(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . I Was A Failed School Teacher: Chapter 2 [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-01-09 Celebrating with colleagues circa 2010 Meeting The Team I was set to teach for the Aurora Public Schools, one of the largest school districts in the state of Colorado. District policy required that we start preparing for the beginning of the school year one week before the students arrived. So, on July 27, 2009, a very warm Tuesday morning, I awoke from sleep, my heart thumping inside of my chest. The anxiety that I’d been struggling with during the summer was ratcheting upward with the passage of each successive minute. So, with that, I pushed myself from the bed, yawned, stretched, and shook my body, willing the nerves to fall from me like crumbs. Stretching seemed to help somewhat, but I needed some more self-therapy. Pressing my two palms together, I closed my eyes tight, and said a silent prayer, asking the omnipresent being how to calm my nerves. The answer: engage in some of the work required of a teacher, act in my new role. I needed to drive to that school, walk to my classroom, open the door, and start doing my job by creating my wall, building my library, and meeting my colleagues. Being a teacher. And if anyone was struggling with seeing me in this role, they were going to be dispelled of that notion. I was one of the first ones to arrive at the school, eager to begin my new journey. Crawford Elementary School was located a few blocks north of the East Colfax thoroughfare, just a mile up the road from my childhood home on Xanthia Street. It was a high-needs elementary school, serving students from the inner city, most of whom spoke English as their second language. The façade of the school was constructed from red bricks, connected to a metal fence that surrounded the play area. Standing at the foot of the blue stairs, which led to a set of double doors, I was struck by a thought. Fourteen years ago, after becoming so dissatisfied with my hometown, I’d left for a bigger city so that I could attend college, live a life unencumbered by the constraints of my upbringing, and begin my journey toward adulthood. At age thirty-three, my path led me back to the place where my life had started. And I was grateful to be here, for if you’d known me a few years before I’d arrived at Crawford, you would not have been able to recognize me. Crawford Elementary School has been through a series of changes. Originally constructed in 1892, it was called the Aurora Central Grade School for twenty-seven years before it was gutted by a fire in 1919. A new school was constructed on the site, serving Aurora’s children for generations before it was torn down in 1972 while the latest version of the school was being built. Crawford Elementary School was remodeled in the 1980s, becoming the last iteration of the school. Who could have forecasted that a school built near the end of the nineteenth century in Colorado — once a haven for the Ku Klux Klan — would serve the majority-minority, naturalized children of undocumented Americans, black American children, and refugees? *** The formerly dormant school building was slowly awakening from its slumber. The doors opened to classroom spaces, and light spilled onto the floors of the dark corridor. As I walked along the path that took me to my space, I peeked into some of the classrooms situated along the path. Young women were milling about the spaces, as they busily prepared for the eventual arrival of their students. A few of the teachers smiled and waved in my direction once they saw me. My heart skipped when I finally arrived at the threshold of my classroom, a space that was larger than I imagined it would be, leaving me in awe. How the heck had this come to be? Only a few years ago I was riding in the back of a police car, hands cuffed behind my back, felled once again by my pesky medical condition, not sure if I was fit to be alive. A crisis counselor was sitting across from me when I asked the question: “Will this ruin my chances of entering school?” “I don’t think that it will,” said the counselor, looking circumspect. “But you have to work to stop your dream from crumbling.” The counselor had been right. I’d done so much after dealing with my issues, enrolling in graduate school the following winter, completing internships, passing the Praxis II Exam on the first try, amassing a GPA of 3.97, and securing my first teaching job. Miraculously, I was about to begin my life as an educator. As Barack Obama would say, “Only in America is my story possible.” So far my story checked off all of the requirements for a made-for-television movie. While stepping over the threshold, I sighed and said, “Holy shit. This is mine.” *** I was taking over the classroom of Jay Chen, an Asian American leaving Denver for the greener pastures of Wisconsin. The departing Jay Chen, one of the most popular teachers at Crawford, had been the only male general education — he taught reading, writing, math, science, and social studies — teacher at the school before he resigned. Jay popped in to visit as I arranged the tables and chairs into their proper places. He and I talked for a while, and I learned of his four-year commitment to the school. And he could not stop gushing about the other fifth-grade teachers who taught there. “They’re a great group of people,” he said. “Experienced, helpful, fun, and smart as hell too. They made my time here so much better. I guarantee that they’ll do the same thing for you.” Unfortunately, I could not completely take Jay, a practical stranger, at his word. Of course, he wasn’t consciously fibbing, as I knew that he meant what he said about my new team members. The other teachers were most likely extremely fond of him. But I wasn’t Jay though, and after fifteen years of trudging through the workforce, I knew that I could never rest on my laurels. Co-workers will turn on you for the slightest reason, especially when you’re a black man and not the perfect employee. “That’s cool,” I said. “I am looking forward to meeting them.” As Jay and I conversed, the other members of the fifth-grade team streamed in, two of them tall and thin while the other was more squat and compact. Georgia, the tallest of the three teachers — she stood nearly six feet tall, with arms extending past her knees — was the first to approach me with an open hand. She taught reading, one of my best and favorite subjects in high school. She exuded warmth as she spoke, promising to be accessible. Morgan was the next teammate to step forward. A half-white and half-Asian waif of a human being, she was more subdued during our introduction. Morgan taught writing, my least favorite subject to instruct during my internship. Although more reserved than Georgia, she readily answered the questions that I had about teaching writing to my students. Stacey was the third to shake my hand. Unlike Georgia and Morgan, two women who could have modeled for J. Crew if they had not been elementary school teachers, Stacey embodied my vision of what a modern-day teacher should look like. As I mentioned before, she was shorter and stockier, with blond curly hair that hung across her shoulders. Stacey taught mathematics and was a teacher leader, as were Georgia and Morgan, literacy teacher leaders. Hmm, I thought. “May I ask you all a question?” I asked. “Sure,” said Georgia. “Ask us anything you want.” “How does it work, you being a teacher leader?” “We have administrative duties in addition to teaching,” said Morgan. “As teacher leaders, our responsibility is to oversee the delivery of content instruction throughout the entire school. So, the three of us don’t teach the same amount of classes as you will.” “I see now,” I said. “I get it.” Jay looked down at his watch and said, “It’s about time for me to head on out.” Jay hugged Morgan, Georgia, and Stacey before shaking my hand. “Good luck to you. You’re going to be in good hands.” I hope so, I thought. And then Jay left the room, temporarily sapping the wind from Georgia, who’d developed a close relationship with Jay. She was going to miss the guy, her friend and confidante for multiple years. Jay’s physical stature was less impressive than mine, but he left some large footprints for me to fill. I was left alone with the team now, the only male teacher amongst a group of three, in addition to being the only rookie. I immediately felt the pressure to engender myself with the group, to show them that I wanted to be there. But I was never dexterous with small talk, as I’d become accustomed to offering up the floor when conversing with new people. And luckily for me, Georgia, Morgan, and Stacey were all willing to speak. I was fine with the three of them taking turns leading the conversation. Georgia, Morgan, and Stacey were polite, welcoming, engaging, and charismatic, necessary attributes for anyone brave enough to stand before a group of twenty-five children. This was especially true of Georgia, the longest-serving member of the teaching trio — she’d been teaching at Crawford for six years, one year longer than the time it took to become a master teacher. I felt the most in sync with Georgia, the most approachable member of the team. As the conversation with my team members persisted, I became more voluble. The topics of conversation were facile, intermittently causing my mind to wander to different places as I listened and spoke, and vice versa. I thought about Christina and Elizabeth, the two fellow University of Colorado at Denver graduate students who were soon-to-be colleagues. Where are they? I wondered. What classrooms were they going to be stationed in? Christina and I had been Facebook friends, communicating sporadically over the summer, often to discuss our shared interest in teaching. Christina was only twenty-one years old, fresh off completing a successful first year of teaching. Although she was twelve years my junior, and extremely bubbly and naïve, I looked up to her. I often sought out her advice, peppering her with any question I could think of. Christina was elated after finding out that I was interviewing for a teaching position at Crawford during the previous spring. She found me as I was taking a tour of the school with Mrs. Waller, the soon-to-be retiring principal. Christina’s eyes were open and she smiled brightly, opening her arms to embrace me as she approached. “Eze!” Christina said, giggling. “I can’t believe you are here!” She jumped at me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders and neck as she squeezed. I reciprocated her embrace with one of my own. “Yep,” I said. “I’m here. How are you doing?” “I’m so good,” Christina said. She unlocked her arms, prompting me to unclasp my arms from her waist. She took a few steps backward, putting her hands on her hips. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Principal Waller staring, a quizzical look on her face. Christina turned to the principal and said, “I’m sorry Principal Waller. But I’m just excited to see him.” Principal Waller smiled and said, “I can very well tell.” “Let me tell you, Principal Waller,” said Christina, slapping me on the shoulder. “Hire him. You will not be disappointed by the guy.” “I know, said Principal Waller. I hope not, I thought. “See you later Eze,” said Christina, waving. She turned and skipped away. I’m not kidding, she skipped. Crawford Elementary School is populated by young English Language learners, perhaps ninety percent or more, with a significant portion of the students speaking English and Spanish. Christina was the only Mexican American who taught in the school, and she spoke fluent Spanish and English. As I’ve said, she was only twenty-one years old, brimming with verve and excitement for life and her profession. There should have been more individuals like Christina — young, female, and Latino — teaching at the school. Instead, she was only one of two teachers of Latin descent, and the only Latin American who taught general studies. Elizabeth eventually arrived at her classroom later in the morning, completing the coalescence of the fifth-grade general studies teaching team. Although excited to be teaching at Crawford Elementary School, it had not been Elizabeth’s first choice. She had exhausted all other options before settling for a last-minute hiring as the fifth grade’s final piece. Of course, I was excited, for Elizabeth was a friend of mine, a good woman, who continually exhibited kindness and intelligence, a rare combination in a person I considered brilliant. Elizabeth was the type of person who greeted you at the finish line after everyone in the crowd had abandoned the race, content with watching their preferred runner cross the finish. She also seemed delicate though, perhaps too suburban to handle the black and brown kids from the neighborhood, rough and tumble young people who could sense a sensitive soul. Her relative inexperience in dealing with kids from the neighborhood, combined with the fact that she had not been exposed to the curriculum, were obstacles that she was going to have to overcome. Elizabeth possessed smarts and tenacity, though, and she’d already accumulated three years of experience teaching children in the classroom. She could perhaps draw from her experience when tackling the challenge of teaching kids from the neighborhood. Elizabeth also had the flaming red air cascading over her two shoulders, a symbol of a fiery temperament hiding beneath the sweet surface. And she was young enough — barely twenty-six years old — to put up a fight for an extended period. All five of the fifth-grade teachers met in Elizabeth’s room in the late afternoon, where we conversed for about a half hour before the more experienced members of the fifth-grade team exited the classroom, leaving Elizabeth and me alone to talk. We hugged and then looked into each other’s eyes, both of us disbelieving the fact that she, Christina, and I ended up at the same freaking elementary school. “I’m so glad you and Christina are here with me,” I said. “I don’t know, but it feels like I should be here now.” “Yes,” said Elizabeth. “To God be all the glory. He wanted us all to be here together, supporting each other, Eze.” “I guess he did,” I said. Elizabeth smiled and said, “Yes he did.” I took a moment to examine her learning walls, illuminated by creative and colorful aids, expertly placed in spaces to facilitate her students’ learning and retention of information. School hadn’t even started yet, and I knew that Elizabeth was going to be better than me. I grabbed Elizabeth by the wrist and said, “Come with me. I want to see what you think about how I’ve set up my classroom.” [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/9/2146045/-I-Was-A-Failed-School-Teacher-Chapter-2 Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/