Friday Funnies

Since it's Friday I thought I would do a little self-advertising and tell some humorous stories that are in my book. I'm certain every professional person can agree that so-called professional development is the bane of our existence. In education it is the same and probably worse. Professional development occurs throughout the year, but it is concentrated in the days before school starts. When you think about it, this is the worst possible time for professional development.

Educational experts over the years have long talked about the importance of the first day and first week of school. All of your rules, procedures, and guidelines are established at that time. More than anything else, the tone for the class is set. By the end of the first week, a student can tell you if their teacher is nice or mean, organized or disorganized, and more importantly, fair or unfair. The week before students come back is a time when teachers are scrambling to get things back together. Instead, we are shuffled off to some kind of professional development that usually only develops our contempt for professional development. I have three stories from my career and I'll let the reading audience choose the best and worst (as it were.)

Story 1

When I was in one school district we had an ex football coach for a principal. He was pretty no nonsense, but he usually came up with absolute fluff for professional development. On this occasion, he brought in a sister and brother team from somewhere in Texas. The sister was the teacher and the brother was a John Stamos wannabe with an acustical guitar. He seemed to provide the same service that a bass player provided at a comedy show I went to. Ambience is fine for onstage comedy, I don't want it at my professional development.

Whenever she made a point he would strum on his guitar some indecipherable tune that I guess drove the point home. He would have been more successful holding signs for the studio audience that said, "laugh", "ooh and ah", "clap." I quickly discovered why the distraction was necessary. I came to discover that we were sitting there for five or six hours only to hear her say one basic thing: we don't teach subjects, we teach kids. Thank you Dr. Insight. Here is about 3000 dollars for your trouble.

While the acustical guitar was bad, this experience wouldn't have made it into the top three without the stirring conclusion. At the end, brother, sister, and maybe an organist urged the crowd to stand up and join them in a stirring rendition of "Greatest Love of All" by Whitney Houston. I wasn't a voice major and I worked hard for the degree I had. Needless to say, most of the faculty not only didn't sing, but were extremely pissed off.

Story 2

In that same district, we had what is normally called convocation. This is where all district employees get together in the same place. As you might imagine, this is a waste of time inofitself. You get more than a thousand employees stuffed into a field house where they are going to hear a generic message from some dignataries. Usually, this doesn't cross the threshold of abject stupidity, but it did on this occasion.

The district hired the teacher from Dangerous Minds to come talk to us about her experiences. You know this movie. It was the movie where Michelle Pfeiffer came into an inner city school and turned them around overnight. Of course, it's not this woman's fault that they made the school seem like an Iraqi warzone. It's also not her fault that they had Pfeiffer essentially win the kids over on the second day of school by wearing a leather jacket. Either the school is hard core or it isn't.

However, like with the last story, she did okay given the obstacles. It was the Elvis impersonator that threw everything over the top. Nothing says good education like some fat jackass in an Elvis suit singing "Hunk A Hunk of Burning Love." The teachers were thinking along the lines of "Caught in a trap." I have to admit though, given some of the places I have taught I sometimes hum "In the Ghetto." However, I don't see that as inspirational.

Story 3

Those first two stories are hard to beat. There have been a number of silly professional development sessions I have been to. Moreover, I have enough things I have picked up from them to account for maybe one hand's worth of fingers. I have one in mind that beats them all, but it's one of those deals that you would have to be on the inside to appreciate. So, I'll stick with funny.

In other district, we had a similar convocation where the speaker was an "expert" on generational analysis. If that sounds impressive, believe me, it's not. Essentially, he just took  a stack of characteristics and attributed it to Generation X. You see, most of the teachers were from Generation X, so we could really identify with it. This is the point where I wish I had an icon that rolled eyes.

He was there to tell us all about Generation Y. Somehow, I always thought it was Generation Why, but that must be the eternal smart ass in me. I've never been one to stereotype people as a rule. Sure, we do it all the time, but throwing the blanket over an entire generation kind of offends my sensibilities, and I'm not that easy to offend. Kids are individuals and deserve to be treated as such.

Again, this wouldn't make the grade except for our esteemed superintendant riding on the gym floor in a cardboard cutout school bus. We spend countless hours preparing to teach kids. We fight the legislature and school board to be taken seriously and there we have our fearless a leader (a woman with a PhD) riding around in a cardboard school bus. I never felt so futile as I did at that moment.

So, what have we learned? We've learned that we teach students and not a subject. Those students all can be fit into the same sets of characteristics. Additionally, if we show up to school in a leather jacket we will immediately get mad respect. Finally, if it all becomes too much to bear we can bust out in line dancing or swivel or hips to songs our students probably have never heard of. Let's see those votes and everyone have a great weekend.