A student with two teachers

 I made a monumental decision this week. I picked a retirement date. I have been fighting the good fight for teachers almost 10 years. Along the way I have had some fabulous students and some that needed lots of work. I have loved them all, even the challenging ones. I have never tried to "indoctrinate"  a student to believe the way I do or think the way I do. I have tried to support them in all their endeavors and give them the tools to think for themselves and evaluate everything. Always ask why. Those questions are important.

The photo at the top of the page is my senior yearbook. I thought I would tell you a little story about my high school experience because the people in power right now are trying to take that away from children.

I had been educated early in Department of the Defense schools. You can imagine that those might be pretty conservative. They weren't or I don't remember them to be. I learned to read and write, explore and ask why.

When I moved home and became a student at Lakeland High School, I had a variety of classes. They ranged from Black History/Literature to Business Math. I had a language class in German and one in American Short Stories, World Geography and Psychology. The two that I am writing about actually are about the teachers, opposites if you will, and what I learned.

Beverly Burnsed was a ball of fire. as a teacher. She taught Current Affairs and Language, was the sponsor of Student Government and coordinator of Student activities. She was the tennis coach and she was liberal as the day was long. She signed my yearbook, "Best of everything, Jean, for now and always. Mrs. B." When she left teaching in 1976, she was elected to the Florida Legislature where she served for 12 years and sat on 10 committees. In 1988, she left the legislature and served as Assistant Secretary of State until 1992. She then became the first female vice-president of FSU, which she had graduated from to become a teacher. She retired in 2006 and died in 2019. She was an important teacher to me.

Switch now to my Americanism vs. Communism, a class which was required by the state at the time. Remember, the Cold War was still going on and we hated communism. I believe they ended that class shortly after I had to take it. Mr. Dennis Mason was my teacher. He was also the sponsor of the chess club and the Key Club. If I remember correctly, he was a Vietnam veteran who had been injured and walked with crutches. He was pretty conservative, kind of like my father, also a vet was, but like Mrs. Burnsed, he never tried to force his beliefs on us. He taught us the truth. We talked in class about the war. We discussed the world and the subjects. I don't know if Mr. Mason is still living. He didn't go in to politics as far as my research would show. I hope he is alive and doing well. I hope he is still talking about both sides and compromise. 

I cannot believe what parents are doing to teachers today and I cannot believe that this is how students are going to learn to make decisions on their own. 

I am not sure where this will end. I hope it does not continue to split the country the way it is doing now. I am going to sit back and watch from my recliner. Thank God for Dennis Mason and Beverly Burnsed. They allowed me to learn. Too bad teachers are so handcuffed today by rules and regulations that have more to do with politics than education and that students' education will suffer.

Summer did not bring teaching peace of mind

 Teachers try and regroup emotionally and physically during the summer. This is done in different ways for different teachers. In my case, I try and do lots of PD, lots of pool time and time spent with my dogs.

This year, I found relaxing very hard to do even with meeting all my goals of summer. I did the PD. I lounged in the pool. I spoiled my dogs. I also was exposed to Covid-19, even though I am vaccinated and boosted and wear my mask most places, I came home from a trip to DC and tested positive. This caused me to miss important first days of school and left me feeling a little tired with a feeling of breathlessness that I am having to take medicine for. 

I also came back to a shitstorm of political proportion from both counties I am associated with. I know the conspiracy theory folks, ultra conservative, abortion is murder, stop indoctrinating our students are fighting hard on one side to take over the school boards of the county in which I live and the county in which I teach. 

I know we are fighting hard to retain some semblance of normalcy but even the teacher's union has backed a known person who only wants political control and does not really have our students in his vision. It saddens me but it also makes me angry.

I am old enough to retire should I want to. I turned that old in July. I had always planned on teaching until I was 70, but my understanding at this point is, several of these groups who think we teachers are indoctrinating their children, have vowed to come after any teacher who does not believe the same way they do. They were actually having classes in Tampa a few weeks ago on how to track teachers like me through their social media so they could make sure they were fired from their jobs. All this while Florida is suffering from an extreme shortage of professional teachers.

Now veterans can teach and their families, many with only a high school education. What is going to happen when a snarky teenage girl comes home crying because a teacher insults her in her mind or a snarky teenage boy who accuses one of these macho veterans of putting their hands on them in a negative way and they felt threatened so they ran home to mommy and daddy. Think that won't happen? Just wait. 

So no masks, no real history, nothing that may hurt someone's feelings or you can be sued. Don't mention slavery and make sure the kids understand that everyone was not bad just because they owned humans. They were our founding fathers so we need to revere them. Not discuss their bad sides. 

I am lucky. I teach at a Title 1 school where the parents are much more concerned their children are fed and educated. They don't really care how we do it as long as it gets done. They want to know when their child does good or bad and for the most part, are highly supportive of us. In all my years of teaching, I have only had two parents actually object to something I had taught. 

I may not make it to 70. I am going to try. But these alt right parents who think they own the world and get to make decisions for everyone's child, not just theirs, need to take a pill and chill. You are getting your 15 minutes of fame. Let someone else step in.