I quit my job

Yes, you heard right. I quit my job in THIS economy with THIS recession. I had a job and I quit it. Simple. Wow, pretty gutsy you're thinking, huh? Especially since I'm bilingual and I probably could get a job anywhere, right? Not so fast. Let me take you back, keep going, yup a little further...STOP! It's 1968-69 my room in Venezuela, ( country currently controlled by a madman in South America,) and I'm hard at work. I had a class full of girls and they were silent. Either I was captivating or they were mute. I'll go with mute since they were dolls. Each of them, however, was getting a brilliant lesson on whatever it was that I had learned that day. Complete with teacher imitations I might add. O.K., so, what's the big deal? The big deal is that I always knew I wanted to become a teacher and through moves, coups, deaths and yes, even college I never wavered in my determination. Hold on we are moving again.......it's now 2000 and I hear rumors of what the NCLB No Child Left Behind is going to mean for the lowly but all important classroom teacher. State accountability standards, funding cuts or increases, incentive pay etc., but really, what did that mean to my little 3rd graders? Nothing THEN, but scoot up to 2008-09 school year. I changed schools within my fabulous district wanting to become more involved with the neediest of the needy English Language Learners, from now to be referred to as ELLs.

I felt that having grown up in Latin America and learning English as a second language I could possibly have something to offer. The door opens to a brand new year of possibilites. I feel like Mary Poppins. Aretha Franklin's R.E.S.P.E.C.T is blaring in my head. I meet my babies, I fall in love and then I get sick. They can't read, they can't write and they sure can't do math. What??? No way, I do some digging. Most, not all had been at the school since kindergarten and some since pre kinder. You do the math, yeah that's right 3 years. Hmmm, what were they doing in those lower grades? No time for that, gotta get 'em ready to pass THE TEST. You know, if you don't pass you don't pass, but really what it means is that the school gets a little red mark for too many non passers. Ok, I'm game, let's get going. So we do. Early morning school (7a.m.-7:45), lunch group so they can learn geography, after school, Saturday school I mean we schooled them. All of us as a collective unit at my school did a great job. THEY PASSED THE TEST!!!! YIPPEE!!!! Oh, but they can barely read, I mean I taught them HOW to pass the test but I didn't really teach them HOW to READ. So in comes this year and guess what????? They can't read, again. Well, they ARE better than last year but not where they "should" be.

My quittin' reason. Evidently lesson plans and their forms are way more important than teaching kids how to read, write and to arithmitic. Not too many want to hear that out there, but it's true. Why else would a veteran teacher with 100% of her students passing THE TESTS quit on Sept. 15th? I'll tell you why. Teachers care about their kids, but after that no one else does. Oh they say they do, but they are a statistic and if they are ELL kiddos they become well, money in the districts pockets. So, saute all that up and what do you get? A receipe for FAILURE TO EDUCATE THE TOTAL CHILD. Don't get me wrong, I have friends that are excellent teachers still hard at work, laboring long into the night over lesson plans and various other things they have to do like grade papers, enter grades, attend meeting after meeting after meeting. They are the heroes of this story. They stuck it out. I got out to tell the rest of you what is actually happening during a school day and what my heroes have to do all day every day to earn a living. My principal told me on my way out, "I look forward to reading your first book." I wonder, did she realize what she was asking?

So, yes, I quit to become a writer, a blogger, an activist and a voice for my kids, soon to be someone else's kids. I'll never stop fighting. Won't you join me on this ride? It'll be full of adventure I can assure you of that. A collossal fight worth fighting, pure and unadultarated education. I have a question for you my dear friends? Is that too much to ask?

Until tomorrow, when we really dig deep into the bowls of la-la land school.