Three mini blogs for the price of none…

For the past three years I have given my AP students a research paper to write over Christmas break.  Yes, Yes… evil shrew teacher I know.  Before you get all crazed, realize I assign it on October 15.  We dedicate portions of at least four class days to doing it.  It’s not actually DUE until January 15.  However, the paper is also a contest.  Students need to use a minimum of 5 sources and 700-1000 words to describe an act of political courage by an elected US official since 1956.

It’s a pretty tough task.  The winner gets $10,000 and a trip to Boston.  In the past two years I have had an honorable mention and a finalist.  (The finalist won $500.  YAY!)

In order for them to SUBMIT, however, they have to submit by January 5.  I am supposed to proofread and advise on their submissions before they send them.  Submission is not a requirement; but if they do submit, I give them bonus points AND I have proofread their paper, so many choose to do so.  I tell them that they must email their paper to me over the break by January 2.

I woke up to the following email this morning.

I haven’t proof read it yet (just finished writing it) but I feel like it’s just genuinely bad. I picked someone who just doesn’t really have political courage but I’ve spent all this time researching her so I went ahead and attempted to write it. This is definitely far from my best work and I feel terrible about it but I made myself write because the stress is killing me and I want to be Done with this so I’m really sorry, please help as much as you can but…I don’t see it getting any better than this. Anyways I hope you’re enjoying your break! Thanks for the help and sorry you have to read this. 

(I am so tired) 

Awwwwww!!!!   Poor baby  :-(((((  Being 16 is so hard!!!

Kids are so darn sweet!   Now, this is from one of the BEST of the BEST students.  She’ll graduate somewhere in the top 10 in her class (not top 10%… top 10 people).  She is an excellent writer.  She works her keister off.  Can’t you just FEEL the frustration?

Then, her apologizing to ME for what she feels is subpar work… wow…

A slight digression here.  I say this again and again, but I hope all teachers realize this.  Teaching is a heady, heady thing…. and very dangerous.  I don’t know if it’s the great job that parents do establishing to their children that teachers are an authority or that we’re all ego driven control freaks who project so much ethos that students believe what we say is important.  It doesn’t matter either way…  those kids are looking up to you.  They are listening to you.  They are trying to make you proud.  RESPECT THAT.  Think about every word that comes out of your mouth.

Sweet girl, I was ANYTHING BUT a stellar student in school.  I was mediocre at best.  I was smart, sure… but did I care about school?  Not so much…  Now, I say that, but looking back I remember Mr. Levin and Mr. Goldberg… both who said that they had never had a better writer in class than I.  I remember my brother being proud when Goldberg told him that HE was the best writer since his sister.  (My brother was also a subpar student… who then went on to minor in English in college.) I remember my 8th grade English teacher, Mrs. Davis, who told me I was the biggest disappointment she ever had in her career because I refused to apply myself and she couldn’t recommend me for honors English.  (I thought I didn’t care… but that was more than 30 years ago, and I remember…).  I remember Mrs. Reichenbach telling my mother in a parent conference that my brother and I were two of the biggest disappointments she had in 20 years…  I remember ALL of that…So I think I must have cared.

So back to loving my students.  The email above is not the first encounter I have had of this kind.  One of my VERY best students used to come in to class SHAKING before every test.  At one point I told her “This is just school.  This is not life.”  She earnestly looked at me and said “But what if this IS my life.”  I heard my quote echoed back to me during her salutatory address at graduation, but I was quite sincere about that.  I still am!

Another student came in every day after school to prepare for the AP test.  She asked for practice after practice.  I told her that she had to calm down… that she was going to be fine.  She responded, “I just know you think I’m going to do well.  I’m so afraid I’m going to disappoint you.”

Disappoint me?  I spent an educational career of disappointing teachers.  Just by virtue of the fact that you CARE  you MIGHT disappoint me, you can’t disappoint me.

I spend a lot of time telling students that I am no sort of superior authority just because I’m the sage on the stage standing in front of the class.  All that means is I have a college education and passed a test that said I could do this… There was no great magical wand that came down from the sky and said, “I dub thee, TEACHER.”  Yet, they treat me that way.

So… yes, I edited the research paper, but this is also how I responded to the email:

“First thing is first. This is JUST an assignment for class. It’s just one paper. It is not a judgment of your skills as a writer or, more importantly, of you as a person. Don’t let it get you down. Writing about things that don’t necessarily intrigue you can be quite difficult. You are a talented writer and a bright, capable student.

… Chin up, buttercup 🙂. All is not lost. In the end, you will complete the assignment. Maybe you’ll like it. Maybe you won’t, but it will be behind you.“

I read back over that, and I hope I said the right things.

But in the end *I* know that I did the best I could…  that I tried to do right by her as I try to do right by all of my students, and I know that with the kind of students I deal with on a day to day basis that the world is going to be just fine.