not that lucky. Perhaps next year, or even sooner, we should be doing concerts and tracking the development of freedoms while listening to each others' music. The wait has been far too long.
As I joined the end of the line, I interrupted a lively conversation between two couples, with a brusque and perfunctory, "Are they not letting people in?" An equally arch response came back at me, "They've JUST started, but it's very slow," Then, the shorter woman in the couple whisked a hair upward in the same motion with which she rolled her eyes, "Good timing." I tried to unleash my hokey, "Well, I do my best, ma'am," smile, but it was no use. The sarcasm had no place in the group I eagerly joined tonight. For, it seemed, practically every New York Jew I could have gone to Hebrew school with (was not only on this line, but would file in all evening) to the exuberant, "Nittle Nacht" celebration at Sixth Street Community Synagogue, packing the place with a few hundred people. As the crowd grew, the age range extended broadly to include those who would have gone to Hebrew school with my parents, grandparents and my grandchildren.
Of course, the reason the doors were just opening had to do with the end of the Sabbath - there hadn't been that much time between sundown and show time to get over to the building and set-up. Nevertheless, they should have known that the audience would be eager to come inside - the evening promised to be a novel take on the yearly escape from Christmas eve made by Jews worldwide. Traditionally, this ritual involves things like Chinese food (some of it Kosher, some, well...), movies, cheesecake and card playing. This isn't to say that we don't like Christmas. Pop culture is replete with Jews hosting Christmas specials, producing albums of sacred and fun holiday music - with the most famous, glaring, and ironic example being "White Christmas," written by our own Irving Berlin The holiday begs the "Jackie Mason"-like remark: "If it weren't for Jews, there would BE no Christmas."
The star performer at the Sixth Street Celebration, John Zorn, has also produced a Christmas album. On this night, Zorn and a group opf talented Klezmer musicians did a rip-roaring rendition of "Winter Wonderland," that had the audience snapping it's fingers. If there had been room in the aisles for swing dancing, I'm sure that some people would have leapt to the dance floor, and everyone else would've been envious of their courage. The music throughout the evening was a fantasia on the traditional "Jewish Jazz" sometimes switching from electric guitar to one stringed lutes, but always keeping a wild, euphoric beat. Only a crowd of over-educated, hyper-self-conscious, post-modern, and self-referential New Yorkers would JUST SIT THERE, bouncing their heads to it and not actually dancing - there was sufficient room in the aisles for some kind of rhythmic movement. I've never felt more comfortable in my whole life.
The desire to dance, to sing, and to be a part of our own wild traditions was what drove both those who stood outside and those who waited for the precise moment when they thought the streets would be quiet to make the pilgrimage. It wasn't for lack of things to do downtown. The streets were not as crowded as they usuallly would be on a Saturday night, but they were filled with rich eavesdropping experiences. At St. Mark's Bookshop, where, I'm afraid, I was NOT the first person to think of this as the perfect night to buy a book by the late Christopher Hitchens (sold out), as I tried to decide whether I needed left wing exhortation or Mallarme, the tapping of a pen against a cell phone diverted my attention, "No, Alexander, no. Bubba (Yiddish for grandfather) cannot turn the car around now! If you were well enough to go this morning, you are not suddenly SO SICK now. You are meeting him in front of the opera and I don't care ....We've had this planned FOR WEEKS. You made a commitment. Alex, I'm being reasonable with you....Just, NO...Yes, I'm sure." There were about five of us in tears as the woman tousled her vines of red ringlets away from her face and pretended that she was not, in fact, in a store full of Jewish people who had a pretty good picture of Alexander, Bubba and all of the conversations that her family has had for the last two generation, perhaps more.
The "Nittle Nacht" celebration provided a place for all of us to confront and rejoice in our heritage in mor than just the fact that we were surrounded by people whom we all vaguely recognized. (There were a fair number of possible members of the Goyishe persuasion in the audience, by the way, though I cannot be sure) Rabbi Greg, a gifted saxophonist who leads his own, Ayn Soph orchestra (which sadly came on at midnight when half the audience had already left for the long subway ride and the LIRR) encourages musical exploration that is as intense as prayer. The highlight of the evening was John Zorn whose music unleashed the celebratory Hasid in all of us - the whirling dervish dancing to the delight of god. But, all of the performers were incredible and ambitious - one band interpreting Shlomo Carlbach through the lens of Fela. At intermission, there was a staged reading by 24/6, a theater company in residence at the synagogue. The play was a kind of SNL skit with the aim of teaching the audience the meaning of "Nittle Nacht" - the Jewish reaction to Christmas eve. For centuries and even now (I learned about this in Hebrew elementary school) Jews have made a habit of not engaging in any religious study on Christmas eve so as not to seem to be advocating in any spiritual way on Jesus' behalf. "Santa wasn't such a popular character until Coca Cola revived him! Christmas eve has meant pogroms for us. We have to honor these memories." When the husband claims never to have heard of this tradition before, despite being observant his entire life, the wife exclaims, "You're a Litvak, what would you know about it!" "Oh, some local Rebbe said it," counters the husband. With that debate, the couple shook much of the audience back to a corner of a room in their childhood home infused with the traditions and gossips of their forefathers and in which the rivalries between Jews of different sectors of Europe felt as palpable as those between Yankees and Red Sox. Any minute, I could see my grandmother mugging the high mannered ways associated with the academicians of Lithuania. Although my grandmother's town was one of the early centers of Reformed Judaism, she retained her regional respect for the Shtetl synagogues of Poland and the words ot the reigning local Rabbis.
After intermission, there was more Klezmer, though the crowd began to thin, worrying about transportation on Christmas eve/early morning. Those who waited were treated to two really good numbers by Ayn Sof which performed starting around midnight. Even later, there was a mix of music and spoken word which, perhaps because of the thinning crowd, was especially acerbic. At past midnight, it wasn't necessarily fair to ask an audience to enter into debate about which escape from the floods of Santa-colored windows and packaging was THE SMARTEST choice for the evening's refugees. I was feeling good - shaken by the music into a wish to talk, but not to debate with other Jews about how I should have spent my evening. It was a naive urge, certainly, but one I needed to follow out of the synagogue.
When I left the synagogue, I felt a strange desire to tell everyone about my evening. Since it was well-past midnight, and I really should have left with the crew taking the train back to affordable housing, I grabbed a cab. Unsurprisingly, but to my delight, my driver was a devout Muslim. "Obviously neither of us is celebrating Christmas,," I announced smuggly, as if I could just high-five my long-lost cousin and declare peace in the Middle East. I went into my well-rehearsed monologue about the irony of killing a tree and putting it in your house in honor of the birth of a savior. But, while he chuckled, my driver was much more solemn. "Jesus was killed because he wanted to teach people the right way, and the Romans wouldn't allow him to do it. Just like Moses and Muhammad. Human Rights have never been respected in this world." His comment brought me back to Egypt - 2011 and all the issues throughout Israel, the West Bank and Middle East. And everywhere. While I had huddled with a happy audience to escape the Yule logs and kids everywhere tracked Santa on Google, it seems obvious, but it doesn't go without saying that most of the world is not that lucky. Perhaps next year, or even sooner, we should be doing concerts and tracking the development of freedoms while listening to each others' music. The wait has been far too long.
24 December, 2011
16 December, 2011
30 November, 2011
Bernie turns FIVE on December 1
And I couldn't be prouder of him. He has proven to be one of the most loving, caring, sensitive, playful, adorable, handsome, kind and warm creatures on the planet. As you can see, Larry feels the same way. They are often found cuddled around each other, sometimes with Larry all scrunched up against Bernie or Bernie stretched out along Larry. Or like they are now, taking in how lucky they are to be together. This past year, Bernie has become as protective of Larry as his big brother is of him, and as you can see in this picture, he will sometimes shield him with his brawny, beautiful self.
22 November, 2011
Happy Birthday, Karen Beth Hunter, wherever you are!
Karen loved birthday parties in the true childhood sense. She also often said she felt like Gumby, both for his innocence and for the feeling of being stretched and stretchable. So, I've posted the Gumby video "Balloonacy" in her honor, below. Her birthday is tomorrow. She would be 60.
I'll try to be silly, tomorrow.
I'll try to be silly, tomorrow.
05 November, 2011
Goodbye, Mr. Geller
I didn't have you as a teacher. I remember how many of my fellow students liked you, and pronounced your name with awe.
Here's a link to an article about Richard Geller, who taught Math at Stuyvesant for 29 years. 29 is a prime number, as he points out.
http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2011/11/02/stuyvesant-students-mourn-a-math-teacher-who-was-no-1/
Here's a link to an article about Richard Geller, who taught Math at Stuyvesant for 29 years. 29 is a prime number, as he points out.
http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2011/11/02/stuyvesant-students-mourn-a-math-teacher-who-was-no-1/
01 September, 2011
The Sixth Anniversary of Losing Karen B. Hunter
Every Sept 2, I have little truthfully to bring to the day but regret. I have good memories, certainly. All "they can't take away." But my life hasn't grown, except in the ways it always does -- the relationships with my cats. This year I have some stronger human friendships, some strong internet friendships and some new live friendships. I have wizened a bit to the ways of friends she had long ago wanted me to cut off from. I'm finally talking with her daughter which means a lot to me, though I don't know how long she will want to speak with me as, the more I remember, the more mistakes I remember making, some of them critical. I remember Karen going to a fortune teller who predicted her being in danger at night and then her calling me and telling me she was coming home at night and my not saying anything the night she died. But I took no stock in fortune tellers -- I was as smugly Western then as one could be. I'm not sure I had even remembered the fortune teller that night. But Karen did, I'm certain. She took tremendous interest in what they told her. Why this took me so long to put together, I don't know. I remembered having premonitions about night and not wanting her to fly at night. I remember not being able to tell her because I didn't want to second guess her in any way. But, her telling me and telling me angrily -- was she angry because I made her check in with me or angry because she was looking for the right response. I have always felt responsible.
I always come to this day with more and more regret, uncertainty and maybe some personal growth. I'm grateful for those who trust in me, especially those who are new and those who have come back after long absences. Those who are tireless in their fur. Those who want to understand even when they can't. I can't say it is only losing Karen that has made it so hard. Not having her to face the changes in the DOE is also hard. The changes themselves have torn at me. It's not a question of how to teach, but just how to let oneself teach without being consumed with worry about the future.
What I want is a time machine. Take me back to 2004. Summer. August. Whisper in my ear the phrase "build a life with her."
I'd be ever so grateful.
I always come to this day with more and more regret, uncertainty and maybe some personal growth. I'm grateful for those who trust in me, especially those who are new and those who have come back after long absences. Those who are tireless in their fur. Those who want to understand even when they can't. I can't say it is only losing Karen that has made it so hard. Not having her to face the changes in the DOE is also hard. The changes themselves have torn at me. It's not a question of how to teach, but just how to let oneself teach without being consumed with worry about the future.
What I want is a time machine. Take me back to 2004. Summer. August. Whisper in my ear the phrase "build a life with her."
I'd be ever so grateful.
05 August, 2011
THE PLOT TO KILL SUSAN BOYLE
THE PLOT TO KILL SUSAN BOYLE!
I didn't see her Cinderella-like debut the night it happened, but learned about it during a peremptory class trip given to select members of the senior class at one of those large, historic high schools which was subsequently closed in Brooklyn, New York. About 30 members of that school's last graduating class had been volunteered the day before, to teach lessons they had never seen to kindergarten and first-grade children a few blocks away. In six inch heels and oxfords with sharp, pointy toes, our kids arrived somewhere between 8 and 8:30am for this unpaid teaching assignment, chatty, hungry and with no training for what they were about to do. Among the many reasons given for the closing of the school was its poor four year graduation rate, attendance and high rate of lateness. I can't say that even those who met the appointed time limit always hit all the other benchmarks, but you could often find high levels of intellectual and emotional accomplishment on both sides of the finish line. The kids that day were working very hard to do whatever it was they were supposed to be doing at around the time they were supposed to be there – not that I knew what either was, and I had everything but a doctorate.
A colleague who had done this for years, was in a suit and tie. All I had been told was that I was going on a trip, so I wore the generic black pants, white shirt, and black sweater purchased from some store which could pass for Old Navy. In a crisp, mandarin jacket which hung beneath her waist, was the woman from “QuestCon”, carrying about 30 lean plastic folders. “Shandeliquia?” “Um...she's not here yet,” said my colleague, as he gave her petite figure so inordinately thorough a review it made me blush. To lighten the mood, he started a conversation with me. “What do you think of Susan Boyle?” I pulled my body from head to toe as if I were Gumby, to seem as tall, thin and geeky as possible. Sure, I am actually under five feet tall and dumpy. I aimed to camouflage my body shape and turn my impish face upward in an effort to make the teacher and the accompanying vixen feel old. If you broke me open and counted the rings, I had fifteen less than " have- aviator glasses- will -think- he's -ageless" and ten less than" Ms. Where-Are-My-Unpaid-Slaves-Don't-They-Want-To-Be-Republicans?" It seems that yesterday she had cornered my colleague and made him, literally, grab every nice kid he knew and make them agree to a specific grade they would teach today. On their way to Music or lunch or the bathroom. By some miracle they all arrived and they brought friends who could help. I'm sure they sensed that my colleague was in trouble and that maybe the wench in the bad suit had a gun.
“I don't know who Susan Boyle is.”
“She's this woman in her 40's who went on Britain's got talent and might win. She's all over YouTube. She's got great courage. I really like her.”
“Is she really beautiful?” “No, she looks like—she could be any woman off the street. She's even kind of heavy. But, she's got a lot of spunk. She's funny. I think she's great.” He talks her up to the kids. “Oh yeah, the fat British chick with the amazing voice. I'm rooting for her.” It's a pathetic gesture, but I buy in.
We take the bus and get off way too early. The school we've been assigned to was the site of the murder of a little girl last year by a fellow kindergarten student. The principal spoke to us in the hall and now I remember the recordings played on the news. “She's turning blue.”
One of my students practices his list of rules on me. They sound fair. If they don't work, his partner, who still barely speaks English, will make lots of funny faces. Also sounds good. They haven't read the lesson yet. We weren't on the bus more than three minutes. I promise to come in and watch, and I do, almost immediately. So does my colleague. It's a relief to see the faculty is pretty casual and their parental instincts come out for our big kids, as well, but it isn't necessary. Within two minutes, it's clear. Our kids walk in, they are MOVIE STARS. Bona-fide real teenagers just like on TV and not related to me. And CUTE! Ten minutes in, and I see what used to be a class clown having the “perhaps when you are grown, you will understand speech” with a teary girl whose hand he is holding. The other girls look on. They are working very hard to suppress the “AHHH!” Our celebrities pull stories they see on the bookshelves which they recognize as good and start reading them. Or they make them up with the class. A lot of the kids talk about what happened last year while they do this.
Some of our teenagers have a real gift for this and emerge with their classes for lunch as...CHOO CHOO TRAINS.
The entire First-Grade was lead out by one student who was the front engine. If you broke the train, you had to go back. Each class was linked by another student. We bought our budding “Little Engines that Could” Chinese food. School lunch would've been a very cruel response to their ingenuity. They ate vigorously while their charges continued to eat the plastic food look-a-likes at tables nearby.
“YOU DIDN'T USE THE LESSONS.”
“Well, no.” “They already know what a penny is, Miss. And they have better books here. Plus, they're still not over the shooting. DID YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT? God, I'm still crying.”
“This is a complete failure.”
Frank O'Hara once wrote that children know they want their backs broken. I think teenagers know they don't. The default position for less than literate men who feel defensive and teenagers who feel they are being told how to live before they know what life is, is “chair back, foot against another chair, etc.” We had thirty kids in that position instantly.
I looked at the colleague who was my senior and said, “Oh, Mr. Rogers?”
“Yes. Miss, the children our students have worked very hard with today are happier than they were when they came in. Look at them. They're not fighting. They're in their seats. They are smiling and laughing. They came to the cafeteria as a choo-choo train. They all read or created stories which are very good literacy activities. Ask their teachers if they felt this was a meaningful day.”
“I will do just that.” With a barely visible swing of her woolen suit, she moved forward. “What does her face look like?” “You know,” answered a student named Paul, “that's a good question.”
“If they hadn't been so happy, we wouldn't be deafened by the clicks of her cheap plastic shoes,” I couldn't help noting.
When we came back from lunch, I sat in the rectangular, windowless lounge, lulled by the flyswatter-sound of the soda machine. With her jacket slung over her shoulder, our corporate sponsor shifted quietly in. The words came out quickly and she faced the floor. “I'm sorry. The principal is very happy with what your kids are doing. I was totally and utterly misguided.” My hand lifted some cold water from around my can of soda, applying to my face, while pushing my second can toward her. “Please, I have two. You'll dehydrate.” “Thanks.” She looked genuinely surprised. “I heard you talking about Susan Boyle. Isn't she amazing?” “Actually, I'm going to have to go home and watch her on YouTube. I missed it. I dean and teach. When I get home, sometimes I hit the floor like lead, right after I feed the cats.” “Well, there you go,” she said, and she eyed me like a salesgirl who thought she had found just the right shade of blush without knowing that I don't ever wear it. “Oh?” “She loves cats!” “She has a cat she loves so much and she lives with her mom and works in a bakery. That's been her whole life till now. That and her singing lessons. She's 48 years old.” “Jesus, what drudgery.” “She cares about her mom – and you, yourself said you love cats.” “The cats are great. But the bakery and going home to your mother when you are in your 40's. People must make so much fun of her. She must have a thick skin.” “Or, I hope so.”
Two years later and the school has come and gone, three small schools sitting in place of one, occupying the same building, only now it is called a campus. I ask myself, what if someone had done a news report on the work of our students that day, would it have saved the school? Or would it have won temporary, relatively useless recognition for the students involved, perhaps small checks toward books in their first year of college. Of course, a good deed is supposed to be it's own reward, but so is academic study -- ideally, you aren't supposed to be weighted by how quickly you learn but by the fact that you keep trying. I think of those students as part of the same mystery of Susan Boyle's career in this same period.
I've now seen the Youtube video of that very first night and heard the Henry Mancini level productions that Simon Cowell put together of Susan Boyle. The first night is better than Frank Capra, especially because the technicians have clearly directed the show – they had to know she was going to win everyone over. You know they love her. The bells ringing like a boxing match is coming up. She's all adrenaline. The shift of the hips at Simon – “Take a ride on these hips, fella,” she seems to say. How could anyone have ever thought she was slow? Just very nervous and not from a major city. Or, so it seems. Admittedly, I don't watch these talent shows on a regular basis because they make me bilious. There seems something unfair to the millions of singers who braved piano bars a few towns over, found whatever kindred spirits were available, found their ways to a train, plane, bus, to audition after audition and then either luck or a family and some scrawny offspring named Baby June/Biff. Then again, we wouldn't have many talented artists without some of these shows, and talk shows are a kind of venue for new comic talent that aren't really available for other fields. I've “bought in” again to the story, though part of me wonder what of it, is a fix, the way people wonder about Babe Ruth's home runs.
Accusations appear and re-appear, especially when acts are put on television like man ubiquitously referred to in the tabloids as “the anti-Susan Boyle” - a man so deluded that he was disappointed to find out that the woman to whom he had dedicated his song about suicide was actually alive and well. He was, however, certain, he was set-up for as the butt of a joke and I'm sure he's right, that he knew that beforehand and that he couldn't have been happier – all the more reason to have had him sent to a hospital and not a green room. You can tell those two, adorable and fairly experienced sound technicians know Susan is going to do well that night and they'd have to be deaf and the world supremely unjust to be wrong. Does she know? And is she so overwhelmed at the end because she didn't believe the world would be just or because she didn't believe the world would have a moment when it wouldn't? What also struck me is all the times that the judges said that the audience was against Boyle from the beginning. THEY weren't against Boyle from the beginning. Amanda seemed charmed, Piers seems to know that this woman has something. Only Simon thinks she might be a nut job. The audience sits back when she talks. She's not talking B.S, she's not ragtag, and she's picked a good song. It feels as if she's already gotten good word of mouth from somewhere. This, “everyone was against you” bit seems phoney. Is it because the judges feel cognitive dissonance, or are they covering for a set-up that maybe even SHE doesn't know about?
Every time there's an interview, I buy it. I'm not looking for the deeper side of Susan Boyle. If anything, I'm quite content to accept that she might not be urbane, but I believe she's funny and been through enough to make her credible. Perhaps she may have been discouraged from thinking too much beyond what you need to do to get by because nothing in her life would have improved by doing otherwise. The “Susan Boyle Story” J find on Youtube is a whole seven minutes long. Why isn't there a film? She was was such a big story. Such a big discovery. Is she inflexible? Does no one in her village understand her? Has she opened up to no one. I can't imagine there was an individual in her life who would have understood if she had. One of the hard things about having an extraordinary dream is you often can't explain it to the people sitting next to you. You have to go far away to get recognition in order to be accepted at home.
Carole Cadwalladr, who wrote one of the few articles critical of the way Boyle's career has been handled, interviewed neighbors who testified that, "They used to taunt her and call her names and throw eggs at her door. And now they cheer her and ask for her autograph.” Noting that Boyle was Sony's best-selling artist in 2010, she concludes, “Susan Boyle has transformed her life and she's made a lot of money in the process, well in excess of the £4m in royalties she received with great fanfare from Simon Cowell last year on her birthday.” Those who taunt her and now seek out her valuable signature, also try to calculate her portfolio. Cadwalladr even found a priest in Boyle's hometown weighing in. “Father Ryszard Holuka, the local priest (Susan is a devout Catholic), does a quick bit of mental arithmetic when I tell him she's Sony's biggest-selling artist. "What do you think she gets? A penny a record?" He thinks for a moment. "That's a lot of pennies."
When I go back to that very first audition, I'm overwhelmed again. The face was actually, for all the awkwardness of the gangly haircut, vital and sensual. An audience of fashionably dressed people were lifted to their feet and their wasn't the least bit of rancor or pity in the ovation. When she walked immediately off the stage, I didn't think it was because Boyle was afraid. I thought it was because she had performed. Her audience had applauded and the natural thing to do was to walk off (come back for the “Brava!”) The three judges were now an intrusion. She'd never say it and she didn't think it, but she felt it. When Cadwalladr approached Boyle for her article, Boyle sounds as if she was much more frightened than she was on that stage. "I can't say anything without their [Syco's] permission. So sorry. Goodbye now. Goodbye.” A close friend, also afraid to be identified, confided that Boyle is afraid that Sony might drop her. That very thing happened to just a few weeks before SYCO signed Boyle to then 18 year old Leon Jackson over issues of things he said to reporters. Reflecting later, Jackson said he would always be, “grateful to The X Factor, but for an 18-year-old who'd never lived away from home it was a brutal introduction to the music industry. 'I had no control over anything,' he says. 'But especially not the music.' I can't believe that this is what Susan Boyle wanted, but Cadwalladr disagrees, adding the viewpoint of Boyle's sister
It is the dream, though. It's what the world wanted for Susan Boyle and what she wanted for herself. We wanted her to triumph against the world and she wanted to be a singer, more than anything. "And she's proved herself to everybody," says her sister, Mary. "She always said, 'Just you wait. I'll show you!' You can see it on her face in the film. I know that face so well. It's, 'Just you wait!'
There's no question that Boyle showed the world what she could do. What she didn't get to do was show them more than once. Nor did she get to be herself more than once. Like my students, who left that afternoon, tired, and won no recognition for what they did, nor did they help to erase the perception which people have of young people who can't be exactly on time every day or who might not graduate in the time frame you hope them they do. I don't know what I would do with a child who had watched a friend bleed to death, but my students did. I have a slight feeling Susan Boyle might. Most likely, my colleagues and I would do best to buy everybody lunch and to help the world to better understand why they are reaching the world stage a tad overage.
What disappoints me most though, are the Oprah interviews. Of all the people in the world, I expected Oprah to accept someone who might have limitations in one way and a wide birth of understanding in another. Or who might just be able to tell about a hard life, and sing of it. Simple poetry. She comes on like a child who has been coached not to say certain things. Oprah doesn't talk to her for more than five minutes. She sings for maybe ten and it's over. She could have gone with her to her village Gone to the Bakery. Met her mother. Sat with her and the cat. Made a whole show about it. Encouraged someone to make a short film. How many women sit alone in small towns, with beautiful voices, learning difficult music about history, but living the most simple, hardened lives. What does her mother really say to her at home? If there's rancor, what is it? If she's depressed, what's behind it? Why not let her sing something sad --- Introduce her to music she doesn't know? Maybe the truth is, she decided she doesn't want to make albums and that's what they're afraid she'll say. They're afraid she'll say, the real business of music didn't seem like music, that the technicians who appreciated her were the last people she felt comfortable talking with. Or worse, that she couldn't believe that is was SO HARD for people to imagine on that day that it was so unlikely that her voice would be so beautiful. That like kids who show up late and come from a closing school can understand how to calm down children from a few blocks away who have lost a friend, a woman who has a dream can sing beautifully about it at any age. When my students left the school building that day, they were worn through. They had given everything, and like Boyle the only immediately appropriate response to their astonishing debut was the applause of their audience (received). Just like Boyle, however, my students were UNPAID for producing a spectacular moment for an organization which was paid handsomely, this time by the Dept. of Education. My students, I think, were already jaded enough not to expect recognition, and as they continue their studies at Cornell, Oswego, Hunter and some struggle to stay in school, they probably wonder if those little kids are all right. Not enough people wonder about them, I think -- had there been, at least, one news story, perhaps, there might have been a "Where are they now?" segment somewhere, if nothing else, to check up on that promising trackstar, Pre-Law student at Cornell (in China as we speak at an economic conference). The air was full of gasoline and the tartness of flat paint glaring in your eyes and they walked into it with the memory of that day, and they have only that. What about Susan Boyle? So, now she has viewed things from the mountain-top and the robber-barons have used her for their own quests and cons they should help her to discover herown real dreams that aren't lacquered up like the four walls of a coffin to make those who were uncomfortable with her appearance on stage feel better about themselves. I was moved by her voice and her ability to connect immediately with an audience. Everything afterward is just promotion of charity work. It's like hype for a funeral. This time, nobody is turning blue, but somebody is definitely disappearing.
Works Cited
1. , Sunday, May 30, 2010Cadwalladr, Carole, “What Happened to the Dream,” The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/may/30/susan-boyle-the-dream
I didn't see her Cinderella-like debut the night it happened, but learned about it during a peremptory class trip given to select members of the senior class at one of those large, historic high schools which was subsequently closed in Brooklyn, New York. About 30 members of that school's last graduating class had been volunteered the day before, to teach lessons they had never seen to kindergarten and first-grade children a few blocks away. In six inch heels and oxfords with sharp, pointy toes, our kids arrived somewhere between 8 and 8:30am for this unpaid teaching assignment, chatty, hungry and with no training for what they were about to do. Among the many reasons given for the closing of the school was its poor four year graduation rate, attendance and high rate of lateness. I can't say that even those who met the appointed time limit always hit all the other benchmarks, but you could often find high levels of intellectual and emotional accomplishment on both sides of the finish line. The kids that day were working very hard to do whatever it was they were supposed to be doing at around the time they were supposed to be there – not that I knew what either was, and I had everything but a doctorate.
A colleague who had done this for years, was in a suit and tie. All I had been told was that I was going on a trip, so I wore the generic black pants, white shirt, and black sweater purchased from some store which could pass for Old Navy. In a crisp, mandarin jacket which hung beneath her waist, was the woman from “QuestCon”, carrying about 30 lean plastic folders. “Shandeliquia?” “Um...she's not here yet,” said my colleague, as he gave her petite figure so inordinately thorough a review it made me blush. To lighten the mood, he started a conversation with me. “What do you think of Susan Boyle?” I pulled my body from head to toe as if I were Gumby, to seem as tall, thin and geeky as possible. Sure, I am actually under five feet tall and dumpy. I aimed to camouflage my body shape and turn my impish face upward in an effort to make the teacher and the accompanying vixen feel old. If you broke me open and counted the rings, I had fifteen less than " have- aviator glasses- will -think- he's -ageless" and ten less than" Ms. Where-Are-My-Unpaid-Slaves-Don't-They-Want-To-Be-Republicans?" It seems that yesterday she had cornered my colleague and made him, literally, grab every nice kid he knew and make them agree to a specific grade they would teach today. On their way to Music or lunch or the bathroom. By some miracle they all arrived and they brought friends who could help. I'm sure they sensed that my colleague was in trouble and that maybe the wench in the bad suit had a gun.
“I don't know who Susan Boyle is.”
“She's this woman in her 40's who went on Britain's got talent and might win. She's all over YouTube. She's got great courage. I really like her.”
“Is she really beautiful?” “No, she looks like—she could be any woman off the street. She's even kind of heavy. But, she's got a lot of spunk. She's funny. I think she's great.” He talks her up to the kids. “Oh yeah, the fat British chick with the amazing voice. I'm rooting for her.” It's a pathetic gesture, but I buy in.
We take the bus and get off way too early. The school we've been assigned to was the site of the murder of a little girl last year by a fellow kindergarten student. The principal spoke to us in the hall and now I remember the recordings played on the news. “She's turning blue.”
One of my students practices his list of rules on me. They sound fair. If they don't work, his partner, who still barely speaks English, will make lots of funny faces. Also sounds good. They haven't read the lesson yet. We weren't on the bus more than three minutes. I promise to come in and watch, and I do, almost immediately. So does my colleague. It's a relief to see the faculty is pretty casual and their parental instincts come out for our big kids, as well, but it isn't necessary. Within two minutes, it's clear. Our kids walk in, they are MOVIE STARS. Bona-fide real teenagers just like on TV and not related to me. And CUTE! Ten minutes in, and I see what used to be a class clown having the “perhaps when you are grown, you will understand speech” with a teary girl whose hand he is holding. The other girls look on. They are working very hard to suppress the “AHHH!” Our celebrities pull stories they see on the bookshelves which they recognize as good and start reading them. Or they make them up with the class. A lot of the kids talk about what happened last year while they do this.
Some of our teenagers have a real gift for this and emerge with their classes for lunch as...CHOO CHOO TRAINS.
The entire First-Grade was lead out by one student who was the front engine. If you broke the train, you had to go back. Each class was linked by another student. We bought our budding “Little Engines that Could” Chinese food. School lunch would've been a very cruel response to their ingenuity. They ate vigorously while their charges continued to eat the plastic food look-a-likes at tables nearby.
“YOU DIDN'T USE THE LESSONS.”
“Well, no.” “They already know what a penny is, Miss. And they have better books here. Plus, they're still not over the shooting. DID YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT? God, I'm still crying.”
“This is a complete failure.”
Frank O'Hara once wrote that children know they want their backs broken. I think teenagers know they don't. The default position for less than literate men who feel defensive and teenagers who feel they are being told how to live before they know what life is, is “chair back, foot against another chair, etc.” We had thirty kids in that position instantly.
I looked at the colleague who was my senior and said, “Oh, Mr. Rogers?”
“Yes. Miss, the children our students have worked very hard with today are happier than they were when they came in. Look at them. They're not fighting. They're in their seats. They are smiling and laughing. They came to the cafeteria as a choo-choo train. They all read or created stories which are very good literacy activities. Ask their teachers if they felt this was a meaningful day.”
“I will do just that.” With a barely visible swing of her woolen suit, she moved forward. “What does her face look like?” “You know,” answered a student named Paul, “that's a good question.”
“If they hadn't been so happy, we wouldn't be deafened by the clicks of her cheap plastic shoes,” I couldn't help noting.
When we came back from lunch, I sat in the rectangular, windowless lounge, lulled by the flyswatter-sound of the soda machine. With her jacket slung over her shoulder, our corporate sponsor shifted quietly in. The words came out quickly and she faced the floor. “I'm sorry. The principal is very happy with what your kids are doing. I was totally and utterly misguided.” My hand lifted some cold water from around my can of soda, applying to my face, while pushing my second can toward her. “Please, I have two. You'll dehydrate.” “Thanks.” She looked genuinely surprised. “I heard you talking about Susan Boyle. Isn't she amazing?” “Actually, I'm going to have to go home and watch her on YouTube. I missed it. I dean and teach. When I get home, sometimes I hit the floor like lead, right after I feed the cats.” “Well, there you go,” she said, and she eyed me like a salesgirl who thought she had found just the right shade of blush without knowing that I don't ever wear it. “Oh?” “She loves cats!” “She has a cat she loves so much and she lives with her mom and works in a bakery. That's been her whole life till now. That and her singing lessons. She's 48 years old.” “Jesus, what drudgery.” “She cares about her mom – and you, yourself said you love cats.” “The cats are great. But the bakery and going home to your mother when you are in your 40's. People must make so much fun of her. She must have a thick skin.” “Or, I hope so.”
Two years later and the school has come and gone, three small schools sitting in place of one, occupying the same building, only now it is called a campus. I ask myself, what if someone had done a news report on the work of our students that day, would it have saved the school? Or would it have won temporary, relatively useless recognition for the students involved, perhaps small checks toward books in their first year of college. Of course, a good deed is supposed to be it's own reward, but so is academic study -- ideally, you aren't supposed to be weighted by how quickly you learn but by the fact that you keep trying. I think of those students as part of the same mystery of Susan Boyle's career in this same period.
I've now seen the Youtube video of that very first night and heard the Henry Mancini level productions that Simon Cowell put together of Susan Boyle. The first night is better than Frank Capra, especially because the technicians have clearly directed the show – they had to know she was going to win everyone over. You know they love her. The bells ringing like a boxing match is coming up. She's all adrenaline. The shift of the hips at Simon – “Take a ride on these hips, fella,” she seems to say. How could anyone have ever thought she was slow? Just very nervous and not from a major city. Or, so it seems. Admittedly, I don't watch these talent shows on a regular basis because they make me bilious. There seems something unfair to the millions of singers who braved piano bars a few towns over, found whatever kindred spirits were available, found their ways to a train, plane, bus, to audition after audition and then either luck or a family and some scrawny offspring named Baby June/Biff. Then again, we wouldn't have many talented artists without some of these shows, and talk shows are a kind of venue for new comic talent that aren't really available for other fields. I've “bought in” again to the story, though part of me wonder what of it, is a fix, the way people wonder about Babe Ruth's home runs.
Accusations appear and re-appear, especially when acts are put on television like man ubiquitously referred to in the tabloids as “the anti-Susan Boyle” - a man so deluded that he was disappointed to find out that the woman to whom he had dedicated his song about suicide was actually alive and well. He was, however, certain, he was set-up for as the butt of a joke and I'm sure he's right, that he knew that beforehand and that he couldn't have been happier – all the more reason to have had him sent to a hospital and not a green room. You can tell those two, adorable and fairly experienced sound technicians know Susan is going to do well that night and they'd have to be deaf and the world supremely unjust to be wrong. Does she know? And is she so overwhelmed at the end because she didn't believe the world would be just or because she didn't believe the world would have a moment when it wouldn't? What also struck me is all the times that the judges said that the audience was against Boyle from the beginning. THEY weren't against Boyle from the beginning. Amanda seemed charmed, Piers seems to know that this woman has something. Only Simon thinks she might be a nut job. The audience sits back when she talks. She's not talking B.S, she's not ragtag, and she's picked a good song. It feels as if she's already gotten good word of mouth from somewhere. This, “everyone was against you” bit seems phoney. Is it because the judges feel cognitive dissonance, or are they covering for a set-up that maybe even SHE doesn't know about?
Every time there's an interview, I buy it. I'm not looking for the deeper side of Susan Boyle. If anything, I'm quite content to accept that she might not be urbane, but I believe she's funny and been through enough to make her credible. Perhaps she may have been discouraged from thinking too much beyond what you need to do to get by because nothing in her life would have improved by doing otherwise. The “Susan Boyle Story” J find on Youtube is a whole seven minutes long. Why isn't there a film? She was was such a big story. Such a big discovery. Is she inflexible? Does no one in her village understand her? Has she opened up to no one. I can't imagine there was an individual in her life who would have understood if she had. One of the hard things about having an extraordinary dream is you often can't explain it to the people sitting next to you. You have to go far away to get recognition in order to be accepted at home.
Carole Cadwalladr, who wrote one of the few articles critical of the way Boyle's career has been handled, interviewed neighbors who testified that, "They used to taunt her and call her names and throw eggs at her door. And now they cheer her and ask for her autograph.” Noting that Boyle was Sony's best-selling artist in 2010, she concludes, “Susan Boyle has transformed her life and she's made a lot of money in the process, well in excess of the £4m in royalties she received with great fanfare from Simon Cowell last year on her birthday.” Those who taunt her and now seek out her valuable signature, also try to calculate her portfolio. Cadwalladr even found a priest in Boyle's hometown weighing in. “Father Ryszard Holuka, the local priest (Susan is a devout Catholic), does a quick bit of mental arithmetic when I tell him she's Sony's biggest-selling artist. "What do you think she gets? A penny a record?" He thinks for a moment. "That's a lot of pennies."
When I go back to that very first audition, I'm overwhelmed again. The face was actually, for all the awkwardness of the gangly haircut, vital and sensual. An audience of fashionably dressed people were lifted to their feet and their wasn't the least bit of rancor or pity in the ovation. When she walked immediately off the stage, I didn't think it was because Boyle was afraid. I thought it was because she had performed. Her audience had applauded and the natural thing to do was to walk off (come back for the “Brava!”) The three judges were now an intrusion. She'd never say it and she didn't think it, but she felt it. When Cadwalladr approached Boyle for her article, Boyle sounds as if she was much more frightened than she was on that stage. "I can't say anything without their [Syco's] permission. So sorry. Goodbye now. Goodbye.” A close friend, also afraid to be identified, confided that Boyle is afraid that Sony might drop her. That very thing happened to just a few weeks before SYCO signed Boyle to then 18 year old Leon Jackson over issues of things he said to reporters. Reflecting later, Jackson said he would always be, “grateful to The X Factor, but for an 18-year-old who'd never lived away from home it was a brutal introduction to the music industry. 'I had no control over anything,' he says. 'But especially not the music.' I can't believe that this is what Susan Boyle wanted, but Cadwalladr disagrees, adding the viewpoint of Boyle's sister
It is the dream, though. It's what the world wanted for Susan Boyle and what she wanted for herself. We wanted her to triumph against the world and she wanted to be a singer, more than anything. "And she's proved herself to everybody," says her sister, Mary. "She always said, 'Just you wait. I'll show you!' You can see it on her face in the film. I know that face so well. It's, 'Just you wait!'
There's no question that Boyle showed the world what she could do. What she didn't get to do was show them more than once. Nor did she get to be herself more than once. Like my students, who left that afternoon, tired, and won no recognition for what they did, nor did they help to erase the perception which people have of young people who can't be exactly on time every day or who might not graduate in the time frame you hope them they do. I don't know what I would do with a child who had watched a friend bleed to death, but my students did. I have a slight feeling Susan Boyle might. Most likely, my colleagues and I would do best to buy everybody lunch and to help the world to better understand why they are reaching the world stage a tad overage.
What disappoints me most though, are the Oprah interviews. Of all the people in the world, I expected Oprah to accept someone who might have limitations in one way and a wide birth of understanding in another. Or who might just be able to tell about a hard life, and sing of it. Simple poetry. She comes on like a child who has been coached not to say certain things. Oprah doesn't talk to her for more than five minutes. She sings for maybe ten and it's over. She could have gone with her to her village Gone to the Bakery. Met her mother. Sat with her and the cat. Made a whole show about it. Encouraged someone to make a short film. How many women sit alone in small towns, with beautiful voices, learning difficult music about history, but living the most simple, hardened lives. What does her mother really say to her at home? If there's rancor, what is it? If she's depressed, what's behind it? Why not let her sing something sad --- Introduce her to music she doesn't know? Maybe the truth is, she decided she doesn't want to make albums and that's what they're afraid she'll say. They're afraid she'll say, the real business of music didn't seem like music, that the technicians who appreciated her were the last people she felt comfortable talking with. Or worse, that she couldn't believe that is was SO HARD for people to imagine on that day that it was so unlikely that her voice would be so beautiful. That like kids who show up late and come from a closing school can understand how to calm down children from a few blocks away who have lost a friend, a woman who has a dream can sing beautifully about it at any age. When my students left the school building that day, they were worn through. They had given everything, and like Boyle the only immediately appropriate response to their astonishing debut was the applause of their audience (received). Just like Boyle, however, my students were UNPAID for producing a spectacular moment for an organization which was paid handsomely, this time by the Dept. of Education. My students, I think, were already jaded enough not to expect recognition, and as they continue their studies at Cornell, Oswego, Hunter and some struggle to stay in school, they probably wonder if those little kids are all right. Not enough people wonder about them, I think -- had there been, at least, one news story, perhaps, there might have been a "Where are they now?" segment somewhere, if nothing else, to check up on that promising trackstar, Pre-Law student at Cornell (in China as we speak at an economic conference). The air was full of gasoline and the tartness of flat paint glaring in your eyes and they walked into it with the memory of that day, and they have only that. What about Susan Boyle? So, now she has viewed things from the mountain-top and the robber-barons have used her for their own quests and cons they should help her to discover herown real dreams that aren't lacquered up like the four walls of a coffin to make those who were uncomfortable with her appearance on stage feel better about themselves. I was moved by her voice and her ability to connect immediately with an audience. Everything afterward is just promotion of charity work. It's like hype for a funeral. This time, nobody is turning blue, but somebody is definitely disappearing.
Works Cited
1. , Sunday, May 30, 2010Cadwalladr, Carole, “What Happened to the Dream,” The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2010/may/30/susan-boyle-the-dream
16 July, 2011
We still miss you Henry
We lost Larry's twin brother, the Hennybee, July 17, but were lucky that the Bernilius came to comfort us that same year and be Larry's little brother. But life would never have been the same had we not been graced by a fleetfooted creature with pink ears, a white body and a mark of god on his back. We loved him so.
30 June, 2011
Waiting for Superman TRUTH: The documentary
Place this link in your browser and see the real story
http://www.waitingforsupermantruth.org/?page_id=316
http://www.waitingforsupermantruth.org/?page_id=316
24 June, 2011
Old, familiar faces
In 2008, Brooklyn Comprehensive Night High School closed.
It is 2011 and the same dignitaries from what is now called the Department of Education arrived at my current school's graduation. They said the same words at this graduation as they said at BCNHS' graduations. This graduating class has "heart." For, at least, twelve years, BCNHS' June ceremony was one dignitary's "favorite graduation," because of how hard our students had fought to get to that moment. I sat there, and for the first time in years, I felt completely out of place.
There stood an individual who had voted to close my school. I wasn't angry. I was stunned. For years, we had received similar support. The same words, the same...except now we were all a little older and thicker in the waist.
I was very honored by my colleagues' work, by the true emotions of the students and the principal. But the ghosts were there. I felt like a ghost, as well.I felt as if I should leave the building. My world had been torn asunder by the same people staring down at my former students now. Now an alternate universe existed in which it was all happening again, but if it does exist, how can I also be part of it. One dignitary looked at me and then spoke to another person in hushed tones. I was, once more, an alien. In my heart it hit me that it would be nearly impossible for me to be accepted in my old district. I would have to look somewhere else, someplace where we were not all "old, familiar faces" to each other, and I did not know that the platitudes are spoken without true grace and in which I could be offered no grace to return, to try to become part of something new, to participate in the rituals of growth. Not here. Not in the old, familiar places. Not with the old, familiar faces.
What's ironic, of course, is Brooklyn Comprehensive was a small school before there was the first round of "New Small Schools" in the 1990's. So, what does this say about the current batch -- are these dignitaries going grant them the 19 years we had?
I suppose this is how people handle being involved in "Re-org's" in business, etc. But, like O'Brien in Orwell's 1984, the same person was the director of the new system as was the old. There isn't even the gesture of the glasses as a false comfort.
It is 2011 and the same dignitaries from what is now called the Department of Education arrived at my current school's graduation. They said the same words at this graduation as they said at BCNHS' graduations. This graduating class has "heart." For, at least, twelve years, BCNHS' June ceremony was one dignitary's "favorite graduation," because of how hard our students had fought to get to that moment. I sat there, and for the first time in years, I felt completely out of place.
There stood an individual who had voted to close my school. I wasn't angry. I was stunned. For years, we had received similar support. The same words, the same...except now we were all a little older and thicker in the waist.
I was very honored by my colleagues' work, by the true emotions of the students and the principal. But the ghosts were there. I felt like a ghost, as well.I felt as if I should leave the building. My world had been torn asunder by the same people staring down at my former students now. Now an alternate universe existed in which it was all happening again, but if it does exist, how can I also be part of it. One dignitary looked at me and then spoke to another person in hushed tones. I was, once more, an alien. In my heart it hit me that it would be nearly impossible for me to be accepted in my old district. I would have to look somewhere else, someplace where we were not all "old, familiar faces" to each other, and I did not know that the platitudes are spoken without true grace and in which I could be offered no grace to return, to try to become part of something new, to participate in the rituals of growth. Not here. Not in the old, familiar places. Not with the old, familiar faces.
What's ironic, of course, is Brooklyn Comprehensive was a small school before there was the first round of "New Small Schools" in the 1990's. So, what does this say about the current batch -- are these dignitaries going grant them the 19 years we had?
I suppose this is how people handle being involved in "Re-org's" in business, etc. But, like O'Brien in Orwell's 1984, the same person was the director of the new system as was the old. There isn't even the gesture of the glasses as a false comfort.
23 June, 2011
The Communists are Coming!
I got a text message on the bus on the way home. My eyes were on my phone because I left my e-reader at home. Consequently, I cradled my elephantine, non-smart phone in my lap,looking at it so as to dodge eye contact. The screen went white and I clicked the round "OK" button in order to read the new message from a colleague. "My doctor was shocked that teachers are allowed to grade Regents exams." I went livid. Of course, I have complained about differences with colleagues over how to interpret the rubric for the ELA Regents. That is the nature of language, however, and it wouldn't be fair if we didn't question each other and dialogue with the grading system foisted upon us. The Board of Regents itself concedes that there is more than one way to obtain the same grade -- there are "4" level essays which are more than thoughtful, but stray somewhat from their objectives, though they ultimately defend their original argument sufficiently. There are those which hit the mark, provide sufficient development -- all "no more, no less," than very good, but not excellent. We are given more than one "Anchor paper" (model papers) to judge our own by. The more you work with language, the more shades you can see to it. People will always have stylistic differences. Not every English teacher is interested in pretty prose -- some are in it for the bold themes or the heroic stories. However, we balance each other in the end as no one person determines a student's final score. Papers are always marked in teams. In the end, we always agree that the tasks themselves aren't rigorous enough, and the rubrics are equally shallow.
I go into this explanation because I was so affronted by my colleague's physician's response. She had related some of my feelings about the debates which ensue over work sometimes. Instead of seeing the complexity of the task, or perhaps, wondering why the State bothers to insist on "standardized" exams when its own rubrics are not stringent enough to satisfy the ideals of good teachers, he just questioned teachers' abilities to judge. Why not just let teachers create better, harder tests? The largest complaint in our grading room was about the fact that papers were going to pass State standards despite the fact that we would've failed those same papers if they were submitted to us in our courses. It would be unfair, however, not to give the student the State exam grade he/she deserves. In this case, the teacher is punished twice. First, we have to give an exam which doesn't live up to our own standards. Then, we have to pass kids on this exam whom we failed regularly during the year. But, all my colleague's physician could think of was the possible inadequacy of the teachers grading the exam, not that the whole exercise is flawed. It's natural for people to argue about language. What's sad is when the language isn't worth our breath. Or, in my case, my thumb movements.
After sending upwards of 15 texts back, many asking questions about whether doctors could be trusted to treat their patients properly given all the incentives from insurance companies to cut corners, I grabbed the handles of the backdoor with both hands and slowly pulled myself down onto the wet pavement. Without even waiting for me to turn around, one of the local car service drivers pulled up and I got in. First, he rebuffs my exhaustion with "well, just one more day." "No. There's Monday and I have Professional Development before summer school." "Well, at least you are working," says the upbeat driver. I let the "at least" comment go. I've never been fond of cherishing the "At least." It brings to mind my forebears in Nazi Germany thinking, "At least, they haven't..." Until they had. I make some passing remark about the heat and the lack of A/C in my classroom. He is seemingly, sincerely up-in-arms. "What about portable air conditioners?" "We would need three per room." I know this because the computer room has three air conditioners to insure that, even if the students fail, the equipment doesn't. Finally, he says to me, "Well, this is all because the communists are coming." I'm livid again. For one thing, education in the Soviet Union was, arguably, better than ours is here. For another, it's American cheapness that is keeping us from providing proper treatment to our students. If we were any cheaper, we'd be anarchists. I say something like, "but we're not spending any money on schools." "You will see. Little by little they will take over." What this has to do with anything I have said, I don't know, but this man is convinced of this. Like my colleague's doctor, he lives in the golden world of rumor which is fueled by anger and ignorance. Of course, this is part of the new/old list of Republican talking points against Obama, recycled from the start of the Cold War. Standardized tests were created out of distrust for teachers when, in fact, they undermine our efforts to be rigorous and rely on our best abilities to interpret their "standards" in order to be clear and fair with our students. I suppose that my driver was picking up on the buzz from our "fair and balanced" media, but does not understand that it is the rumor mongers who are denying my students decent learning conditions and giving weak students the impression they have achieved something by passing easy exams.
Of course, if education were a world priority, none of this would be happening. But, never fear. Companies are in no danger of losing their right to create and sell standardized exams, and drivers are in no danger of losing their opportunity to make cash they don't declare on their taxes. The classrooms are still boiling hot, the students are definitely "first" to be given an easy way out, and the teachers can't do anything to stop it. If we do, the media will say we aren't teaching because scores are too low. If scores are too high, they'll complain about why we are allowed to grade the exams. Has anyone bothered to look at the tests, the rubrics for grading, the anchor papers, etc.? Too busy looking for those Communists/Weapons of Mass Destruction/Communists/Evil Teachers.
I go into this explanation because I was so affronted by my colleague's physician's response. She had related some of my feelings about the debates which ensue over work sometimes. Instead of seeing the complexity of the task, or perhaps, wondering why the State bothers to insist on "standardized" exams when its own rubrics are not stringent enough to satisfy the ideals of good teachers, he just questioned teachers' abilities to judge. Why not just let teachers create better, harder tests? The largest complaint in our grading room was about the fact that papers were going to pass State standards despite the fact that we would've failed those same papers if they were submitted to us in our courses. It would be unfair, however, not to give the student the State exam grade he/she deserves. In this case, the teacher is punished twice. First, we have to give an exam which doesn't live up to our own standards. Then, we have to pass kids on this exam whom we failed regularly during the year. But, all my colleague's physician could think of was the possible inadequacy of the teachers grading the exam, not that the whole exercise is flawed. It's natural for people to argue about language. What's sad is when the language isn't worth our breath. Or, in my case, my thumb movements.
After sending upwards of 15 texts back, many asking questions about whether doctors could be trusted to treat their patients properly given all the incentives from insurance companies to cut corners, I grabbed the handles of the backdoor with both hands and slowly pulled myself down onto the wet pavement. Without even waiting for me to turn around, one of the local car service drivers pulled up and I got in. First, he rebuffs my exhaustion with "well, just one more day." "No. There's Monday and I have Professional Development before summer school." "Well, at least you are working," says the upbeat driver. I let the "at least" comment go. I've never been fond of cherishing the "At least." It brings to mind my forebears in Nazi Germany thinking, "At least, they haven't..." Until they had. I make some passing remark about the heat and the lack of A/C in my classroom. He is seemingly, sincerely up-in-arms. "What about portable air conditioners?" "We would need three per room." I know this because the computer room has three air conditioners to insure that, even if the students fail, the equipment doesn't. Finally, he says to me, "Well, this is all because the communists are coming." I'm livid again. For one thing, education in the Soviet Union was, arguably, better than ours is here. For another, it's American cheapness that is keeping us from providing proper treatment to our students. If we were any cheaper, we'd be anarchists. I say something like, "but we're not spending any money on schools." "You will see. Little by little they will take over." What this has to do with anything I have said, I don't know, but this man is convinced of this. Like my colleague's doctor, he lives in the golden world of rumor which is fueled by anger and ignorance. Of course, this is part of the new/old list of Republican talking points against Obama, recycled from the start of the Cold War. Standardized tests were created out of distrust for teachers when, in fact, they undermine our efforts to be rigorous and rely on our best abilities to interpret their "standards" in order to be clear and fair with our students. I suppose that my driver was picking up on the buzz from our "fair and balanced" media, but does not understand that it is the rumor mongers who are denying my students decent learning conditions and giving weak students the impression they have achieved something by passing easy exams.
Of course, if education were a world priority, none of this would be happening. But, never fear. Companies are in no danger of losing their right to create and sell standardized exams, and drivers are in no danger of losing their opportunity to make cash they don't declare on their taxes. The classrooms are still boiling hot, the students are definitely "first" to be given an easy way out, and the teachers can't do anything to stop it. If we do, the media will say we aren't teaching because scores are too low. If scores are too high, they'll complain about why we are allowed to grade the exams. Has anyone bothered to look at the tests, the rubrics for grading, the anchor papers, etc.? Too busy looking for those Communists/Weapons of Mass Destruction/Communists/Evil Teachers.
12 June, 2011
Wish List
A few months ago, while opening up a letter regarding the pension fund, I read the blurb which came with it. I don't remember if it was on a separate insert or on the letter, but it said that the pension fund had been started when a social worker discovered a retired teacher living in a chicken coupe. For the past several weeks, I've been obsessively scouring web pages about "Tiny Houses." As you'll see from the picture in this posting, some tiny houses are, perhaps, smaller than a place one would house fowl. From my research, it looks as if now, should I want to retire in a 96 square foot house, it will cost me something like 55,000 dollars. I hope that original teacher's family kept the coupe! I understand that I would have far more amenities than an ordinary shed, and that I can even get a small house I can pull by car. The prospect of several tens of thousands of people in their sixties driving tiny houses all over the country and, eventually, fighting it out for who gets the best wi-fi and is closest to the water source, doesn't do much to calm my nerves.
This afternoon, after watching a PBS NOW documentary on Child Marriages, I noticed a story about allowing homeless people to live in foreclosed homes. The could lead to a paradoxical situation: imagine being kicked out of your foreclosed home and then being moved into another one after you've been living on the street! However, two similar practices in NYC called, "Squatting" and "Homesteading" allowed some fortunate groups of people to eventually buy abandoned buildings from the city and renovate them. The practice was illegal, but for a few lucky groups, it became a means by which they were able to own their own apartments. I remember being just out of college in the early 90's and contemplating joining a Squat or Homestead, but I didn't have the courage. I don't know if I wish I had as it would have changed the course of my life. Literally taking over and renovating an abandoned building while living in it is very much a way of life. Even if I could've mustered the courage, I'm awful with my hands. Had I somehow managed, I don't know if I could've begun my teaching career. Ironically, I might have an apartment of my own right now. Sure, I could've saved enough to have one either way. Let's just say I am about as good at saving money as I am with my hands. Don't think I've spent my life vacationing in the South of France. I've spent a good many years in which I've supplemented my classroom with the rent money. I'm not the only teacher I know who has lived his/her life in the ironic cycle of spending the paycheck to keep earning it. This is what leads me to scour the internet looking at tiny houses in the first place.
So, the first thing on my wish list is the time to think through...how to think this through.
20 March, 2011
The Best of Times
How do you explain to anyone who wasn't there what it was like to hear George Hearn sing, "The Best of Times (is now)" from La Cage Aux Folles in the 1980's -- when it really was "as for tomorrow, well, who knows?" for so many people. We were thick in the beginning of the AIDS crisis and there were already so many people gone. Gone. They're still gone, of course. I'm not begrudging anyone who enjoys the revival of the show -- it looks great from what I've seen. There's just no way to imagine and no way to replicate, probably, that feeling, being in a vast audience of people, all of whom were somewhere between crying and...well, crying, when they heard the song. I read some nitwit's comment on Youtube regarding Hearn's rendition that he was too masculine. First of all, that's shows a very narrow view of what masculinity is and how its performed. But, that wasn't the point. It was the timbre. It was the breath before "who knows?" that was what most of us heard first.
I don't know why I keep coming back to the song and to the moment, but I have been for a while. So much of history is pressed in books like dried flowers. There is a part of me that would love to begin a unit on the 80's with this song. It encapsulates so much. Reagan not saying the word AIDS until he was almost out of office. The Civil Disobedience of Act Up. The loss of so many important figures to what felt like a plague. The world before the personal computer was ubiquitous. The end of the Cold War -- the mythology of Reagan's role and the real poverty which drove it. The world in which baseball players were skinny guys with shaggy hair. Before George Steinbrenner was an icon, but just a corrupt and bloated owner of a baseball team. Would La Cage Aux Folles have been turned into a musical in 2011? It needed to be in the 80's. It wasn't just gay people who needed it -- my mother needed it. Everybody had lost somebody -- if only Michael Bennett. Plus, we needed a good, corny love story about, more or less, every day folks. And we could admit it.
I don't know what it's like in the audience of the revival because, well, for one thing, I can't afford to see it. I've seen lots of clips on Youtube. (Douglas Hodge is straight. Who knew? Everybody, thanks to some goofey fan interview. I'm still not taking bets of Kelsey Grammar.) It looks campy, which the original show wasn't really. It was about camp, which is different. (It may be different with Fierstein in the show replacing Hodge who seemed coy to me from clips, and not so much heroic.) Of course, it also looks great - the music, the dance -- it's an incredible show sans context. I guess now I know what it's like for people who see Fiddler on the Roof but have no idea what a pogrom was. (Oh, those neat Russian dancers! Why is it they have to move again? What's a Czar?)
But, for now, it is my memory. And my blog post. And that's all.
I don't know why I keep coming back to the song and to the moment, but I have been for a while. So much of history is pressed in books like dried flowers. There is a part of me that would love to begin a unit on the 80's with this song. It encapsulates so much. Reagan not saying the word AIDS until he was almost out of office. The Civil Disobedience of Act Up. The loss of so many important figures to what felt like a plague. The world before the personal computer was ubiquitous. The end of the Cold War -- the mythology of Reagan's role and the real poverty which drove it. The world in which baseball players were skinny guys with shaggy hair. Before George Steinbrenner was an icon, but just a corrupt and bloated owner of a baseball team. Would La Cage Aux Folles have been turned into a musical in 2011? It needed to be in the 80's. It wasn't just gay people who needed it -- my mother needed it. Everybody had lost somebody -- if only Michael Bennett. Plus, we needed a good, corny love story about, more or less, every day folks. And we could admit it.
I don't know what it's like in the audience of the revival because, well, for one thing, I can't afford to see it. I've seen lots of clips on Youtube. (Douglas Hodge is straight. Who knew? Everybody, thanks to some goofey fan interview. I'm still not taking bets of Kelsey Grammar.) It looks campy, which the original show wasn't really. It was about camp, which is different. (It may be different with Fierstein in the show replacing Hodge who seemed coy to me from clips, and not so much heroic.) Of course, it also looks great - the music, the dance -- it's an incredible show sans context. I guess now I know what it's like for people who see Fiddler on the Roof but have no idea what a pogrom was. (Oh, those neat Russian dancers! Why is it they have to move again? What's a Czar?)
But, for now, it is my memory. And my blog post. And that's all.
06 March, 2011
Tightening those salaries
According to this Sunday, March 6, 2011, NY Times
The average salary for New York’s full-time state employees in 2009 (even before the last round of raises) was $63,382, well above the state’s average personal income that year of $46,957. Mr. Cuomo’s proposed salary freeze for many of the state’s 236,000 employees is an important step to rein in New York’s out-of-control payroll. It could save between $200 million and $400 million.
According to Executive Paywatch, the average CEO makes 263 times the salary of the average worker. Furthermore, Executive Paywatch charts the following
2009 Average CEO Pay at S&P 500 Companies
Salary $1,041,012
Bonus $203,714
Stock Awards $2,630,574
Option Awards $2,284,595
Non-Equity Incentive Plan Compensation $1,790,703
Pension and Deferred Compensation Earnings $1,060,867
All Other Compensation $235,232
Total $9,246,697
(Both stats can be found at http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/pay/index.cfm).
So, whose salaries need to be hemmed in?
The average salary for New York’s full-time state employees in 2009 (even before the last round of raises) was $63,382, well above the state’s average personal income that year of $46,957. Mr. Cuomo’s proposed salary freeze for many of the state’s 236,000 employees is an important step to rein in New York’s out-of-control payroll. It could save between $200 million and $400 million.
According to Executive Paywatch, the average CEO makes 263 times the salary of the average worker. Furthermore, Executive Paywatch charts the following
2009 Average CEO Pay at S&P 500 Companies
Salary $1,041,012
Bonus $203,714
Stock Awards $2,630,574
Option Awards $2,284,595
Non-Equity Incentive Plan Compensation $1,790,703
Pension and Deferred Compensation Earnings $1,060,867
All Other Compensation $235,232
Total $9,246,697
(Both stats can be found at http://www.aflcio.org/corporatewatch/paywatch/pay/index.cfm).
So, whose salaries need to be hemmed in?
14 February, 2011
Song for Karen B. Hunter, by her brother Chaim Bezalel-Levy
Karen Hunter's brother and his folkband, Chaim and the Essentials play a song he wrote for her, here: http://www.folkalley.com/openmic/song.php?id=15963 There is also a link on the right side of this page. It is incredibly moving. I thank him for sharing it with me. Coincidentally, he posted it, after four years of working on it, on my 43rd birthday. I can understand how it would take him so long to produce something so beautiful and also so painful.
And not coincidentally, I post notice about the song on Valentine's Day.
Happy Valentine's Day, KBH.
And not coincidentally, I post notice about the song on Valentine's Day.
Happy Valentine's Day, KBH.
06 February, 2011
Eight, really 4 times 2
Well extended-family,
It's almost February 8th, which will be my 8th birthday. By now, my mommy and I are very accomplished at making blog postings together. I can just think them and send them to her.
Being 8 really feels like being 4 times 2. My brother Bernie is 4 and I feel like he and I are a team -- so really we are both 8 and 4 at the same time. Since we do so much together, I run as much a 4 year old and he sleeps as much as an 8 year old. We consult with each other on everything except the catnip toys and strawberry ice cream. I don't know why, but those are always mine first. Otherwise, we share. Of course, I give him back his catnip toys...and he gives me back my fuzzy carrots, etc. Frankly, we have the same of everything, so it's hard to tell whose is whose, except that I don't dunk the fuzzy carrots in food. If it smells like food, it's his carrot. I've never understood that, but he doesn't understand why I sweep up AFTER he sweeps up around his bowl. It's a Larry thing.
I would like to thank all of my family for their love this year, for the new nicknames, (Sarastro, The LUVBUG, Leering Larry, etc.), and for looking at all those fabulous pictures of Bernie and me that my mother sends around. (It's not our idea, though we hear it brightens peoples days.) Above is one of me being my "smooth" self in the early am.
Cheers and Happy Love Forever Day!
Larry
27 January, 2011
Oh what a beautiful snow day
After two days of Regents exams, I am very grateful for today's snow day. Waiting around in the hallway to 1)escort students to the bathroom; 2)be on hand to get more pencils; and 3) be of use in potential disasters, usually makes me a little too talkative afterwards. Think of it: I spend most of my days being pounced on to communicate and explain things. It's addictive. Then I have to play Monk with Pencils during Regents' Week. The first person who says hello to me on my break is in for an earful! At least, when I am proctoring, I am forcefully engaging students with my eyes and footsteps. But, I wasn't selected to proctor until tomorrow. Proctoring isn't my favorite duty either, as I am always afraid of losing important papers/messing up the order of things.
It's also just these kind of activities which bring out the worst in the nicest of people. All of us were grumpy. If someone was five minutes late, administrators were called. Keeping an entire group of people in a silent world in which their job is to maintain silence can cause them to be irritated by the smallest sounds. I instinctively bark if I hear a student's mouth begin to open. I mean literally bark. "Woof!" I also hiss. I feel like a predator, alert to sound as if it is my nemesis and my prey. The students are completely used to this and it doesn't even generate a giggle.
My colleagues have begun the customary increase in the number of sentences which begin with "What am I supposed to....." It's the silence and the stakes of it. We still have grading to do. We have planning to do. There is nothing more disabling than hours of staring and snarling. You can't read papers as you have to keep your eyes on the kids. You can't look at anything but the kids for the time you are with them. If you are in the hall, you scout not just for the teacher calling you to escort a kid, but for any stray people who might be coming the wrong way. In a building with two other schools, this can happen. Even in those patches in the hallway in which you have nothing to do and feel like you are being lazy, you can't leave because something is going to happen soon and you will be needed. Grrrrrr. There are no words for it.
There's also a great deal of politesse which emerges from being busy and separated for a good part of your day. You simply don't see people enough to get angry.
At meetings, you collectively decry meetings. You collectively swallow your feelings and volunteer for more such assemblies. Then you go back to your intensive universe for a while. Even when you collaborate on curricula, you are all quarterbacks executing huge plays across a large field. The kids become quarterbacks, too. We are all together, but alone with the process of creation, as well. It's like working on sculptures. So, take us out of that and our hands and feet and teeth all chatter. It's much better to shiver silently in the snow.
It's also just these kind of activities which bring out the worst in the nicest of people. All of us were grumpy. If someone was five minutes late, administrators were called. Keeping an entire group of people in a silent world in which their job is to maintain silence can cause them to be irritated by the smallest sounds. I instinctively bark if I hear a student's mouth begin to open. I mean literally bark. "Woof!" I also hiss. I feel like a predator, alert to sound as if it is my nemesis and my prey. The students are completely used to this and it doesn't even generate a giggle.
My colleagues have begun the customary increase in the number of sentences which begin with "What am I supposed to....." It's the silence and the stakes of it. We still have grading to do. We have planning to do. There is nothing more disabling than hours of staring and snarling. You can't read papers as you have to keep your eyes on the kids. You can't look at anything but the kids for the time you are with them. If you are in the hall, you scout not just for the teacher calling you to escort a kid, but for any stray people who might be coming the wrong way. In a building with two other schools, this can happen. Even in those patches in the hallway in which you have nothing to do and feel like you are being lazy, you can't leave because something is going to happen soon and you will be needed. Grrrrrr. There are no words for it.
There's also a great deal of politesse which emerges from being busy and separated for a good part of your day. You simply don't see people enough to get angry.
At meetings, you collectively decry meetings. You collectively swallow your feelings and volunteer for more such assemblies. Then you go back to your intensive universe for a while. Even when you collaborate on curricula, you are all quarterbacks executing huge plays across a large field. The kids become quarterbacks, too. We are all together, but alone with the process of creation, as well. It's like working on sculptures. So, take us out of that and our hands and feet and teeth all chatter. It's much better to shiver silently in the snow.
09 January, 2011
Truthout gets it right on Obama and Education
Note that the author says that most people in DC don't agree with Rhee's/Obama's policies.
Read it here
http://www.truth-out.org/mr-president-we-want-your-childrens-education-too66425
Read it here
http://www.truth-out.org/mr-president-we-want-your-childrens-education-too66425
06 January, 2011
CODA: Founder of Brooklyn Bridge Academy Replaced As Principal
Three years since the close of Brooklyn Comprehensive, our replacement, Brooklyn Bridge Academy has already replaced its founding principal. A major issue was violence. Never once did BCNHS has a violence problem. Oh and Inside Schools notes that "Attendance is always an issue" at the school. So, they added violence and they did nothing to increase attendance.
I hope the new principal can re-direct the school. It will be interesting to see how he handles the attendance issue and the fact that the school's four year graduation rate is 13 percent. Most of our students didn't graduate in four years...and that ended up being a reason to close us. The fact that these kids DID eventually graduate didn't matter.
Good luck. "To the stars despite the difficulties."
I hope the new principal can re-direct the school. It will be interesting to see how he handles the attendance issue and the fact that the school's four year graduation rate is 13 percent. Most of our students didn't graduate in four years...and that ended up being a reason to close us. The fact that these kids DID eventually graduate didn't matter.
Good luck. "To the stars despite the difficulties."
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