loose change

today has to be one of the sundayest mondays of the year. sam is in town, and we spent it doing a little bit of admin as we prepare to head east for the summer. i felt very anxious today upon waking up and it was frustrating to watch the day play out while the anxiety followed me around. by 2p i was Over It and did my best to move forward! now i am in wine girl hours while s watches the celtics. i’m still working through this book, the once and future witches, and i’d much rather be reading it at this moment than writing this piece so i fear it may be brief!

i’ve been thinking a lot about the futures of my students this week. every single day i get more preemptively nostalgic about our days spent learning together. with the time off i’m taking this week, i only have Seven More Days of being their first grade teacher–and not-so-secretly, seven more days of being a teacher at all, for the time being.

some of my students won’t be returning to howard next year. the enrollment exodus has been a hot topic of lunch table conversation between my coworkers. it isn’t just our school–the CUSD reports that carp’s local enrollment has dropped 32% since the pandemic. another report by the Public Policy Institute of California suggests that public schools have lost as many as 310,000 students since the pandemic began.

at the beginning of my teaching career, i remember being daunted by articles published in the atlantic and the new york times about the contemporary challenges with which teachers are faced. there is the lack of support from school boards, the lack of trust from parents, the constant complaining from kids. then there is the theory that right-wing politicians want to dismantle our accessible education system, to dumb-down future voters in order to further policies that, to a literate person, seem stupid (this is written in a very rudimentary way–this would be how my mom has explained the phenomenon to me in the past, although i do believe it to be accurate).

in many states but in california especially, there is a homeschooling epidemic. young parents are opting out of traditional preschools and instead choosing to raise their kids on their own, or in a ‘cohort’ with other parents who do not trust our teachers. a lot of parents will homeschool due to religious or spiritual reasons. i’ve never met any of them, but i imagine there are a lot of parents who prefer to be in complete control of the knowledge being imparted upon their children. there’s also an aesthetic allure to homeschool–moms on tik tok and instagram have become viral for their ‘homeschool routines’ or their ‘gentle parenting successes. other “schools” peddle themselves to young families as ‘outdoor schools,’ advertising with pictures of kids playing outside in nature, holding hands walking down wooded paths, examining ladybugs, eating string cheese while sitting on tree trunks.

the more i’m inclined to criticize these homeschooling programs, the more i empathize with parents who just want to do right by their kids. how can parents really know anything to be Better or Worse when there are so many opinions swirling around on social media about the Right Way To Raise Your Kids?

as a young teacher, i feel like i am learning constantly from the kids. i am constantly in awe of their wits and sense of self, at the vast amount of knowledge they obtain just by observing the world and following suit. i am the teacher, and i do know i’ve taught them a good bit–they’re almost grasping second-grade math concepts, and all of them can read well beyond their average age-group. but the amount i have learned from them surely outweighs the impact my lessons will have on their future.

i think about this all the time: i cannot imagine what it feels like to be a parent on the other side of the equation. they send their kids to me, every single day of the week, for eight hours, and they trust that i’ll do the right things. that i’ll follow a proper academic curriculum, that i’ll ensure they eat enough food and drink enough water, that i’ll help them through hard feelings and that i’ll ultimately keep them safe and comfortable.

being a schoolteacher and seeing all of this from the outside, you begin to understand that the role of a parent extends past drop-off and pick-up. there is a whole social aspect to being a parent of a kid enrolled in school. at a school like mine, you’re obligated to engage with the other parents, you’re obligated to show up for snack deliveries, you’re obligated to volunteer on afternoons and weekends. there’s a whole social current amongst parents that i’ve started to pick up on. on the surface, everybody seems so well-acquainted and kind. below the surface, everybody’s got an opinion. and parents listen to their kids! and kids can talk–about teachers, students, and about other parents, too.

i would love to be a fly on the window for some of the car rides home after my kids have had a particularly bad day: she made us do TEN ROWS OF CURSIVE TODAY. she made me go work outside by myself in the freezing cold. she made me eat the leftover radishes because i had nothing else left in my lunch!!!!!!

all of this is to say that i’m very thankful to have the job i’ve had this year, and i’ve learned a lot about what i do and do not want for my future, regardless of whether it involves kids. i’m sad that some of my kids are headed for different school programs next year, mainly because they work so well together. more often than not, you can find all seven of my students together at recess, playing some invented game or coloring with gel pens at the lunch tables or demanding to put on a performance for me. their communication skills and their boundaries around one another have grown tremendously this year, without them recognizing it.

i find so much joy in hanging out with each one of them. i’m trying to encapsulate each one of them in a small piece of writing that i’d like to read on our last days of school next week; maybe i will copy it here when it’s finished. this has been such a formative eight months for me.

and TODAY has been a very scattered monday, i imagine this piece follows suit, i’m excited for next monday! happy memorial day folks. thanks for readin’