Educators are the Veruca Salt of Working Professionals (Part 1)

 

Oompa Loompa Doompa-dee-do, I have another blogpost for you!

One of my favorite movies is Roald Dahl's "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory." While channel surfing on a boring weekend as a young lad, I would always stop on a channel if the original 1971 movie was playing. I loved the story, the sets, and the music. I consider Pure Imagination one of the greatest songs of all time. One of the other things I have enjoyed about this story is how my understanding of it has changed as I have grown older. 

After watching the new Broadway production of Matilda one year (another favorite of mine), I decided I was going to start every year reading Roald Dahl as part of our guided reading groups. I'm not even sure guided reading is a thing anymore, but the way we did it at our school was by splitting up students according to reading levels and Dibels scores. Each of my student groups ended up reading either "Matilda," "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," or "The Twits." 

My main focus during these reading groups was to help them learn how to read and understand punctuation and dialogue. I would give them specific characters to read and they would have to use expression to act out their parts. Another thing we focused on was the parts of the story like the setting, characters, and theme. We talked about the elements of a story arc like the exposition, conflict, climax, and resolution. 

One interesting thing that stuck with me when we were reading "Charlie and Chocolate Factory" was our discussion about the protagonist and antagonist. The Protagonist is somewhat easy to understand, but it wasn't until we really thought about the antagonist that we realized it wasn't even a person. The antagonist in this book is not Willy Wonka, but it's the Factory. Every room had something that tempted a kid to throw caution to the wind and prevent them from becoming the heir of the chocolate factory. 

Each character has a nasty behavior they manifest like Augustus Gloop (Gluttony), Violet (Pride), and Mike Taevee (Sloth). All of the characters are memorable in their own way, but Veruca Salt holds a special place in our hearts because I think we all know that type of person and have had to deal with them at one point.

When I think of Veruca Salt I think of an entitled girl who wants her daddy to give her everything she wants without having to work for it or earn it in any way. This is why I think, educators are the Veruca Salt of working professionals. I gave away the plot in the title of this post, but I'm a sucker for exposition I suppose. 

The additional point I wanted to make is that the machine, which is public education, is merely enticing them to act on their worst desires. Every year they want more, but what are they willing to do for what they want? Work more days or hours? Improve student outcomes? Before we cave into Veruca's screams of "I want it now!" we should first ask, what are you willing to do to in order to receive the golden egg (or squirrel, for the book lovers)? If we keep giving into demands without getting anything in return, our education system will surely end up in the same place as Veruca. 

To end on a positive note...

You can't handle the truth!

I came across the video linked below and it really made me think about the answers they gave in this roundtable interview. Every question they are asked, they continue to parrot the talking points that teachers feel like they need to give so that they can be seen as a "good" educator. 

Talking points I've heard throughout the years that don't seem to ever go away.

- Teachers don't make a lot of money.

- We can't blame the students for their behavior because you never know what's going on in their life.

- Teachers lack the resources to be successful

- The system is set up to fail these kids

- Teachers still do a lot of work in the Summer. 

- I love being a teacher because of that "ah-ha" moment.

I take issue with a lot of these answers because most of them simply don't hold true. 

Firstly, in Utah, the starting salary for a new teacher is between 50-60k. It may not seem like a lot compared to a Tech or Finance Bro, but it's a livable wage right out of college. Some states are still far behind that number, but every teacher jokes that they didn't get into it for the money. If that's the case, don't complain about it. 

We can definitely blame students for their actions and behaviors. Full stop. 

Teachers don't lack the resources they need to be successful, they lack the will to ask for those resources. If your administration is unable or willing to give you what you need, there are dozens of grants and organizations out there that you can write to and receive funds. I was able to purchase thousands of dollars worth of resources. Some teachers I worked with resented me for it because I had a classroom set of Chromebooks and iPads. These teachers could've also had these same resources if they had just written for the same grants I did. 

How is the system set up to fail the kids? Many of them receive free meals throughout the day, daycare after school, food and supplies for the weekend, and a free education. I lived in a poor African country for a couple of years and most were too poor to afford school. What is the definition of "failing"? The only failure I see is when we continue to move students through the system when they haven't shown that they are successful with current grade level content. But I am not allowed to say that because failing a kid only hurts them in the long run...so they say. 

Most teachers I know choose teaching and refuse to leave because of the summers. Almost everyone that applies for a job at the State Board of Education will always ask if we are required to work summers. The answer, of course, is yes. Just because we are in education doesn't mean we get our summers off. I loved my summers as a teacher and think about going back into teaching for that one reason alone. We recently had an employee leave the State Board for this very reason. 

I hate the "ah-ha" moment. I don't mean I hate seeing that in students, because it can be rewarding, but I feel like it's a fake answer. As an educator, our job is to build off previous knowledge, not present them with some new and fascinating concept they've never thought about. My goal is to limit how many "ah-ha's" for my students because if I'm doing my job, it should come naturally to the students and they should be able to grow in knowledge gradually. I know this is kind of a stupid point to make, but I really dislike when teachers use this as their "why" for teaching. If we were being honest, a lot of teachers would refer to the paragraph above as the real reason they love teaching. 

The interesting thing about this video is that throughout the video, they slowly drop their defenses and say things they are originally hesitant to say. These are things I'd love to talk about in a future post. For example, a few moments of truth that I found interesting were:

- I'm afraid of the students because they are bigger than me and could harm me.

- Teachers need help with the student's behavior 

Memories

And just like that, another year has passed me by. It's almost Memorial Day and I still get that giddy feeling in my stomach that school will almost be out for the summer. This time of year was one of my favorites as a teacher for many reasons. 

End-of-year testing was done. We could work on projects that were a little more creative and fun. Students are well trained on classroom procedures which makes classroom management easier. We would go to Hogle Zoo and This is the Place Park for our Salt Lake City field trip. One of my favorites, the weather was warming up enough to play scatterball with the students (Insert clip of Billy Madison pelting kids with balls). 

The last day of school was always fun for me as well because we would do three things. I would give out awards to the students for different achievements which included academics as well as behavior. (This may be controversial now, but only a handful of kids got awards in my class) I would hold our final auction of the year which was the biggest and best auction of the year. Lastly, I would create a yearbook video for the class using pictures and videos I had taken throughout the year. I would spend a month making this video and the mere process of making it would choke me up a little because it would be a reminder of how far we had come as a class that year. Watching it with my students on that last day was always a bonding moment for our class because sometimes you're so caught up in the minutia of the day-to-day that you forget all of the fun you had along the way. (See Example Video Below)

It made me think back to when I was a student. I don't remember learning the alphabet, the phases of the moon, or long division. I know I learned that stuff because I can still recall all of those items...except the moon stuff. (Science was never my strongest subject) What I do remember were the field trips, story-telling assemblies, and fun classroom parties put on by the teacher and parent volunteers. 

One thing I realized at the school I taught at was that we had a unique and positive school culture. I think this is mainly because our principal and staff made it a priority to create these fun activities that cement lasting memories with our students. We sacrificed our own time to blow up balloons to make professional-caliber decorations for Valentine's Day. We spent weeks setting up our spook alley in the basement that the neighborhood would use after school for a food drive. My brother would spend all year creating a yearbook video for the school to watch at the end of year, which left everyone with a salty discharge in their eyes. To this day, whenever I see an old student from Ellis, whether they are 15 or 28, they ask if my brother and I still make the Garbage Monster movies. 

Without a doubt, every year the media will do a story about whether or not we should be celebrating Halloween, Valentine's Day, or Christmas in our schools. Now that I've been out of the classroom for eight years, I can affirmatively say that I don't miss being in the classroom as much as I thought I would. But every time a holiday approaches, I long for my teaching days because those were the days we got to have a little fun where we didn't have to focus so much on the curriculum. We could just focus on bonding with our students and create some lasting memories. 

I mean, it's a long video, but you can't tell me that our students didn't have a blast at Ellis. 

Teacher Hungover on the First Day of School

Note: This is the first blog post I wrote for the EdTech startup company I worked for when I left teaching. I wanted to document it here because I think it still rings true for teaching, but also for any career or job change. Enjoy

Every year I show up hungover on the first day of school. An intoxication not produced by the consumption of liquor, spirits, or tainted fruit.  It’s produced from the lingering memories of the previous year.  As new students walk into my class for the first time I would get nostalgic about the students I had the previous year. When I meet my new students I slowly start to remember that we are starting from square one. They don’t know classroom routines and they definitely don’t know the new curriculum which we will be working tirelessly on all year long.  

This is what I call the hangover effect. I’ve been teaching for six years and it always hits me during the first week of school, but it always comes as a surprise for some reason.  When it does hit, I go through a series of stages similar in nature to the five stages of grief, but I only have three.   First I become angry, then I become depressed, and eventually, I accept the fact that I have to work just as hard this year as I did last year. The great, but difficult thing about teaching is that you start fresh every school year. 

To help me with this teacher hangover I’ve incorporated a principle that I learned from a teacher and mentor that lives in Los Angeles. He told me he adds one new thing to his class every year in order to push and motivate himself so that he doesn’t get stagnate. I’ve taken that advice to heart and have implemented something new every year in my own classroom.  Some are successful and some are not so successful, but the point is that it fires me up for the new school year. It keeps my mind busy during the summer and helps me get over my hangover quicker because the class and I are doing something that the previous class didn’t do. We’re learning something new together.  

(shameless plug for the company I worked for)

If you’d like to add something to your class this year I’d suggest finding a tech tool that you’d like to learn and integrate with your students. Great technology tools can be found in the ever-growing video library that Kyte Learning has available. My new favorite tool is EdPuzzle. Find a tool that works for you at KyteLearning.com. 

The Substitute!

There was a movie that came out in 1996 called "The Substitute." I haven't seen the whole movie, but I've seen clips on YouTube. I always criticize movies about education because they often exaggerate or leave out certain aspects of the profession. This one used to fit into that category, until last year.

My mentor, Rafe Esquith, would often say movie producers wanted to make a movie about him and his role as an educator teaching at an inner-city school in Los Angeles. He always turned them down because he never wanted to give the wrong impression about teaching. 

Odds are students won't be standing on a desk reciting poetry as you are being led out of the classroom for disobeying the headmaster of a private school. 

Odds are you aren't going to save an entire group of inner-city youths by having them write in a journal. 

Odds are you aren't going to walk into a school in Harlem as a teacher is quitting and then immediately take over the class where you learn more from the students than they learn from you. 

However, the movie after which I've titled this post after, was more correct than I wanted it to be. 

This last year, our state had a shortage of substitute teachers. It was so bad that the governor asked for state employees to take leave in order to substitute teach. In fact, the state would give us additional time off so we didn't have to use our personal leave. I don't know how many people took him up on this offer, but I do know the governor made time to substitute teach at a middle school long enough to get a few photos for the newspaper. (see below)

I thought this idea was awesome and I had even been talking about it with my colleagues at the state board of education. I know this sounds crazy, but I thought it was important for those of us working in education and making rules for educators, to dip our toe into the classroom occasionally in order to get a feel of what teaching is like in our schools. I stopped teaching in 2016 and I know our schools and students have changed drastically since then. 

I was lucky to find several opportunities to work in a number of school settings as a substitute. I worked at some jr. highs, high schools, and even an elementary school. I thought it would be just like riding a bike and I was somewhat correct. That is if the bike had two flat tires and no handlebars. 

It was a miserable experience. I know having your own classroom is a very different thing than being a substitute teacher, but I used to substitute teach back in 2009 and I felt like it was much easier back then. Almost every school had the same problem and it made me realize why we were having a substitute teacher shortage in the first place. 

The last substitute job I took was at an elementary school teaching 4th grade. This is the grade I used to teach and I was looking forward to it because I was a good 4th grade teacher. Sure, I had problem kids in my teaching days, but the classroom as a whole was good. Students got along and we had a good class culture. I thought I would be able to bring that same energy to this new classroom. I knew that might have been a bigger task than I expected as the principal continued to drop in throughout the morning. It was still early, but the principal had already come in twice to check in on me and the class. I soon realized why. 

After an hour or so, the first problem happened. Two students were starting to argue about something and then they started telling each other to eff off. This didn't sit well with me, so I sent them to the office. As I was watching them walk down the hall, some noise was coming from inside the classroom. It turns out one of the students, who was larger than most kids his age and bound to a wheelchair, was being teased by other students. I soon found that this was very common and he would often fight back and only make the teasing worse. 

As I went back inside to handle this fire, the school's counselor and learning coach came down to ask what the other two students had done. I told them that they were telling each other to eff off and the learning coach sighed and said, "When they use language like that we just remind them to use professional language." I could tell she knew that this was something that never worked in their school, but that is how they were taught to handle these types of situations. 

The only ray of light about this day was that they were being released early, so I only had to be there until 12:30. If it had been a full day, I would've left at lunch because it was that bad. There are many awful events that took place that day, but nothing worse than the email I got from the agency that was in charge of placing substitutes. 

I was told that MY behavior was unprofessional that day because a student had told a parent or teacher that I had said the class was awful (which they absolutely were). I was reprimanded for saying this. However, the context of me saying that to the class was it was AWFUL how they were treating that poor student in the wheelchair and they should stop bullying him. I wrote the company back and told them they didn't have to worry about me because I was never going to substitute teach for that school or district ever again. 

I left that school with a lot of feelings, none of them good. It made me really angry because this was a profession I loved, but it only took one day...ONE DAY!!! to make me so disheartened and bitter about it that I decided I'd probably never teach in the classroom again. I could talk about some of the other experiences I had during my short stint as a substitute teacher, but this is the one that stuck with me and impacted me the most. 

If you've ever substitute taught, my hat is off to you. If you're a teacher, please make that day as easy as possible for the substitute. Simple things like a seating chart or a class leader to help the substitute can make their day 100% better. 

Pro Tip: FERPA allows you to leave notes about specific students if you think it is applicable to their job for the day. Take advantage of this. 

So We Beat On, Boats Against the Current...Into the Past.

Why am I doing this? It's been over seven years since I've last written a blog post. I don't even know if blogs are still a thing anymore, but I've been wanting to get some of my thoughts down. I don't have a personal journal, so what better place to jot my memories than the internet for all to see. I think this first post needs to be a quick update and recap of the last few years. I'll break it down by career changes. 

2016-2017 Kyte Learning

I quit my job teaching at Ellis on August 1, 2016. The superintendent decided to move our principal to another school and I did not have a good feeling about the new one, so I wanted to jump ship. Luckily, a company I had been making videos for was looking to hire someone. They called me, asked if I was looking for a job, and I said yes. I started working for Kyte Learning that year and I loved it. I think a fear that most teachers have about leaving the classroom is that they will get bored sitting in a chair all day and not having the summers off. Well, let me assuage your fears, it was the best job I could've ever had at that time. Kyte is a small start-up that specializes in creating and curating ed tech videos for teachers in order to learn how to use technology in the classroom. I got to make some fun videos and make some great friends along the way. Unfortunately, my anxiety couldn't handle the idea of losing my job at any given moment if we lost our funding, so I decided to look for another job. 

2017-2020 USBE Student Data Privacy 

I interviewed for a student data privacy specialist position at the Utah State Board of Education. Originally, I only wanted to receive an offer so I could negotiate for a higher salary at Kyte Learning, but that anxiety of losing my job kicked in, so I begrudgingly accepted the offer from USBE. I went from playing Spike Ball twice a day at Kyte to sitting in a cubicle with little to no interaction with any of my coworkers at USBE. I thought I had made a huge mistake. Fortunately, my boss was good to me and we eventually hired someone within the agency that would eventually show me how to read law and policy. He also ended up being a really good on-screen personality, which was helpful because my main job was to create a series of training videos to help educators across the state understand student data privacy law. 

We made a lot of videos and I can honestly say that I had a blast making them. We traveled across the state to film in different locations and we received a lot of positive feedback on them. We were a new department and we had a small team, but that's what I loved about it. We were able to think outside of the government-mandated box and we did things differently. After three years, I felt like I had accomplished everything I set out to do with that job so I was becoming very bored. 

I decided in 2019 that I wanted to earn my school leadership license and become an administrator. There aren't many pathways in education that lead to more money, so I made this step thinking it was the most logical thing to do. I'm glad I went through this program because it made me realize that I'm not quite ready to become an administrator. I learned a lot and had some great experiences during my internships, but by the end of the program, I had become burned out and thought this would not be a good direction for me. 

2020-2023 USBE Licensing

I was already bored with my data privacy job, but I became miserable when COVID hit. I felt like I had nothing to do all day and I needed to change things up. Several jobs had opened up at USBE and I thought I'd throw my hat into the ring. After an interview, I was offered a job working in the licensing department where I would work with out-of-state applications and university educator preparation programs. I had never done any type of clerical work, but I thought it would give me a steady supply of work to do so that I wouldn't be bored anymore. Well, I underestimated the workload and soon became filled with stress and anxiety. It didn't help that most of the department was new and that COVID had fundamentally changed our work environment. On top of all of this, I was seriously dating someone and planning a proposal. Also, we were in the process of looking for a house in the middle of the housing boom. 

Needless to say, that first year was very hard, but I learned a lot along the way. I felt pretty comfortable in my role and am able to work with some great people. I've helped transition our department from physical to digital applications and have issued hundreds of licenses to educators across Utah. It's a good feeling to help someone with a license so they can apply for a job and start a new life in the state. 

Present Day

I ended up getting married in May of 2021. We moved into our house in June of 2021. Life is still marching forward and I'm happy where I'm at...for now. I'm not sure how long I'll be in my current position, but I often think back to my days teaching in the classroom. My wife makes fun of the fact that I have several large totes filled with materials from my time in the classroom. I'm not sure if other people who have left education have this feeling, but I'll occasionally long for my teaching days. It's a tough job, which is probably why I haven't decided to go back to the classroom. It is, however, a job that sticks with you and occasionally calls you back because you know you could've done a better job and you feel like you still got something left in the tank to give. I feel like Nick, talking about Gatsby and the green light at the end of the dock in "The Great Gatsby" 

"So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly, into the past."

The time just flies

NOTE: For the past year and a half the film maker above  (Casey Neistat) has truly inspired me

It's been a while since I posted last.  Over a year and a half actually.  Let me go over some details of what has happened in my teaching career as of late.  Firstly, I'm still teaching 4th grade at Ellis. Last year I had a really great class.  They ended up having the best test scores in the city which was pretty awesome.  My video club won some competitions again, but I really didn't like the kids in the club. I felt like I was babysitting more than I was teaching.  Last year ended up just being a really great year. I started feeling very comfortable with teaching and what I had to do to get students to succeed.

This year things have changed.  The other fourth grade teacher that taught with me left to teach 5th grade. That meant a new teacher came in to replace her. I've never been the veteran teacher and I've had a hard time adjusting to that role. Also, I must be a really horrible person because I've made this new teacher cry several times.  I don't know how to handle people that are so emotionally fragile.

I have an intern this year which has been great. Normally I would've hated having someone in my class all year, but our district has implemented a new reading and writing program.  I'm probably its most outspoken critic, which has left a bitter taste in the eyes of the district and my principal.  I still don't understand how administrators, who don't teach, can argue that materials, that they've never used before, are going to improve our scores.  Anyway, I've given the intern all of the reading and writing stuff (ReadyGen) to teach this year.  It's prevented me from having complete mental breakdowns and quit, so there's that.

We had about 34 kids in my class this year and they are a weird bunch.  Definitely some trouble makers, but they are coming along slowly now.  It makes me really miss last year's class. The following is a list of stuff I've accomplished for memory sake:
- Made several films for the school district
- Won several video contests from ProjectEd.com and NextVista.org
- Won the Voya Unsung Hero grant/award for $2,000 to start a film festival
- Got some money to start a Lego Robotics league (never competed in the league....oops)
- Started making videos for several companies.
- Taught a 4-H club how to edit videos (it did not go as well as I expected)

Anyway, right now I'm walking on the aforementioned moving sidewalk.  Last year I was running on it and life was great. I'm trying to motivate myself to run on it again, but then I get tired and I just rest on it, which sends me further back than where I started last year.  The main reason for my lack of motivation is that our new Superintendent has blacklisted me from ever getting a better job in this district and my principal hates me because I make teachers cry.  It's amazing how different you can feel from one year to the next.  I must be in one of the valleys they saw on the last blog post.  I'm just trying to figure out what mountain I want to try and climb next.