Back to School Blockbuster
We talk about a wide range of school-related topics. Virtual learning pods, being anti-racist in educational spaces, and liberal arts core. Plus, a beautiful commemoration from Mairin about teaching.
If you want to submit a commemoration or send a question to ask Sarah and Beth, please email hello@pantsuitpoliticsshow.com with "Commemoration" or "Ask Sarah and Beth" in the subject line.
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Transcript:
Beth Silvers: [00:00:00] Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us for this episode of the nuance life. You all have many thoughts about school as do we...
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:00:07] So does every American on planet earth,
Beth Silvers: [00:00:10] We're going to do what Elise is calling a back to school blockbuster that will range from kindergarten to college, probably beyond in both directions as we discuss this more and we will just dive right into it.
I also want to mention before we get into school stuff, that if you are not a regular Pantsuit Politics listener, You just must join us on Friday. We are having Anne Helen Peterson on to discuss her book 'can't even', about millennial burnout. It is such a good conversation that touches on so many themes that frequently come around here on The Nuance Life. So even if you feel like politics is not normally your thing, this is an unmissable conversation.
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:00:51] So we are going to start out with a question from Meredith. Like many of you, she has formed a virtual learning pod where families can learn together and hire teachers to support their kids while virtual learning.
She said, her community is not diverse. There are upper middle class families and their families and subsidized housing. She says "we have extremely little in between. I cannot wrap my mind around what the answer is here. A family that needs childcare and support while both parents work, hiring a nanny to facilitate school sounds practical and splitting the cost with other family sounds even more practical, but how do we lift up these families and children who do not have this option who have such limited options already? How do we choose what is best in this situation? Not just what is best for our family. How do we support beyond sending money in these COVID times?"
"My answer has been so far to do everything I can to get these kids back in the classroom as quickly as possible, and stated verbal opposition to schools, allowing sports programs in person, but not IEP and the IP services. But our underserved communities were extremely upset at the shutting down of the sports programs because of the scholarships that come from those programs."
"I'd like to hear more discussion on this issue. I don't know that there are answers, but if there are, they are difficult."
Beth Silvers: [00:01:56] I don't know if there are answers here either. I think working to get school reopened safely is the best answer. Because short of that, whether we want it to be this way or not, we all are just trying to do the best that we can.
As many of, you know, I put together with three other families in my neighborhood, a little pod, we didn't hire someone. We worked together as moms to kind of take over that learning time. And we have stopped meeting for class and are just letting the kids get together and play when they're finished, because it felt like we were sort of.
Fighting with the school. That those are my words. I don't know how the other moms would put it, but it just, it was so stressful for everyone because what the school is delivering for distance learning with us is really designed for a child to be sitting alone in a quiet space with a parent sitting beside them when they need them.
That's just not available to practically anyone, but that's what it is being designed for. And it becomes really obvious to me when I'm trying to help Ellen with one of her calls. So she's in kindergarten and you see kids who are in like a childcare setting, participating in these calls and when it's their turn to talk, it's super loud behind them.
If they have trouble with the mute. Button the teacher saying, can you go ask the helper in your room to help you with this? I mean, it's so silly. All of this to me has been just a complete failure and it looks like it's a failure for the teachers and for the families I've said over and over, we get all of the downside of homeschooling and none of the upside.
And so while I completely agree that. Families who are able to hire a teacher to come in and help have some advantage. I'm not sure how much advantage it is because of the way that things from school are designed to be delivered. I just can't criticize people for doing the best they can in what is a miserably hard situation.
And I do think the recognition that there is a connection among our kids that can only happen in the context of an actual classroom is important. And so advocating for us to get back to that school setting to me is the most equitable,
well, I think that has with everything COVID is just a manifestation of a bigger problem, right?
This conversation around virtual pods is reflected of. Inequity across the system, you know, and it's something I've been thinking a lot about my role in, as I know, many of us have as we were listening along to the New York times, very nice white parents. And so, you know, something, I asked myself and think about a lot, which I think is it did in this virtual pod situation, is, am I opportunity hoarding or am I truly trying to advocate for every child in the system?
Uh, so for example, let me give an example. At my elementary school, they still use the taking away of recess as a classroom management technique. So you have to sit out or for a host of reasons. And I thought, well, I CA I dislike this strongly because of my two children who one of which has not been diagnosed with ADHD, but I thought, well, I don't want to just go in there and push for different roles for my kid.
I'd like this to be a policy across the district, honestly, but particularly at our school, that this is not. A classroom management technique. And so I went to SBDM and then covert happened and I, and I really understand we're going to talk about this in the next question, to the sense of like, at this time, It's really hard because there's the paradox of, this is the moment where we're thinking about our systems.
This is the moment where we can articulate and show clearly some of the inequities within the system. And also this is the moment where the system is incredibly taxed and I felt this sense of like, I really don't want to criticize or pile on when our public school systems are already dealing with so much.
And so I, I'm trying to be really thoughtful. Okay. Well, where is the best, most impactful way I can articulate my concerns where I'm not taxing individual teachers, where I'm really advocating for policy change that I think would be helpful and also not a bigger lift, but maybe even an easier lift in a situation like we're currently experiencing because there are fewer kids in the classroom.
So it's like, you know, I know this is like, Several rounds of mental gymnastics. But I think, you know, if we're worried about inequities thinking about any criticisms we have through the lens of how they impact every kid in the system and not just our kid in the system, whether we're talking about virtual pods or another policy issue we have is a, is a great first step.
I think it's a great first step. Just the fact that you're asking these questions is good.
And I think asking the question is different than being. Angry with people who have taken the more privileged option. And I feel like we're losing our, our grasp on that distinction because kids who are in these virtual pods supervised by a teacher.
We don't need those kids to suffer in order to be able to say, everyone should have had that opportunity and suffering is not the right word. I'm struggling with language around this because I do want to be sensitive to all the factors, but I really struggle in a host of spaces with our villainization.
Of people doing what they think is best for their kids. While we're asking questions about equity, it is just the fact that COVID-19 has put all of us in a situation where we are afraid in a number of respects. And when we talk about kids and their mental health, we are also talking about the mental health of their caregivers and.
I just think I'm not going to judge any caregiver for the decisions that they make, that they believe are going to most promote their family units, mental health. I'm just not sure. Even where there is an issue of equity, that that is a societal issue, not an individual one. It's the same thing that you've been talking about so much lately, Sarah, one family opting out of that more privileged arrangement.
Doesn't yes. Closer to the goalpost of more equitable education system for all kids. And so I would like for us to preserve. Some some space between saying, wow, this, this really shines a light for me on this issue of equity. And I'm really mad at those people who have that option.
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:08:42] Well, and here's the thing, the best way I have found to articulate this when I'm just talking with my girlfriends about this issue is to say, I am not mad at you.
Because you want what's best for your child. What I have come to understand is what is best for my child is equity for every child. I truly believe. Okay. Actual equity. Is better for my sons, then a place at the top of an inequitable system, because that is toxic and that is cancerous for the soul. And I don't want that for my boys.
I don't want that for my boys. When we say we want what's best for our kids. Maybe the best question we can ask in conversations with our friends and fellow parents is what does that mean for you? What does that mean? When you say you want what's best for your child, because does best mean access to every extracurricular does best mean the highest grades at the most famous school to what end?
What do you think that will procure for your child? And why do you think that will make them happy? Because there's deeper stuff going on there when people say. I want what's best for my kid and just shaming them and making them feel like they're a bad parent because they want what's best for their kid, quote unquote, is really not the way to examine that alongside them.
Beth Silvers: [00:10:27] And I would just add to that, that in a crisis situation and really throughout their lives. I think that question needs to be what's best for my kids right now. Right now my kids need other kids. That's what's best for them. Honestly, I would be fine with just calling this a gap year and saying next year, Jane's going to do fourth grade again, and Ellen's going to do kindergarten again.
I would be fine with that. I don't think anything in the world is lost. If that's where we end up. That might not be true for every family. I fully acknowledge it, but I'm not thinking about this from the perspective of, Oh my gosh. Like they're losing valuable time. They could be involved in whatever extracurricular activity or accumulating these grades or moving forward at a pace, whatever.
I just, they, they need other kids right now. And so as you answer these questions, you know, I just think we have to have a lot of grace and understanding that none of us are operating from an ideal scenario. And, and those of us who have more choices in the matter, acknowledging that we have more choices, hopefully will motivate us to be better listeners in PTA meetings.
We're able to have those again and yeah. Reach out to the school and say, what do you need? Guidance office is you did Sarah and inspired me to do, like, there are lots of ways that we can contribute without leading. And I think part of what we have to recognize when we have more options is that maybe we shouldn't be the leading voices on the decisions about whether school reopens or whether we get back to soccer practice or whatever it is.
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:12:11] Is it a good transition to our question from Sarah? She noticed a racially problematic story in our kindergarten child's language arts curriculum, ticky, ticky, Timbo by Arlene muscle. And she made some decisions about hand, how to handle it. She feels guilt about, you know, criticizing her amazing public school.
That's a hard year, but she did feel like it was important to speak up. She sent a letter to the publisher and she emailed one of the school's administrators as kindly as possible. But she wanted to talk to us about how we think about speaking up when we see something wrong or taking anti-racist actions within our school systems.
Beth Silvers: [00:12:45] I think it's great that she spoke up. I mean, you and I are in a position of frequently receiving critical feedback. And it is so easy to welcome critical feedback when it's offered in a spirit of, I just want to make things better. And so to me, the fact that Sarah is asking the question of, you know, how do I do this without piling on to people who are already strained?
It means that she probably did it beautifully. It's the people who like clearly are dashing off an angry note to make themselves feel awesome that don't do this well, but. It is needed for all of us to say, I just want to raise a flag here. I know that this is probably been used for years. Maybe no one's ever spoken up, but I'm really trying to raise my own consciousness about this.
And I want to mention it to you whenever you come from that place. I feel an enormous sense of gratitude to people who, who approach us in that way.
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:13:41] Well, it's an, I think this is so fraught. Um, you know, I just mentioned in the previous question that I am trying to get this policy change at my school with regards to recess.
And when I brought it back to the vice principal, I talked about two examples in my current child's classes and our, with the kindergarten and with the fourth grade. And I regret doing that because then it immediately became about individual teachers. Managements. And I, you know, the kindergarten teacher reached out to me and I said, look, this is not assure you with all the breath in me that I'm not trying to go above your head.
And, you know, Make change to your individual classroom management. I have no problems with your individual classroom management, but I do think it's hard to walk that line. And because of, you know, the vocational law, we talked about pantsuit politics on Tuesday that we treat teachers as if they're holding up the world, but we don't pay them as professionals.
To what they deserve. It's hard because any criticism, even if you make it abundantly clear that it is a criticism of policy becomes a conversation about you don't trust us. That has been my experience, even though I come from a family of educators and of course I trust and value teachers, but there is not a lot of room to say I trust and value.
And also I disagree with this decision in this policy. Like that is hard. It's just hard. And you know, the relationship we held with our listeners is so different than the relationship. Many of us hold with our schools and the teachers. And I think because of decades of underpay and under appreciation and the people who do roll in right.
Burn the whole thing down, like they're just, they're really raw. And I, since like defensive, rightly so. Yeah. I mean, I just, and I just say that to say, like, I think we should be upfront about it. There is an enormous amount of. Raw emotion, particularly right now, if you come forward with any criticism, even if you are extraordinarily careful to make sure that you are saying that it's just policy and not a criticism of the teacher, but, you know, I think in some way, especially if you're talking about being the work of being anti-racist like, look, I think the hard reality is there's no way to really advocate for anti-racist policies without upsetting people.
I mean, I think that that's, you know, sort of built into the definition of antiracist work and, you know, I think just to articulate clearly and repeatedly, this is not about you as an individual. I think you're doing a great job. And also I disagree with this curriculum or this policy. It's just hard. I just think it's, it's important to be honest, that this is it's hard because people, like I said, because of.
Underpay and under appreciation and the stress of our current situation are very they're raw and they're fragile, I think, but,
Beth Silvers: [00:16:32] you know, I think that's always true even outside of this and it's just not serving us, like not having these conversations is not serving us. And so that is a reason to approach it thoughtfully, but not a reason to not do it.
As you're doing, you know, you're marching ahead, even though it's really hard. And I think all of us need to do that. And, and there is a difference again, to me, this is about making your strong offer and then releasing control of what happens from there, because it very much may be that you send this note and the book stays.
That could happen. It still mattered that you said something and you can not resent the teacher forever or the school forever, or the publisher forever. If the book stays, even with your objection out there, like part of being willing to wholeheartedly engage with people in these uncomfortable conversations is knowing that you do your best, but then what happens from there isn't yours anymore.
And also. Assuming the best of that other person as you do your best. So I will tell you, Ellen went to school for two hours as part of this soft reopening last week was a very stressful day because the same day that she went is the day that both of my parents received positive COVID tests. So I had a big bucket of emotions going.
We were also selling a car which necessitated a whole lot of running around. It was just, there was a lot. And Ellen comes home and I asked her how school was and she drops her head and she says, I don't really want to talk about it. And I said, why? And she said, I did something wrong. And I said, what did you do, Ellen?
She was there for two hours. I'm like struggling to imagine what she's done wrong in two hours. And she said,
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:18:20] Oh, I can imagine lots of things. Felix can do wrong in two
Beth Silvers: [00:18:22] hours. She said, I'm really sad and embarrassed. And it took like most of the evening for her to tell me what happened. And what happened was that she drank out of her water bottle that was in her backpack instead of the paper cups that had been provided to her.
Oh goodness. And she said that her teacher was mad at her about it, and I will be very vulnerable and tell you that, that lit me up. I was so hot. I was so angry about it and not integration space, but I calmed down and I thought, assume the best in that teacher here, knowing that the teacher is also like frayed.
And RA and all the things that I am in spades. Right. And so I did send the teacher a note because I thought I need to understand if there's more to this story, it could be that Ellen was told not to use that. And then she did, or that she was disrespectful in some way. Right. And I wanted to understand, because for Ellen to say I'm sad and embarrassed when not a lot ruffles her feathers is a big deal.
So I reached out to the teacher and just said, I. You know, Ellen came home telling me that she was sad and embarrassed about the thing that happened at school. And I wanted to understand if Ellen crossed a line with you and how we should address that at home. And we had a lovely interaction. She was very gracious.
I still ended up having a conversation with my girls about how some role, those are dumb. And sometimes we have to follow dumb rules. But, you know, it was, it went down fine, even though it could have been hard. And I think it probably did. I, it was probably not a good point in her day. And I'm sorry about that.
And also I needed to know, because it was not the introduction to school that I wanted to Ellen either. And so I'm just saying like all of these hard conversations we got to check in with ourselves constantly. I did not want to. Come at this teacher hard. I also did not want to totally let it go. And I thanked her and told her, I know that these are very long, hard days.
I really appreciate you getting back to me. And she was very kind and it's fine. So you have to release, release the expectations after you've said what you want to say in the way that you want to say it. And Ellen's water bottle way less important than anti-racist work. So go forth, Sarah, do your thing.
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:20:42] Well, and I think, you know, it's such a good example of what we're talking about, right? That you're not rolling in as a consumer insight change this thing. You're saying I'm a part of this. I'm a, I'm a part of the system too. Parents are, that's why school is so fraught. There are so many stakeholders, children, parents, employees, teachers, administrators, government.
That's why it's so fraught. Cause it is a system that holds a lot of people and a lot of expectations. And you know what I always want to convey when I do. Criticize teachers or administrators is like, I am in this with you. We are on the same team. I'm not coming here to antagonize you. I'm coming here because I want what's best.
And we might disagree with that, but that does not change the fact that we are on the same team. You know, like I told her, I'm my child's kindergarten. I'm like, please know that I don't really negate. I don't ever want to do that. This is the bargain we've struck. I send them and I don't. Re litigate, every little single thing you do.
Cause they're not here with me and I'm happy with, I'm happy to strike that bargain, you know, but when it comes a systematic thing, which I feel like the recess thing is then I'm going to have to say something. Not because I don't think you'd know what's best, but right now we have the same values, but we disagree about strategy and that's okay.
That's okay. But it's like you said, like. But I have to release that because participating in a system where we're all in the same team means that I can control the outcome every time. And that's hard. That's really, really hard, especially when we feel like the stakes are so high because it's kids. And I think, you know, I learn every time I interact with a teacher or with an administrator, or I have another conversation with my family of educators, you know, I learned something else and I learned something powerful about how to interact with the system and how to interact with human beings.
And I learned something about myself and that's, you know, that's all we can hope for.
Beth Silvers: [00:22:46] we also heard from Jillian moving on to college. The faculty at her liberal arts school is discussing core reform. They had planned to do this pre-COVID and they are asking the question, what do we want our students to know as we send them out to be citizens of the world. And I think we should just stop and say most healthy discussion begins with a good question.
And that is a good question. She said, "we can still teach things like Jane Austin and the Brontes, but let's tie their themes of independence and gender inequality to the me too movement happening now. And I think it's obvious that we need hefty doses of American history from the non-white perspective and possibly some basic civics as well."
So that's her question to us. What basic ideas would you want college grads to know as they become citizens of the world?
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:23:30] That's so good. You know, I think the most powerful thing I learned in college was critical thinking. The idea and the ability to question my own opinions, to be able to back up what I was saying was something, besides everybody has a right to their opinion, and to be able to.
Understand the limits of my own perspectives and to seek out differing perspectives. And so to me, that's it like that's the whole ball game of college is critical thinking, how do I learn logical fallacies and where historical perspectives have failed us in the past and where we need new narratives and psycho psychology was hugely impactful for me as a college student.
Like all those, because I think all of those lead to the same. They just on the same journey, which is to be able to be critical thinkers.
Beth Silvers: [00:24:22] I definitely agree about critical thinking what I did not learn in college, and I probably needed to learn well in advance of college and just never got in my education was a sense of.
How my own strengths should direct me in life. It was always like, I was just a person in a system up against this like objective curriculum that applies to all people. And because of that, I was just really untethered to any sense of direction for myself. I just wanted to succeed in that system. And that was the objective.
And it's not that I think you should be like telling third graders, you're going to be an engineer. But I do think like some kind of pervasive, social, emotional learning component. I see this happening now with my kids and it's so encouraging. Just the sense of like, okay, we're done. She needed to be a thinker.
We're teaching you about the world. Now think about your place in it. And where you can start. What interests you? What makes you excited? What do you feel a little fire about inside of you? When we talk about it, those questions just were not a part of my occasion at any moment, all the way through law school.
And I think that's really sad. And I think it's been obvious to me as I've talked with other people about their experiences with education, I was just talking to two really smart women who have really different career paths than mine. And what all of us had in common was getting to college and being like, I have no idea what I want to do next.
And. It's not that you should know precisely, but having some sense of like what helps me make that decision and I think would be really valuable. And I do just think the more you can instill in college, an interest in being a lifelong learner that you're not done here, that there are so much more to explore about yourself and the world and your community and the people around you.
I do think that college did that for me. And that that should be a part of any kind of discussion about. At our core, are we inspiring people to always be learning more instead of just impressing us that they've learned what we've told them so that they can move on to the next thing?
Sarah Stewart Holland: [00:26:48] No, I definitely agree with that.
I definitely agree with that. Before we wrap up, we want to share Marin's beautiful commemoration of working within education and being a teacher. Yeah. And we wanted Marin to share this with you in her own voice.
Maren: [00:27:01] Thank you so much for creating the space myself and others to meditate upon and relish.
These formative moments of our lives cannot begin to express my gratitude for your shows, your device and your grace. I'm writing today with a whole massive commemorations about being a teacher. I grew up as the second oldest child of eight children of a single mother whose main source of income was substance farming and running a small business, selling goats, milk soap, and giving lectures on her agricultural practices.
She never said no to an opportunity to make money as she was. Constantly scraping to make ends meet. She depended on a tight community neighbors and church goers to keep our family functioning. So she also never said no to an opportunity to repay and kind and lend a hand. Teaching is the job I have wanted since I was in second grade, aside from ballerina, of course, I grew up in a chaotic and unstable home where my quiet, demeanor and eagerness to please meant that it was difficult to stand out.
But at school I really stood out. I did very well because I loved being there so much. And because I love and lived for the, of my teachers filling the role of an overstretch mother and absent father. Interestingly, my mother tried to talk me out of being a teacher. She worked with such fervor to create a dream job that she felt like I was settling and not living up to my potential, which are some exact words by becoming a teacher.
I have a wonderfully unusual mother who may be the only parent in history who was disappointed. Her children. Didn't try to be rockstars ballerinas. Okay. Painters. So first I want to commemorate becoming a teacher in the first one. Place. I want to commemorate that. Although teachers are being trampled over now more than ever.
My love of literature, my curiosity about the world, my compassion for the adolescent psyche and my reverence for the adolescent zeal for asking questions and writing wrongs. I want reassure me that teaching is what I was always meant to do. My mother, my main role model for womanhood was someone who spread herself impossibly thin by necessity and by character, but who also never stopped pursuing ways to create her ideal job and life on the farm.
The other women that I was taught to admire were martyrs and missionaries who go over their strength, skills, identities, and lives to a cause of goodness, godliness or greatness. So when I became an educator, I also learned to spread myself then in an impossible hunt for the balance between martyrdom and the name of helping children and gaining accolades and recognition from the female school teachers whose approval I desperately sought.
Somewhere in that impossible balancing act. I added the weight of gardening, harvesting, canning, pickling, and cooking in an effort to hold on to the values of being connected to the land and the seasons. And that were instilled by my own mother. I'm not insult your intelligence or womanhood by adding to this, the long list of other unrealistic.
The expectations. I placed upon myself with regards to my mothering teaching housekeeping or maintenance of my physical appearance. It will shock not a single person that all of this was a recipe for a human on the brink of it. Traveling for you. Years ago, I transitioned from teaching in title one schools, where I was regularly in lockdown drills after school or due to violent fights in the parking lot.
Between parents to teaching my own Alma mater and Academy program, which had introduced me to the novels that influenced me more than any real person in my life. This place that made me love learning and made me feel that I was unique and loved. It was extremely emotional as I felt like I was coming home to my favorite place in the world.
I was in awe of the fact that I was now colleagues with a women who I had admired since I was a child. And it also felt like a prestigious accomplishment while teaching at this school, I felt an intense mix of emotions running from guilt that my job wasn't serving enough of an underprivileged group to pry that I had managed to earn such a coveted position to dread that I was not good enough.
Every teacher in my school served on a million committees and earned a million accolades and awards. My administrators were figureheads in the development of gifted education program that had shaped me. I couldn't understand how I could ever work hard enough to earn my place amongst these giants and heroes or how these women were able to do this job, which such a singular focus three years into this dream job that I love with all my heart teaching the.
Best quirkiest, funniest, gifted students. I had a horrible year. I suffered for several months with symptoms of graves' disease until I was diagnosed. My babies that are quit in February, leaving me with no one to watch my two children. I was taking night classes through William and Mary to earn my certification in gifted education.
I was completely spent from a lack of sleep and desperately trying to prove I deserve my position at this school. Then in the spring, my baby caught Adena, a virus which had us in and out of hospitals and emergency rooms for weeks. Has he had chest X, rays, blood draws caught secondary infections, rejected medications, et cetera.
Each night, I wrote detailed substitute plans with one hand while rocking my wheezing baby and the other. And I stayed awake all night, sleeping with him in the room. Can chair, I worry about equally about the students. I felt I was abandoning as I did about my son shallow breathing. Um, it's my own personal difficulties.
I was suffering from crippling anxiety. As I watched school after school experience, horrific tragedies due to gun violence. My relationships with my family members suffered as they continued to place gun ownership above the value of my life. Their daughter, granddaughter daughter-in-law sister, et cetera.
After hellacious year, I received an extremely Frank end of year review, which States, you know, that my absences from school have been excessive and lead to detrimental instruction for my students hit by with the reality that I had feared was hot happening. I sobbed until I had a migraine, then. Came up with a plan for how to fix it.
I volunteered for committees set up meetings with contacts in the city government to develop exciting new programs in our building. I was so ready to show my admin that I was the obedient daughter and zealous scholar, who they had hired. I could rise to the levels of achievement my colleagues had and be the teacher who was here for my students only in his own home life.
Didn't exist. Then in August administration at my daughter's small private school, also, my son's daycare reached out to see if I had any teacher, friends who would be interested in the last minute position to teach part time. After a fraught week of interviews, tears there's pro and con list and passive aggression for my former administration.
I was finally released from contract at my former dream job, and the began a terrifying new journey at a brand new school. This was the hardest decision I have ever made. I had to confront my completely incorrect bias against private schools as being too easy and of a missionary sacrifice with their small classes and involve parents.
I
Beth Silvers: [00:34:09] had to let go of the
Mairin: [00:34:10] scale, the mindset developed in my youth and pushed away the fear that I was putting my family into financial hardship. Hardest of all was making a choice that was better for no one, but myself and my family, I still have stress nightmares where I feverish apologize and try to win back the good opinion of my old administration.
But I took the job. So I would also like to commemorate the one year anniversary of the first time I ever made a real life altering decision that was solely to make money life better and easier. You could probably guess this teaching part time in the same school. As my babies turned out to be a godsend being in the same building as my children and having serious security on campus.
So many of my anxieties about gun violence, I was a better parent and teacher when I actually had time to go to doctor's appointments, run errands, exercise, prep, dinner plan for interesting and involved conceptual units. Then when we went to virtual learning in the spring, all of that beautiful balance went out the window.
I was live teaching for five hours each day, as my toddler screamed and pulled on my leg. And my kindergarten cried because she was late to her school, Google meeting. And my husband, who's an attorney attempted to conduct virtual depositions, meet with judges, et cetera. And the home office. I was back to pulling all nighters and falling into a puddle of tears.
As I wondered how I could ever possibly be good enough for my children and my students. I began to think, well, this is the come up. So you got the leaving your old school and alert. This is karma. So he right. Not healthy. They're all this craziness. My new administration made outstanding as both a teacher and a parent.
I was an all of these two incredible women who stood strong on delivering quality. Virtually provided the teachers with anything they might need trusted us completely to conduct virtual learning in the format that best suited our students in our home lives. They dropped off gifts on our doorsteps personally drove novels and packets of math manipulatives.
My students, when we began new units during quarantine, forgave, tuition, infants, and toddlers, they work themselves to the bone and did it with so much. Grace was demonstrated that this fall, we will begin teaching with students in the classroom, which is another four-page email of detailed anxiety. I find it completely unacceptable that these Herculean efforts of preparing for this school year have fallen on the shoulders of these women who are attempting to keep our school from closing for good, with zero guidance, enforcement testing, or grants CPE from the government.
However, I completely trust that these women have done everything in their power to protect myself and my students. If all that wasn't enough. Our admin and teaching staff have cultivated an atmosphere in which we depend on one another. We share everything from supplies to duties, to lessons than ideas.
There's no keeping secrets in order to be the colleague to an accolade or a title, even right. That are still, my colleagues are mostly part time teachers who fight to remain that way so that they can maintain a home life balance. It's completely common and expected for teachers to speak their mind, ask for what they need and expect to be heard.
So I want to commemorate the beautifully sassy, bold women in my building at being called hero is by the same government officials who did not trust us to make our own decisions in our classroom, refuse to pay us a living wage. In case we start to do the job for the money instead of for the greater good or regardless as a serious professional.
You know, since we take the summers off, I want to commemorate working with bad-ass women who lift each other up instead of competing with one another and who take their families and their jobs equally, seriously tomorrow, I'll be back in the building for my eighth year of teaching after chewing same years in a row with more insanity to come.
I want to come in right the start of a new school year. I want to commemorate the rush of anticipation, hope and joy of outlining unit. It's for the year. I want to commemorate shopping for school supplies with my daughter online and the Christmas morning, excitement on her face. Each time a new Amazon box is delivered with a notebook or a pencil case covered in glittering unicorns.
I want to commemorate the nerves. I still face each school year before I meet my new students and how I still always forget what I'm supposed to teach the first week. I want to commemorate the smell of a fresh new novel and of an old burning laminator. Heck, I want to commemorate the feeling of your hair.
Getting caught in the metal bracket on the plastic student's seat. I want to commemorate finding new and interesting ways to teach as well as not letting yourself get sucked into spending four days, trying to make a Bitmoji classrooms sprinkle with tick talk hyperlinks. I want to commemorate letting students take the lead in their learning and the teachers who allow their students needs to guide instruction in these uncertain times.
I want to commemorate facing hard truths about yourself that no one, not even teachers can or should make career choices, completely addict, selfless martyrdom here's to no such thing. The perfect job perfect way to learn or perfect plan here is to the best part of teaching that every season brings something so beautifully new.
Beth Silvers: [00:39:10] Thank you all so much for continuing to share your questions and your life stories and your thoughts about where we are as a country with us, we look forward to being with you here again next Wednesday until then keep it nuanced ya'll.