The Wikiness

My friend Laura, who still teaches at the school where I served the last 27 years of my career, texted. She wanted to know if I’d be interested in the $30/hour job of supervising exams.

Test administration was the worst part of my job, the part called “summative assessment” that really meant “Son we’re gonna measure your brain function today, and attach the results to your permanent record. To us you’re ultimately just a set of data points.” I read a script that told them, “Do not speak with or look at your fellows. Turn to page three of the test booklet and begin the Mathematics section of your test now.”  Then, “Pencils Down. Look up from your answer sheets. Remain seated while we collect your test materials.”

Starting this year, students take these exams online, so I would be paid to interact even less with students as individual, valid human beings. 

The best part of those test days was the wrap-up–the kids’ excitement to leave and enjoy their somewhat free afternoon, and the relief you felt as test giver when the ordeal passed with no irregularities or errors that could invalidate the whole room’s scores. For teachers, it was a quick lunch, and then professional learning teams until 3:06, the end of the contractual day.

I left behind my depersonalized, depersonalizing role in the Education Industrial Complex almost four years ago. Never once since have I thought, “How good it would be to get up early and herd sleepy teens into assigned seats and proctor them through a four hour high-stakes test.” Not even for $30/hour.

Today I make half that amount at Panera, but when I encounter young people, I am no longer an authority figure trying to coerce them into desired outcomes. I am instead merely a fellow human, even a potential ally or friend. 

“No thanks, Laura. Imma leave your offer behind and find a better use of my time.”

Looking back, I see that as a teacher, I was consistently anti-depersonalization and pro-humanization. I strove to put personalized creativity and collaboration at the center of my course designs. Knowing how deadly standardized education is to the human spirit, I gave students as much choice in their learning–of topics and media–as possible. Small-group work was a regular feature in my classrooms, too. I wanted them each to feel they mattered and that their identity was valued in at least one of their courses. 

But how much of what I left behind is still there?

Having just checked the school’s website, I can affirm that I left behind courses, units, clubs, activities, and learning and recreational spaces that persist. Each of these legacies assuage my ego and mitigate the degradation that schooling-as-usual engenders. I’m telling myself that very time the Amateur Musicians Club releases an album of original student compositions or has a live performance, every time students discover wonderful truths about Chicago in their Chicago Lit class, every time they step into one of the garden classroom spaces we created and breathe a little easier in the school day, and each time I drive past York Commons and see the skatepark filled with kids, I can sigh and relax. I have left behind an improved school and community.

Yea, me!