So I went to my daughter's school this evening for an open ouse. It was pretty cool. My daughter is fifteen yearsl old and goes to a pretty large high school - she has six classes a day on a campus the size of a small airport. Her first class in the morning, very early - like 7:30 - is an English class. This English class is taught in a sort of portable barn-like building attached to the greenhouse at the school. It is separate from the main building and seems kind of cold and dank. Th teacher is a native San Franciscan who is kind of a hippy, dopy chick type. She's a drama teacher most of the time, but teaches english as well. She was nice enough, but I could tell that, as an English teacher, there was quite a bit lacking. Oh well, hopefully she will make it through the curriculum of Holocaust victims, Lord of the Flies and Midsummer Night's Dream.
Her next class is Integrated math with a very sensible seeming Asian guy for a teacher. Not too much you can bullshit about in math. you either get it or you don't, byou either do the work or you don't. Nice enough guy.
Third period finds her in Spanish class with a young male teacher who has them build up points for class by collecting pesos (pesos are the measure of credit given for doing extra curricular stuff like watching the Spanish channel). She seems like she's going to do fine in that class.
Next was Chef's class where she has an anal retentive hun for a teacher who is a "portions" Nazi. Very bizarre. My daughter has been cooking and learning and doing very well with all the stuff she does, but she only got shit for cdredit because we put the recipes up on a web-site, and apparently they needed to be "typed, double spaced, one sheet of paper." Okay then.....
Next was her World civics teacher who just about made me crack up - what a SPAZ this guy is. I doubt she's going to learn much of anything in that class. He was just all over the place. He didn't string together a coherant sentence the whole time we were in there. He was so nervous and spastic that it was comical.
And last but not least was her chemisty teacher who was like a wet piece of white bread.
It reminded me of my high school days. Some teachers good....most atrocious. These people are influencing our kids lives and most of them are there just to collect a paycheck (I'm not faulting them for that....we've all got to make a living) and some are there to feed their own egos and others are there because they simply don't know what else to do with their lives. Then, there are a rare few who really care....who really get fired up about teaching....who really have the capactiy the will and the drive to make a difference in these kids lives. And to those, I met two of them tonight...potentially three...I say thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for showing my kid something positive and giving her the idea and the fire to follow her dreams and her heart. And to you others I say, have a heart....reevealuate what you're doing....wake up....look at how important you are to the kids you teach. Look at the potential you have to shape the future for all of us through them. Wake up! Wake up!
Goodnight everybody,
Az
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