Tuesday, 7.17.18
12:53pm
36 years old
184 pounds
Topeka, KS
A bunch of fat raindrops sit pregnant and poised to pop in the bloated, humid air of a summer day in the capital city of Kansas. Topeka is not a place anyone chooses who isn't from here. Topeka is a place to which you become chained as a child. My coworkers and I have been summoned here to teach a software we know to be buggy to a group of teachers who are here against their will. Eyes are glassy with boredom in the reflection of their laptop screens. They are full from lunch, and sleepy. They are growing restless as my cohorts continue to bullshit their way through functionality we know to be problematic. I'm here to shadow and to learn. I make myself an effective shadow - I sit quietly in a corner and I watch. All I've learned so far is that this is not going anywhere near as smoothly as my colleagues would like. This morning's training took three hours. In that time, I heard the phrase, "what you should have seen" or "what should have happened" eight times.
A bulletin board in the hallway gives examples to students of a fixed mindset versus a growth mindset. I pause as I read "I made a mistake" under the fixed mindset. This doesn't make sense to me. Admitting to our mistakes, learning from them, and moving forward might not exactly be the elixir of life, but it certainly shows a mindset capable of growth. Admitting a mistake is difficult. The bulletin board makes me think of all the mistakes I've made lately, how I've owned up to them, and how I've moved forward. The header is making me wonder whether or not I've remained fixed in my thinking, or if I've exhibited growth. The whole of my life can be summed up by my mistakes, and the redemptive arc of my personal story can be measured in the lessons I learned from them. As I pause by the bulletin board, I wonder if the arc is as heroic as I imagine it to be. I wonder if what I've learned is what I've needed to know.
Frustrated by the limitations of our software's functionality, a teacher asks if a specific feature can be added that would make her job easier. As the administrator in the room answers her, another teacher pipes up and says, "I thought if you asked often enough, eventually they give you what you want so you'll leave them alone." This strikes me as ironically funny. I wonder how many of their students ask incessantly for things that they'd like, and how often the teachers find themselves annoyed by the constant peppering. The qualities that make a child annoying are seen as being admirable in an adult. If I ask you over and over as a nine-year-old, I am a busybody. If I ask as an adult, I'm displaying stick-to-it-iveness and follow-through.
I remind myself of the artificiality of this entire construct. A software program that is known to be buggy has been sold to a school district in need of a short-term solution, is being taught by instructors who mask the faults of the system, is being used to record the progress of students who are judged by an imperfect rubric and standardized tests that don't measure their skills accurately. The adults in charge of this whole construct have created their own language for it. Succeeding in this world is related directly to how well they know this tongue. What happens to anyone after leaving this world is for the fates to decide. Students are afterthoughts now, as they will be until the first day of school rolls around. On that day, students will be thrilled to return to school to see their friends and get their classes and debut their outfits and show off their summers. They will be greeted by educators who are burned out from a summer of learning a system that no one asked if they wanted, with which no one feels completely comfortable. We have no intention of fixing the education problem in this country - we focus solely on tinkering with and improving a student information tracking software because it is profitable for us to do so. We have hired away teachers who used to care about students. We have hired away teachers who were fed up with the bureaucracy of the system. On three different occasions, I have heard the administrator remind her teachers to clock in so that they can be paid for the day and each time, this is greeted with a knowing laugh - the cash is why they are all here. This is an open secret. This is where we are now, and this is where we will stay.
I'll be happy to leave Topeka because I will be happy to leave these reminders behind me: reminders that the product I'm peddling is digital snake oil; reminders that these teachers are being forced to adapt AGAIN to a system no one wants; reminders that students are taught now that admitting to a mistake is not a signal of growth; reminders that money lubricates and powers this motor, and keeps it humming along smoothly. I remind myself that this is just my job. I remind myself of the artificiality of it all. When I return home, this all falls away again and I can go back to being myself and I won't have to remind myself to smile politely in the face of a monster who cannot and will not die.
12:53pm
36 years old
184 pounds
Topeka, KS
A bunch of fat raindrops sit pregnant and poised to pop in the bloated, humid air of a summer day in the capital city of Kansas. Topeka is not a place anyone chooses who isn't from here. Topeka is a place to which you become chained as a child. My coworkers and I have been summoned here to teach a software we know to be buggy to a group of teachers who are here against their will. Eyes are glassy with boredom in the reflection of their laptop screens. They are full from lunch, and sleepy. They are growing restless as my cohorts continue to bullshit their way through functionality we know to be problematic. I'm here to shadow and to learn. I make myself an effective shadow - I sit quietly in a corner and I watch. All I've learned so far is that this is not going anywhere near as smoothly as my colleagues would like. This morning's training took three hours. In that time, I heard the phrase, "what you should have seen" or "what should have happened" eight times.
A bulletin board in the hallway gives examples to students of a fixed mindset versus a growth mindset. I pause as I read "I made a mistake" under the fixed mindset. This doesn't make sense to me. Admitting to our mistakes, learning from them, and moving forward might not exactly be the elixir of life, but it certainly shows a mindset capable of growth. Admitting a mistake is difficult. The bulletin board makes me think of all the mistakes I've made lately, how I've owned up to them, and how I've moved forward. The header is making me wonder whether or not I've remained fixed in my thinking, or if I've exhibited growth. The whole of my life can be summed up by my mistakes, and the redemptive arc of my personal story can be measured in the lessons I learned from them. As I pause by the bulletin board, I wonder if the arc is as heroic as I imagine it to be. I wonder if what I've learned is what I've needed to know.
Frustrated by the limitations of our software's functionality, a teacher asks if a specific feature can be added that would make her job easier. As the administrator in the room answers her, another teacher pipes up and says, "I thought if you asked often enough, eventually they give you what you want so you'll leave them alone." This strikes me as ironically funny. I wonder how many of their students ask incessantly for things that they'd like, and how often the teachers find themselves annoyed by the constant peppering. The qualities that make a child annoying are seen as being admirable in an adult. If I ask you over and over as a nine-year-old, I am a busybody. If I ask as an adult, I'm displaying stick-to-it-iveness and follow-through.
I remind myself of the artificiality of this entire construct. A software program that is known to be buggy has been sold to a school district in need of a short-term solution, is being taught by instructors who mask the faults of the system, is being used to record the progress of students who are judged by an imperfect rubric and standardized tests that don't measure their skills accurately. The adults in charge of this whole construct have created their own language for it. Succeeding in this world is related directly to how well they know this tongue. What happens to anyone after leaving this world is for the fates to decide. Students are afterthoughts now, as they will be until the first day of school rolls around. On that day, students will be thrilled to return to school to see their friends and get their classes and debut their outfits and show off their summers. They will be greeted by educators who are burned out from a summer of learning a system that no one asked if they wanted, with which no one feels completely comfortable. We have no intention of fixing the education problem in this country - we focus solely on tinkering with and improving a student information tracking software because it is profitable for us to do so. We have hired away teachers who used to care about students. We have hired away teachers who were fed up with the bureaucracy of the system. On three different occasions, I have heard the administrator remind her teachers to clock in so that they can be paid for the day and each time, this is greeted with a knowing laugh - the cash is why they are all here. This is an open secret. This is where we are now, and this is where we will stay.
I'll be happy to leave Topeka because I will be happy to leave these reminders behind me: reminders that the product I'm peddling is digital snake oil; reminders that these teachers are being forced to adapt AGAIN to a system no one wants; reminders that students are taught now that admitting to a mistake is not a signal of growth; reminders that money lubricates and powers this motor, and keeps it humming along smoothly. I remind myself that this is just my job. I remind myself of the artificiality of it all. When I return home, this all falls away again and I can go back to being myself and I won't have to remind myself to smile politely in the face of a monster who cannot and will not die.
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