Some Recovery School District "highlights"

Many of the teachers that I worked with over the summer are assigned to the NOLA Recovery School District (RSD), these operate on the state budget and are managed within New Orleans. James' school is a charter school run by the University of New Orleans, so he is not considered an RSD employee - though his sch0ol is a part of the larger heading of schools in recovery. (It's extremely complicated to sort out the differences.

What this means to James is that he actually is working with a school system that is functioning, even though he is struggling with classroom management issues and other new teacher problesms, the administration of UNO could be considered somewhat reasonable at this point.

The RSD in general is a mess. I hear horror stories from my friends about how the administration is causing daily uncertainty, confusion, and overall chaos in their lives. Examples follow:

Some terminology used by the RSD:

Surplus– This is the term used for teachers who are deemed “extra” and removed from their existing classrooms and schools and placed in a different school without warning or their or their principal’s approval.

Ms. A's story -
Jenny A. or Ms. A, my co-teacher this summer, was given notice on last Friday that she was a part of the “surplus” – for the past six weeks she had been working hard at Dibert Elementary where she taught 6 classes in Science, Social Studies and Reading – she had approximately 19 students in each class. Because she did not have a minimum of 23 students in each class and she was the newer of the two teachers in her subject matter, the RSD deemed her unnecessary in her school. They called her on Friday morning and told her to report to the RSD office – she did not know why. When she arrived they explained that she was no longer a teacher at Dibert and she, instead would be a teacher at Banneaker. She was instructed to return to Dibert, finish teaching that day, pack up her room, and begin teaching at Banneaker on Monday morning. When she asked what would happen to her students, she was told that her students would combine into the other classes meaning that those classes would have as many 39 students in them.

After much confusion and a horrible day of telling her students goodbye, Ms. A called Banneaker and asked for instructions for Monday morning. She was told by the principal that because she was a new teacher, Banneaker was most likely not interested in having her as a teacher. Ms. A explained that she was given no choice in the matter - the principal told her that she was sympathetic and that Ms. A could come and interview on Monday morning, but she was not guaranteed a position.

On Monday morning, Ms. A showed up for the interview and was given little hope that there was a job at that school. She returned the RSD office and explained the situation - she was informed that she had to be on a school site in order to be paid for that day, so she need to go back to Banneaker. More discussion ensued. The administrator finally told her to go back to Dibert and teach her classes there until they worked out the problems with her placement. Ms. A returned to Dibert and to her very confused students, and tried to explain that she was just there temporarily until they located another school for her.
Ms. A is heartbroken. She is a new teacher; she previously was a social worker. She is just trying to learn lesson planning and classroom management. She has just learned all of her students’ names and is learning things about them. She liked her school, her principal, and her peers. Her work was hard enough and now she is in completely uncertainty – as are her students.

Schedule change – These occur as often as needed until the school’s administration determines that students are equally distributed among teachers and that they are in the “appropriate” class for their learning level.

Mr. Anderson's story -
At Reed (the school I taught in this summer) schedules have been changed no less than four times for each teacher since the beginning of the school year. School started has officially been in session for 6 weeks, which means that another member of my teachNOLA cohort , Mr. Anderson, has not had a consistent class of students for more than one week at a time and schedules are still not set.

He cannot, therefore, learn students’ names, maintain classroom management, or create a positive classroom culture (all things we were taught during our summer training). He has no ability to teach students anything, because they know that the situation will not last. In a few days, they will be rearranged again. His hope is to make it until January as a teacher.
Mr. Anderson is a retired college professor who came to New Orleans to help kids who needed him. He has so much to offer and no defined set of students to which to offer it. When asked what his plan was at this point, he answered, “To show up every day until January. Maybe by then I’ll have the classroom management issue down, if I can’t manage them by then, perhaps I’m in the wrong field.” When asked if he wanted to get together one night soon (he is our neighbor), he replied, “You can always find me at the bar on Magazine and Jackson, I go there every day after work.”

neighbors

Yesterday, I had three little helpers when I was working in my yard. They each dug a bulb from their yard and carried it over to my yard to help transplant them (with their dad's permission, of course). We happily walked to the flowerbed, where in the next 5 minutes, complete chaos ensued. Huge holes were created, bulbs were twirled around by their leaves, rocks were found and thrown. The garden adventure ended quickly but will not soon be forgotten....