Up The Down Staircase

8. From The Calvin Coolidge Clarion

Calvin Coolidge

CLARION

September

INTERESTING INTERVIEWS:

Miss Sylvia Barrett, the new English teacher, is not only everybody's choice "Audrey Hepburn" of Calvin Coolidge but is also a very attractive young woman of whom we are so very proud. The interview found her to be 5 feet 4 inches in her stocking feet, with brown hair and blue-gray eyes and very pleasant to talk to. She received her B.A. degree with Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude (It's Greek to us!) and her M.A. (Miss America?) with highest honors. (Boy! What a record!)

Listed among her favorites are Chaucer the poet (That's Greek to us too!) and reading books. She is also partial to painting in her spare time (Don't go up and pose for her, boys!) and bicycling (built for two?), whipped cream (Oh, those calories!) and swimming (Yummm!); and she likes to visit different places like everyone else. She visited some places in Mexico last summer (Halba Espanol?). She feels that teaching here will be a real challenge to her.

Glad to have you at Coolidge, Miss "Audrey" Barrett, and hope you stay awhile.

A MESSAGE FROM OUR PRINCIPAL:

Your education has been planned and geared to arm and prepare you to function as mature and thinking citizens capable of shouldering the burdens and responsibilities which a thriving democracy imposes. It is through you and others like you that the forward march of democracy, spurred and fortified by a thorough and well-rounded education, will move on to greater triumphs and victories. We have no doubt that our aims and efforts in this direction will bear fruit and achieve the goals and objectives set forth, for in the miniature democracy of our school you are proving yourselves worthy and deserving of our trust and expectations.

Very sincerely yours,

Maxwell E. Clarke, Principal

COMPLIMENTS OF VANITY CORSET CO.

THE CORNER COFFEE SHOPPE: "WHERE FRIEND MEETS FRIEND"

HOW TO AVOID

FRESHMAN FOLLY——

SOPHOMORE SLUMP——

JUNIOR JITTERS——

SENIOR SORROWS:

JOIN YOUR G.O.!!! GET YOUR G.O. BUTTONS WHILE THEY LAST !!! GO, GO, G.O.!

SCHOOL SPIRIT, ANYONE?

COME AND ROOT FOR YOUR TEAM

SCHEDULED BASKETBALL GAMES:

SEPT. CALVIN COOLIDGE VS. MANHATTAN MUNICIPAL

OCT. CALVIN COOLIDGE VS. (?) UNSCHEDULED

NOV. CALVIN COOLIDGE VS. (?) UNSCHEDULED

DEC. (?)

Dr. Maxwell E. Clarke

James J. McHAbe

Mary Lewis

SylVia Barrett

Ella FrIedenberg

Paul BarriNger

Beatrice SchaChter

Charlotte WOlf

Frederick LoOmis

Henrietta PastorfieLd

Marcus ManheIm

SaDie Finch

Frances EGan

Samuel BEster

FACULTY FLASHES

The teacher the girls would like to be on a desert island most with: MR. PAUL ("POET") BARRINGER

The teacher readiest with unselfish helps: MRS. BEATRICE ("MOM") SCHACHTER

The teacher who makes lessons most like games: MISS HENRIETTA ("PAL") PASTORFIELD

Most absentminded teacher: MR. MARCUS ("H2O") MANHEIM

Most glamorous teacher: MISS SYLVIA BARRETT

THE CALVIN COOLIDGE CLARION is "The Voice of Your School." Please subscribe and solicit ads to keep it "talking"!

We wish to express our gratitude to Miss Mary Lewis, Faculty Advisor to The Clarion, who so unstintingly gave of herself to us.

9. Those Who Can’t

Sept. 25

Dear Ellen,

It's FTG (Friday Thank God), which means I need not set the alarm for 6:30 tomorrow morning; I can wash a blouse, think a thought, write a letter.

Congratulations on the baby's new tooth. Soon there is bound to be another tooth and another and another, and before you know it, little Suzie will start going to school, and her troubles will just begin. Though I hope that by the time she gets into the public high school system, things will be different. At least, they keep promising that things will be different. I'm told that since the recent strike threats, negotiations with the United Federation of Teachers, and greater public interest, we are enjoying "improved conditions." But in the two weeks that I've been here, conditions seem greatly unimproved.

You ask what I am teaching. Hard to say. Professor Winters advised teaching "not the subject but the whole child." The English Syllabus urges "individualization and enrichment"—which means giving individual attention to each student to bring out the best in him and enlarge his scope beyond the prescribed work. Bester says to "motivate and distribute" books —that is, to get students ready and eager to read. All this is easier said than done. In fact, all this is plain impossible.

Many of our kids—though physically mature—can't read beyond 4th or 5th grade level. Their background consists of the simplest comics and thrillers. They've been exposed to some ten years of schooling, yet they don't know what a sentence is.

The books we are required to teach frequently have nothing to do with anything except the fact that they have always been taught, or that there is an oversupply of them, or that some committee or other was asked to come up with some titles.

For example: I've distributed Shakespeare's Julius Caesar to my 5th term class of "slow non-readers." (Question: How would "fast non-readers" read?) This is in lieu of The Mill on the Floss. I am supposed to teach Romeo and Juliet OR A Tale of Two Cities (strange bedfellows!) to my "low-normal" class, and Essays Old and New to my "special-slows." So far, however, I've been unable to give out any books because of problems having to do with Purloined Book Receipts, Book Labels without Glue, Inaccurate Inventory of Book Room, and Traffic Conditions on the Stairs.

I have let it be a challenge to me: I've been trying to teach without books. There was one heady moment when I was able to excite the class by an idea: I had put on the blackboard Browning's "A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?" and we got involved in a spirited discussion of aspiration vs. reality. Is it wise, I asked, to aim higher than one's capacity? Does it not doom one to failure? No, no, some said, that's ambition and progress? No, no, others cried, that's frustration and defeat! What about hope? What about despair?—You've got to be practical!—You've got to have a dream! They said this in their own words, you understand, startled into discovery. To the young, clichés seem freshly minted. Hitch your wagon to a star! Shoemaker, stick to your last! And when the dismissal bell rang, they paid me the highest compliment: they groaned! They crowded in the doorway, chirping like agitated sparrows, pecking at the seeds I had strewn—when who should materialize but Admiral Ass.

"What is the meaning of this noise?"

"It's the sound of thinking, Mr. McHabe," I said.

In my letter-box that afternoon was a note from him, with copies to my principal and chairman (and—who knows?—perhaps a sealed indictment dispatched to the Board?) which read (sic):

"I have observed that in your class the class entering your room is held up because the pupils exiting from your room are exiting in a disorganized fashion, blocking the doorway unnecessarily and talking. An orderly flow of traffic is the responsibility of the teacher whose class is exiting from the room."

The cardinal sin, strange as it may seem in an institution of learning, is talking. There are others, of course—sins, I mean, and I seem to have committed a good number. Yesterday I was playing my record of Gielgud reading Shakespeare. I had brought my own phonograph to school (no one could find the Requisition Forms for "Audio-Visual Aids"—that's the name for the school record player) and I had succeeded, I thought, in establishing a mood. I mean, I got them to be quiet, when—enter Admiral Ass, in full regalia, epaulettes quivering with indignation. He snapped his fingers for me to stop the phonograph, waited for the turntable to stop turning, and pronounced:

"There will be a series of three bells rung three times indicating Emergency Shelter Drill. Playing records does not encourage the orderly evacuation of the class."

I mention McHabe because he has crystallized into The Enemy.

But there are other difficulties. There are floaters floating in during class (these are peripatetic, or unanchored teachers) to rummage through my desk drawers for a forgotten Delaney Book. (I have no idea why it's call that. Perhaps because it was invented by a Mr. Delaney. It's a seating-plan book, with cards with kids' names stuck into slots.)

There are questionnaires to be filled out in the middle of a lesson, such as: "Are there any defective electrical outlets in your home?"

There is money to be collected for publications, organizations, milk, G.O. (the General Organization), basketball tickets, and "Voluntary Contributions to the Custodial Staff." The latter is some kind of tacit appeasement of Mr. Grayson, who lives in the basement, if he exists at all; he is the mystery man of Calvin Coolidge.

There is the drilling on the street below that makes the windows vibrate; the Orchestra tuning up down the hall; the campaigners (this is the election season) bursting into the room to blazon on my sole blackboard in curlicued yellow chalk:

HARRY KAGAN WINS RESPECT

IF YOU WILL HIM FOR PRES. ELECT!

and

GLORIA EHRLICH IS PRETTY AND NICE

VOTE FOR GLORIA FOR VICE!

And the shelter area drills, which usually come at the most interesting point in the lesson. Bells clanging frantically, we all spill out into the gym, where we stand silent and safe between parallel bars, careful not to lean on horses, excused, for the moment, from destruction.

Sometimes the lesson is interrupted by life: the girl who, during grammar drill, rushed out of the room to look for her lost $8.70 for the gas and electric bill, crying: "My mother will kill me, for sure!" And for sure, she might. The boy who apologized for not doing his homework because he had to go to get married. "I got this girl into trouble all right, and we're Catholics, but the thing is, I don't like her."

Chaos, waste, cries for help—strident, yet unheard. Or am I romanticizing? That's what Paul says; he only shrugs and makes up funny verses about everyone. That's Paul Barringer—a writer who teaches English on one foot, as it were, just waiting to be published. He's very attractive: a tan crew cut; a white smile with lots of teeth; one eyebrow higher than the other. All the girls are in love with him.

There are a few good, hard-working, patient people like Bea—a childless widow—"Mother Schachter and her cherubs," as the kids say, who manage to teach against insuperable odds; a few brilliantly endowed teachers who—unknown and unsung—work their magic in the classroom; a few who truly love young people. The rest, it seems to me, have either given up, or are taking it out on the kids. "Those who can, do; those who can't, teach." Like most sayings, this is only half true. Those who can, teach; those who can't—the bitter, the misguided, the failures from other fields—find in the school system an excuse or a refuge.

There is Mary Lewis, bowed and cowed, who labors through the halls as overloaded as a pack mule, thriving on discomfort and overwork, compulsively following all directions from supervisors, a willing martyr to the system. She's an old-timer who parses sentences and gives out zeros to kids who chew gum.

There is Henrietta Pastorfield, a hearty spinster who is "married to the school," who woos the kids by entertaining them, convinced that lessons must be fun, knowledge sugar-coated, and that teacher should be pal.

There is Fred Loomis, a math teacher stuck with two out-of-license English classes, who hates kids with a pure and simple hatred. "At the age of 15," he said to me, "they should all be kicked out of school and the girls sterilized so they don't produce others like themselves." These were his words. And he comes in contact with some 200 children a day.

The school nurse, Frances Egan, wears white space shoes and is mad for nutrition; Mrs. Wolf, the librarian, cannot bear to see a book removed from its shelf; and Miss Ella Friedenberg, an ambitious typing teacher promoted to Guidance Counselor, swoops upon the kids and impales them with questions about masturbation. She has evolved a PPP (Pupil Personality Profile) into which she fits each youngster, branding him with pseudo-Freudian phrases. She has most of the teachers bamboozled, and some of the kids terrorized.

My other colleagues I know just by sight: Desk Despots, Blackboard Barons, Classroom Caesars and Lords of the Loose-Leaf, Paul calls them. He has the gift of words. Lyrics are his forte; he composed an amusing song about our principal: "Hark, hark, the Clarke/ At heaven's gate . . . something—something," I forget. He wrote a verse about me too: rhymed me with "14 carat." Very attractive man.

McHabe, of course, is the kind of petty tyrant who flourishes best in the school system, the army, or a totalitarian state. To me he personifies all that is picayune, mean and degrading to the human spirit. I've had a head-on clash with him over one of my boys, Joe Ferone, whom he had accused of theft—unjustifiably, as it turned out; and he has alluded darkly to the danger of my getting a U (Unsatisfactory) end-term rating.

I don't know why I am championing Ferone, who is the most difficult discipline problem in the school, except, perhaps, that I dimly sense in him a rebelliousness, like mine, against the same things. When he is in school, which isn't often, he is rude and contemptuous; hands in pockets, toothpick in mouth, rocking insolently on his heels, he seems to be watching me for some sign.

Most of the time, I am still struggling to establish communication. It is difficult, and I don't know whom to turn to. Dr. Clarke? I don't think he is aware of anything that is going on in his school. All I know about him is that he has a carpet in his office and a private john on the fourth floor landing. Most of the time he secludes himself in one or the other; when he does emerge, he is fond of explaining that education is derived from "e duco," or leading out of. He is also partial to such paired pearls as: aims and goals; guide and inspire; help and encourage; and new horizons and broader vistas; they drop from him like so many cultured cuff links.

And Dr. Bester, my immediate supervisor, Chairman of the English Department, I can't figure out at all. He is a dour, desiccated little man, remote and prissy. Like most chairmen, he teaches only one class of Seniors; the most experienced teachers are frequently promoted right out of the classroom! Kids respect him; teachers dislike him—possibly because he is given to popping up, unexpectedly, to observe them. "The ghost walks" is the grapevine signal for his visits. Bea told me he started out as a great teacher, but he's been soured by the trivia-in-triplicate which his administrative duties impose. I hope he doesn't come to observe me until I get my bearings. I'm still floundering, particularly in my SS class of "reluctant learners." (Under-achievers, non-academic-minded, slow, disadvantaged, sub-paced, non-college-oriented, underprivileged, non-linguistic, intellectually deprived, and laggers—so far, I've counted more than ten different euphemisms for "dumb kids"!)

But I am busiest outside of my teaching classes. Do you know any other business or profession where highly-skilled specialists are required to tally numbers, alphabetize cards, put notices into mailboxes, and patrol the lunchroom?

What a long letter this has turned into! I've quite lost touch with the mainstream, you see, isolated in 304, while bells ring, students come and go, and my wastebasket runneth over.

Write, write! And tell me of the even tenor of your days. If things get too rough here, I might ask you to move over.

Love,

Syl

P. S. Did you know that in New York City high school teachers devote approximately 100 hours a year to homeroom chores? This makes a grand total of over 500,000 hours that they spend on clerical work. That's official school time only; the number of extracurricular hours spent on lesson plans, records, marking papers, and so on is not estimated.

S.

10. Faculty Conference Minutes

NOTES FOR FACULTY CONFERENCE MINUTES

MET: On Monday, Sept. 28

At 3:06 P.M.

In: School Library

Attendance: 100%

Dr. Clarke's after-summer greeting: "Shoulder to wheel & nose to grind stone" –1 1/2 min.

Bea Schachter brought up urgent problems left over from last term: the burden of the teaching-load and of clerical work, and inadequate facilities – 1 min.

Above problems postponed for time being. Two Feuding Floaters sharing same room were given floor:

Floater #1: When enters classroom, finds writing on black-board with "Do not Erase" over it; feels it's unfair usurpation of valuable blackboard space.

Floater #2: Desk dictionary found in back of room; obviously taken by kid!

Dictionary not to be removed from desk at any time!

Floater #1: No room left in lefthand desk drawer.

Floater #2: Left-hand drawer not #l's but #2's.

Subcommittee of Grievance Com. on Rotation of Teachers to more Equitable Room Assignments formed to look into above. – 6 min.

Bea Schachter raised question of student dropouts.

McHabe: Must stick to mimeographed procedure.– 1/2 min.

Main topic for discussion: Marks to be entered on the left or the right side of blue line on PRC?

Various Pro's and Con's. Which is best way to save time?

Committee formed to look into. – 81/2 min.

Barringer suggested abolishing afternoon homeroom. Vetoed by McHabe –1/2 min.

Discussion on School Aides:

Aides were finally assigned to us to relieve teachers of non-teaching chores, but now teachers have been assigned other non-teaching chores. Also, Aides turned out to be in the way: they are not allowed to take over a class; not allowed to work on records; not allowed Late Room or Health Room. Also, cafeteria workers resent them for just sitting around.

Conclusion: School Aides to guard exits of building and challenge

visitors. – 101/2 min.

Problem raised re dope addiction among students, and "pushers" in

school area. Shelved for lack of time.– 1/2 min.

McHabe warned re smoking in lavatories. Urged rereading of Smoking Circular.–1 1/2 min.

Manheim: re inadequate Science Lab. equipment. Had made several requisitions.

McHabe: Must go through channels.–1/2 min.

Miss Egan (School Nurse): Urged importance of hot breakfasts. Start day by stoking engine. Affects marks.

Dr. Clarke: "Mens sana in corporesano."–1 min.

Mrs. Wolf (Librarian): When return books to library shelves, put in straight. Otherwise wastes time. Warn kids re crooked placing of books.– 2 min.

Teacher (? gray suit, mustache): suggested adjourning. McHabe: Not time yet.– 1/2 min.

Bea Schachter: re problems of integration. Dr. Clarke: Due and orderly process.

Patience and Fortitude. Professional Dignity. Brother's Keeper. The

Constitution.– 21/2 min.

Mary Lewis: re plaster falling from ceiling of her room. Grayson not cooperative.

McHabe: Must go through channels.–1/2 min.

McHabe: Urged cooperation on lateness. Epidemic of. Strict observance late procedures. Parents to be notified by Letter #3. "Academic marks are affected when report cards are distributed" (sic).–8 min.

Miss Finch (School Clerk): "Teachers should function according to instructions." Means: Hand in on time!–1 min.

Miss Friedenberg (Guidance Counselor): Need more accurate CC's on PRC's. (Means: "Capsule Characterizations" for each student entered by teacher on Permanent Record Card.) One phrase enough, provided it's in depth.

Example:

"Latent leader; needs encouragement." Study previous PPP's (Pupil Personality Profiles).–31/2 min.

Barringer: Suggested abolishing morning homeroom. Vetoed by McHabe.–1/2 min.

Mary Lewis: Now that reading from Bible on assembly days has been declared unconstitutional, any objection to a minute of silent prayer?

McHabe: OK if word "prayer" is not mentioned, and if don't move

lips during.–1 min.

Teacher (? gray suit, mustache): suggested adjourning.

McHabe: Not time yet.–1/2 min.

Displaced Teachers: Because Fire Dept. found 5th floor Science Office a fire hazard, it was moved to 3rd floor Math Book Room and math books were left in Shop Closet for time being, while Shop Teachers' Supplies were moved to 2nd floor Storage Closet, the contents of which were moved to Main Office for time being. In the shuffle, 5th floor Social Studies Teachers who used Science Office for marking papers, etc. were displaced. Where can they go? Committee formed to look into.–5 min.

Dr. Clarke's conclusion: Education is necessary for growth in democracy.–2 min.

Problems of instructional load, burden of clerical work and inadequate facilities were postponed for lack of time.–1/2 min.

Teacher (? gray suit, mustache) suggested adjourning.–1/2 min.

Faculty Conference adjourned at 4:06P.M.

TOTAL: 60 min.

(Rewrite, type up in triplicate, and respectfully submit)

11. Pupil-Load

Oct. 2

Dear Ellen,

Another FTG; another week. Time collapses and expands like an erratic accordion, and your letters bring order, sanity and remembrance of things past to my disheveled present. I envy you your leisure to browse and putter and to enjoy your family in peaceful suburbia. As for me—as for me . . .

The cold war between the Admiral and me is getting warmer; tension between Ferone and me is getting tenser; Miss Finch, the school clerk, floods me with papers from the giant maw of her mimeograph machine, and I'm not at all sure that I will last in the school system.

In my homeroom, I'm lucky if I can get through the D's in taking attendance. Admiral Ass lurks outside in the hall, ready to pounce at the first sign of mutiny. Or perhaps he watches through a periscope from his office.

In my subject classes, we are still juggling books. Essays Old and New was changed by the powers that be to The Odyssey and Myths and Their Meaning. I have only two weeks in which to teach my SS class the mythology of the race and Homer's great epic, since other teachers are waiting for these books, since they must be read before the Mid-term Exams, since questions on them will appear on the Midterms, and since the Midterms must be scheduled before Thanksgiving to enable the teachers to mark them during the holidays.

I keep looking for clues in whatever the kids say or write. I've even installed a Suggestion Box in my room, in the hope that they will communicate their feelings freely and eventually will learn to trust me.

So far, most of them are still a field of faces, rippling with every wind, but a few are beginning to emerge.

There is Lou Martin, the class comedian, whose forte is facial expressions. No one can look more crestfallen over unprepared homework: hand clasped to brow, knees buckling, shoulders sagging with remorse, he is a penitent to end all penitents. No one can look more thirsty when asking for a pass: tongue hanging out, eyes rolling, a death-rattle in the throat, he can barely make it to the water fountain. No one can look more horrified at a wrong answer issuing from his own traitor lips; or more humble; or more bewildered; or more indignant. I know it's not in the syllabus, but I'm afraid I encourage him by laughing.

I'm beginning to learn some of their names and to help them—if they would let me. But I am still the Alien and the Foe; I have not passed the test, whatever it is.

I'm a foe to Eddie Williams because my skin is white; to Joe Ferone because I am a teacher; to Carrie Paine because I am attractive.

Eddie uses the grievance of his color to browbeat the world.

Joe is flunking every subject, though he is very bright. He has become a bone of contention between McHabe and me because I believed in his innocence in the stolen wallet incident. I trust him, and he—he keeps watching me, ready to spring at the first false move I make.

Carrie is a sullen, cruelly homely girl, hiding and hating behind a wall of fat.

Harry Kagan is a politician and apple-polisher. He is running for G.O. president, and I'm afraid he'll be elected.

Linda Rosen is an over-ripe under-achiever, bursting with hormones.

And pretty Alice Blake, pale with love, lost in a dream of True Romances, is vulnerable and committed as one can be only at 16. She feels deeply, I'm sure, but can translate her feelings only into the cheap clichés she's been brought up on.

Then there is Rusty, the woman-hater.

And a quiet, defeated-looking Puerto Rican boy, whose name I can't even remember.

These children have been nourished on sorry scraps, on shabby facsimiles, and there is no one—not at home, not in school—who has not short-changed them.

You know, I've just realized there is not even a name for them in the English language. 'Teen-agers," "Youngsters," "Students," "Kids," "Young adults," "Children"—these are inappropriate, offensive, stilted, patronizing or inaccurate. On paper they are our "Pupil-load"; on lecture platform they are our "Youngsters"—but what is their proper name?

The frightening thing is their unquestioning acceptance of whatever is taught to them by anyone in front of the room. This has nothing to do with rebellion against authority; they rebel, all right, and loudly. But it doesn't occur to them to think.

There is a premium on conformity, and on silence. Enthusiasm is frowned upon, since it is likely to be noisy. The Admiral had caught a few kids who came to school before class, eager to practice on the typewriters. He issued a manifesto forbidding any students in the building before 8:20 or after 3:00—outside of school hours, students are "unauthorized." They are not allowed to remain in a classroom unsupervised by a teacher. They are not allowed to linger in the corridors. They are not allowed to speak without raising a hand. They are not allowed to feel too strongly or to laugh too loudly.

Yesterday, for example, we were discussing "The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars/ But in ourselves that we are underlings." I had been trying to relate Julius Caesar to their own experiences. Is this true? I asked. Are we really masters of our fate? Is there such a thing as luck? A small boy in the first row, waving his hand frantically: "Oh, call on me, please, please call on me!" was propelled by the momentum of his exuberant arm smack out of his seat and fell on the floor. Wild laughter. Enter McHabe. That afternoon, in my letter-box, it had come to his attention that my "control of the class lacked control."

But I had made that little boy think. I started something in him that emerged as an idea. I got him excited by a concept. And that's a lot!

Sometimes, of course, I am misled by their eagerness. There's a girl who never takes her eyes off me. This morning, when I asked a question about Brutus, she flung out her hand, pleading to be recognized. When I called on her, she said: "You wearing contack lens?"

It's a good thing Bester wasn't there to observe me. Yet there's more to that man than meets the eye. I'm impressed by his masterly handling of what's known hereabouts as "a discipline problem." He had stepped into the Early Late Room (don't ask me to explain what it is, nor why I was there) and asked one of the boys for his program card. "Aw, go jump in the lake," said the boy. The class sucked in its breath. With icy courtesy, Bester asked the boy to repeat what he had said, please. The boy did. "What were the first two words?" Bester asked, exquisitely polite. "Aw go." "Would you say that again, please?" "Aw go." "What was it again?" "Aw go." "Would you mind repeating the next word?" "Jump." "Again, please?" "Jump." "Again?" "Jump." Do you know how absurd the word "jump" can begin to sound after a while, when spoken solemnly by a boy standing among his peers? The boy was licked, and he knew it; the snickering class knew it; Bester knew it; and as he left, he said, with the same impeccable courtesy: "I'll be glad to recommend you for a remedial speech class."

I wish I could learn his assurance. It's in my homeroom that I feel such a failure. They are still suspicious of me. They are still trying me out. One girl, shy and troubled, did reach out. She asked to see me after school last Monday. She was apparently afraid to go home. Unfortunately, it was the day of the Faculty Conference, which is sacrosanct; attendance is compulsory. Perhaps I could have helped her. She hasn't been in school since. Truant officer reports she has run away from home.

At the Conference (we're supposed to sit it out for one hour each month; anything less, I believe, is unlawful) I watched my brothers and sisters, resignation or indifference settled like fine dust upon them—except for a few nervous souls who kept stirring up the soup. As a new teacher, I understood the protocol: I was not to speak. I was, however, asked to write up the minutes. I took notes, which I must now type up, and I timed the meeting: 60 minutes to the second!

All our hours and minutes are accounted for, planned for, raced against. Preparations are already afoot for Open School Day and the Xmas Faculty Show, and there are strange portents in the air and on the bulletin board. Only this morning a cryptic notice appeared over the time clock: "Advanced Algebra will be offered next term until further notice." I don't know what it means, either; nor what "minimal standards and maximal goals" means—it's a problem of communication.

Communication. If I knew how to reach them, I might be able to teach them. I asked them to write for me what they had covered so far in their high school English, and what they hoped to achieve in my class. Their papers were a revelation: I saw how barren were the years they brought me; I saw how desperately they need me, or someone like me. There aren't enough of us. Yet—with all my eagerness to teach, teaching is the one thing Calvin Coolidge makes all but impossible.

To the outside world, of course, this job is a cinch: 9 to 3, five days a week, two months' summer vacation with pay, all legal holidays, prestige and respect. My mother, for example, has the pleasant notion that my day consists of nodding graciously to the rustle of starched curtsies and a chorus of respectful voices bidding me good morning.

It's so good to have you to write to!

Love,

Syl

P. S. Did you know that in New York City there are more than 800 schools, over 86 high schools, and about one million pupils? And that out of every 100 children who start school, only 15 go on to receive a college diploma? For most, this is all the education they'll ever get.

12. A Doze of English

In answer to your question what we got out of English so far I am answering that so far I got without a doubt nothing out of English. Teachers were sourcastic sourpuses or nervous wrecks. Half the time they were from other subjects or only subs. One term we had 9 different subs in English. Once when Dr. Bester took our class I got a glimpse of what it's all about but being the Head he isn't allowed to teach.

Also no place to learn. Last term we had no desks to write only wet slabs from the fawcets because our English was in the Science Lab and before that we had no chairs because of being held in Gym where we had to squatt.

Even the regulars Mrs. Lewis made it so boreing I wore myself out yawning, and Mr. Loomis (a Math) hated teaching and us. Teachers try to make us feel lower than themselves, maybe this is because they feel lower than outside people. One teacher told me to get out of the room and never come back, which I did.

A Cutter

What I got out of it is Litterature and Books. Also some Potery. And just before a test—a doze of English. Having Boys in class dis-tracks me from my English. Better luck next time.

Linda Rosen

In Miss Pastorfeilds class I really enjoyed it we had these modren methods like Amature Hour and Gussing Games in rows with a scorekepper and to draw stick figures to show the different characters in the different books and Speling Hospital and Puntuation Trafic and Sentence Baseball with prizes for all thats the way to really learn English.

A True Student

I only learned one thing and that is a "quotion mark" I know a "quotion mark" upside down and that's all this one teacher thaught. I had one well not to mention no names and she was mad for "grammar" mistakes, Miss Lewis loved to pick on me! With Pasterfield we "dramatized" everything in sight and my last was a bug on "Democricy", we spent all our time voting on what to do and no time to do it.

Only once I had a teacher that was any good but she got "sick" and left. I hope this term with you will be good because you seem to be "alive" though it's too early to tell.

Chas. H. Robbins

I hate to think back on all my English years except one teacher I will never forget because when my note book wasn't so good (it was mostly in pencil) instead of telling me to do it over in ink she just told me to put renforcements on the holes and that will be enough. The next day she asked me did I put renforcements in. When I said I did she didn't even look she just said she'd take my word for it. That gave me a warm feeling inside because it was the first time a teacher took a pupil's word without asking to see if it was true. Most of the time they don't even know your name.

Me

In two years of H.S. Eng. I learned

1. How to read a newspaper

A. Headlines

2. How to outline

3. Comparises of authors (Hawthore)

4. And S. Marner

They shouldn't give S. Marners out. We would prefer a teen age book like Lollita better.

Teenager

During my many years of frequenting school I was well satisfied with my instruction. English is a very important language to study, especially if it's the language we speak daily. Since most of us are in High School, we are interested in getting an English education. I believe English to have been of grave importance to me and I will try in my next future to increase my knowledge. English outshines all my other subjects. I've always had good marks because I am a worker and I feel that anything a teacher tells me is of benefit to me. Speaking, which is my specialty, composition, which also attracts my attention, writing perfect sentences with punctuation where it really belongs, and many others which are of grave importance have been taught to me with excellent results. I was likewise impressed by the good work of my classmates. I hope to achieve further progress in my chosen program of study with an excellent teacher like yourself.

Harry A. Kagan

(The Students Choice)

Being your new around here you should know I made a bargian with all my teachers, if I don't bother them they won't bother me. So from now on I'm not writting any more for you.

In my 16 year life span so far I've had my share of almost every type of teacher but one I shall ne'er forget was in elementary (6th grade) because with her I had to watch my peas and ques. She was so strict she gave us homework every night and tried to pound it into our heads but it's the way she did the pounding that makes her different. She took a real interest and brought out our good and bad points. She stayed in every day after school so we could come in and ask her questions about the work. She militarized us and sometimes whacked us but for all her strictness a strange thing happened at the end of the term: every one gathered around her and kissed her.

But high school seems harder, speeches, speeches, that's all we hear.

Dropout

What I learned in English is to doodle. It's such a boring subject I just sat and doodled the hours away. Sometimes I wore sunglasses in class to sleep.

Doodlebug

I don't look at a teacher as a thing but as a person like myself & I accepted many teachers with their faults & tried to conscentrate on their Dr. Jekile side. But some are just not cut out to be teachers—too old and nervious & the way she taught you just couldn't understand it. She was the talker. If she didn't talk about her sisters or next door neighbors she talked about the generation of today & we couldn't get a word in edgewise. She was one of those that make big plans at the beginning of the term & never get around to it. They act like they're doing you the greatest favor, with sarcastic remarks like "The nerve of some peoples children!" The answer was actually scared out of us even if we knew it. When we did answer she gave us no credit but said "It's about time you learned something!" Whenever I laughed or excuse me burped in class quite acidentally I would be pulled out to sit in some remote corner of the school.

A Bashful Nobody

I had Dr. Bester for one week while my regular teacher took a rest cure and we liked him but I feel he developed a false character to cover up. This false character consisted of a stern face and remarks but every one saw a good teacher shining through the false window of sterness. He roused our somewhat hidden interest in English and we all worked our head off for him.

Carole Blanca

I once had an English teacher in another school that not only treated me as a student but as she would her own sons. She gave me clothes that her son had outgrown. The clothes that were given to me were in good condition.

Frank Allen

In Junior High we had a brand new teacher of English, he was so young he couldn't manage the class at all, we didn't listen to a word he said even when he shouted. One day while he had a chalk fight with a kid the kids all left the room one by one. Well, instead of going out to the hall to see if we were there he put on his coat, took his umbrella swung it over his shoulder and marched out of the room whistling. He didn't say a word to us. You can probably guess that we were replaced by a new teacher.

That is the one English that stands out in my head.

The only teacher I had who didn't make us feel so bad about ourselves. That's Mrs. Schachter. She was plain with us and she made everything seem easy which it isn't. She even liked us. Every since I have pleaded on bended knee to get her back but to no availl. I wish I went to a school with big sunny windows with trees in them and no one talks behind your back. Where the teacher would be more of a friend and not have favorites just because some one is better.

Vivian Paine

As long as you asked here is my list:

Miss Pastorfield lets us walk all over her

Mrs. Lewis they should retire her

Mr. Barringer is a big show off

Mrs. Schachter OK

Miss Barrett should be a movie stare

Mr. Loomis ignorammis

You may not agree but that's my opion.

While attending Jr. H.S. I ran across a teacher who enjoyed himself and didn't mind being a teacher. His way of teaching was simple, he taught with pride and always understood his pupils even if they couldn't explain themselves. He wasn't a dictating teacher but in some magic way we always behaved ourselves. I learned everything I know about English from this nobel man. He made me feel the earth around me, he was like wine except that he didn't give high marks. I frequently went to his room during lunch, we played darts, we ate lunch he brought for us and he would help us with what he could even in other subjects like science. In the summer we went to the park with him and played baseball. This teacher and I still correspond with each other by writing letters.

grateful student

English is a personal subject that should be taught by men. Too many females in the schools and they're all no good.

Rusty

In my other school I was more of a Majority because the Whites were only these few lads but the education they dished out wasn't so good. Here they tried to integrate me but it didn't take.

I'm not what you call an "A" student but I don't mind school at lease it takes me away from home but the teachers are too prejudice they are mostly Whites and I never got a fair mark out of them.

I'm not exacly a book reader but I didn't mind it so much untill the teachers started in they ruined it for me. I got no advantage out of diograms and spelling words to write ten times only a waist of good paper. Semicollons also don't stick to my head. It's not right to be pick on all the time!

Edward Williams, Esq.

What I learned. What I hope to achieve.

So far I've learned words with meanings, words without meanings, oral words, spelling words, parts of speech and a test every Friday. I hope to achieve a grasp on literature and life.

Sophomore

A kaleidoscope. A crazy quilt. An ever-shifting pattern. Shapes and shadows that come and go, leaving no echo behind, no ripple on the water where no stone was ever dropped. Such is my remembrance of the lost and vanished years of English, from whence I arise, all creativity stifled, yet a Phoenix with hope reborn each term anew. Will it be different this term? Will I be encouraged, guided, inspired? The question, poised on the spear of Time, is still unanswered. (I was supposed to be in Mrs. Schachter's Creative Writing class but because of a conflict with Physics 2, I couldn't get in.)

Elizabeth Ellis

Its not necessary to study english because what's the use of it big deal so we never make society so what? We're still living aren't we who needs it. studing another langage it would be much better, for example take books it's alright when you see it in the movies, and the words oh, they really get me. It's a bunch of nonsence.

(Frankly I would perfer a teacher freely telling me I'm no good in english then giving me dirty looks in the hall.)

Disgusted

Dribs & Drabs, McBeth one week Moby Dick next, a quotation mark, oral debates on Should Parents be Strict? Should Girls Wear Jeans? The mistakes I made in elementery school I still make. I hope to achieve correction.

Stander

I think after you learn to speak English in kindergarden the subject should be droped. Ha-ha! Grammer should be outlawed! Coma sentences should be bared from the language! Oral talks are to embarassing for those not gifted with "gab". Writen work causes many errors in gr. & sp! Reading books are to hard to answer questions on it! (I like English with no strain on my brain!) Also on the dislike side of English I can put the constant anoyance of certain students who horsed around. I can put myself in that category because I horsed around and I didn't benefit myself one bit and probly anoyed the class! However we must take the good with the bad and know our whole life will not be a bed of roses!

Lou Martin

Grammar & Shakes. — Phooey!

Essays — a lot of gossip.

Ivanho is for the Birds.

George Elliot stinks, even though he is a lady.

Why did you ask this question? To show that you can do the job better? You teachers are all alike, dishing out crap and expecting us to swallow it and then give it back to you, nice and neat, with a place in it for the mark to go in. But you're even phonier than the others because you put on this act—being a dame you know how— and you stand there pretending that you give a damn. Who you kidding?

We're dirt to you, just like you're dirt to the fatheads and whistle-blowers who run this jail, and they're dirt to the swindlers and horn-tooters who run the school system.

Except for one man in this whole school no one has even given a damn about me, and it's the same at home and in the street outside. You probably don't care for my language, so you can give me a zero in Vocabulary.

Anyhow I'm quitting at the end of this term and joining the dogs eating dogs eating other dogs in the great big lousy world you're all educating us for. I sure as hell got myself an education. Though it's not in any syllabus. But you're the one who's stuck here. Don't worry, you'll find plenty of others willing to play your game of baah, baah, little lost lambs, come back to school. But trot in step, double file. And you'll get your nice clean diplomas served on crap. Yummy. I trust this answers your question.

Joe Ferone

Joe — Though your vocabulary is colorful, certain words would be more effective if used sparingly. You express yourself vividly and well, and your metaphors—from dogs to lambs—are apt. I would tend to give you a considerably higher mark than you give yourself, and I am not speaking of English.

There is some truth in what you say, but you are far too intelligent to cling to a view as narrow as yours. As for your indictment of me—in this country one is innocent until proved guilty. Why not give me the chance any suspect gets? I think we should have a talk. Can you see me after school today?

S. Barrett

I don't understand them big words you use, and I'm busy after school. Every day. You'll have to prove yourself on your own time.

Joe

(P.S. I wish I could believe you.)

13. Enrichment, Etc.

Dear Miss Barrett,

Here is a copy of the English Syllabus; let it be your Bible. It discusses various ways to provide enrichment, etc.

Samuel Bester

Chairman, Language Arts Dept.

A GUIDING PRINCIPLE TO BE CONSIDERED IN ALL CLASSROOM PROCEDURES IS THE PROVISION FOR INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES AND NEEDS OF PUPILS. THE TEACHER SHOULD DISCOVER EACH PUPIL'S ATTAINMENT IN SKILL AND KNOWLEDGE—REGARDLESS OF GRADE PLACEMENT—AND THEN LEAD HIM FORWARD FROM THAT POINT.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF A READING HABIT BASED ON A LOVE OF READING MAY WELL BE THE MOST IMPORTANT CONTRIBUTION THE SCHOOL CAN MAKE.

SPECIAL ATTENTION SHOULD BE GIVEN TO MAKING THE ENGLISH CLASSROOM AS ATTRACTIVE AS POSSIBLE. THERE SHOULD BE SHELVES AND TABLES FOR THE CARE AND DISPLAY OF A WIDE VARIETY OF BOOKS AND PERIODICALS. MOVABLE CHAIRS AND DESKS PROMOTE INFORMALITY AND FACILITATE GROUP WORK. PROVISION FOR THE USE OF A SCREEN AND A PROJECTOR, A TAPE-RECORDER, AND OTHER AUDIO-VISUAL AIDS IS DESIRABLE.