It Is Your Duty

They never tell you what you’re really in for when you decide to become a teacher. I am convinced that if they did, everyone would decide they want to become something else, and teaching would be left to the homeschooling parents like Michelle Duggar, and then those parents would turn into Moms and Dads like Jon and Kate Gosselin...terrifying!!! They don’t tell you about the mounds of paper work you have to do, the long faculty meetings you must endure, usually about boosting math scores, the fundraisers you sponsor that are much more work than they are worth, and on top of all that, you sometimes have a duty. A duty is another task you have to perform during the day, such as hall duty or lunch monitoring, or holding a study hall. At my last job, I was exceptionally fortunate: I was duty free! I taught 5 classes and had 2 prep periods and a lunch period. Life was good. The first and the last period of every day were free for me to do what I wanted. This usually meant making photocopies, usually for the a cappella group I unwillingly advised (yeah, I’m still bitter), and meant I could start my plans and map out the following day.

I loved this schedule. I called these glorious free periods my “unwind time.” Any teacher will tell you that this time is essential to getting through the day. It’s the time in which you answer administrator e-mails, discuss different things with colleagues, put some good music on, and get your work done. You can close the office door and enjoy 40 minutes of no one calling your name in a shrill and accusing tone. It was the best. NO DUTY.

At my most recent job, I have the unfortunate duty of supervising the students that are serving In School Suspension or ISS 3 days in every 4 day cycle. It is a nightmare. ISS offenders are the real life equivalent of misdemeanor criminals, where the real life crimes would be something like reckless driving or petty theft. The kids that are in ISS behave too poorly to be with the “normal” kids, but not so poorly that they are not allowed to attend school for a given period of time. Essentially, it is behavioral segregation. 

The students in ISS are there for various offenses: Cursing, rough housing, bullying, inappropriate behavior, ASSAULT, ect. When I was in school, my parents would have driven to the school and murdered me if I were given ISS. If for some reason they decided to let me live, I guarantee it would have been in solitary confinement, in my room, where my meals would be slipped under the door, and I would only be allowed to leave to use the restroom, that is if they decided NOT to have a toilet installed next to my bed. In addition, I would be completely mortified. I walk the straight and narrow and being the least street savvy person to walk the earth, I would have either gotten my ass kicked, or would have confined myself to the corner where I would slowly rock back and forth, sobbing softly and saying, “I’ll be a good boy” over and over until they brought in the straight jacket.  These kids, however, show no remorse. They are well on their way to becoming hardened criminals. You know its going to be bad when there is a sheet of paper on the desk you sit at that has the words: IN CASE OF AN EMERGENCY CALL SECURITY: EXT ****. Below are also listed the numbers for all of the administrators and local police.

WTF?!?!?!?! I chose not to work in an intercity school for a reason. The sheet is also pretty worn, meaning it has been used a lot. I am pretty sure they are looking for me to die there because whoever designed the room decided to put the phone 5 steps away from the desk at the front of the room. And of course, it’s on the wall opposite the door, so if you ran to make a call and one of the students intercepted you, it’s not like you can tuck and roll and make your way out the door. No, you’re trapped…just how they want you. They have also conveniently located the room UNDERGROUND. Yes, the ISS room is built into the side of a hill. There are windows, with the shades closed because bad kids don't get the luxury of looking outside, but you'll never make it to them in time to bust through the screen to freedom. Not only is the room underground, it is also huddled between a janitor's closet and the lunch detention room, so no one can hear you scream, unless it is periods 4, 5, or 6, and let's face it, the poor bastard in the lunch detention room has enough on his hands. You're on your own.

I have ISS Duty period 3 and period 9, depending on the day. No one is in the room next to me, it's just me and the 6 or 7 kids in there. My first day there, 8 kids were lucky enough to have scored ISS. They had all decided that they were going to bolt for the woods during recess, hop the fence, and make their way to the deli down the road where they would spend the day regaling each other with tales of their latest crimes. They hadn't planned on the administrators following them, hopping the fence as well (one of them did it in heels) and apprehending them. It was interesting, they rounded up "the leader" of the group, and once they had him, the others came voluntarily, resigned to their fate of spending the next 2 days in ISS. I was in no way prepared to deal with these kids. Who thought it was a good idea to put all of the school's bad kids in ONE ROOM and have a MUSIC teacher watch them? It was probably a gym teacher's idea...they hate us. I think private cells are a much better idea and, in some cases, it would prepare these students for their future days spent in various state and federal penitentiaries. Alcatraz would be a very fitting place to put these students for ISS, but I am sure that the Department of Education would never go for it…especially considering all of the tourism revenue that would be lost.

On that first day, the students were talking quietly, something they should not have been doing, and the leader was telling the others about his latest criminal exploits. Let’s call this kid Bernardo, after the Sharks gang leader in West Side Story. This kid looked nothing like Bernardo, and I am pretty sure he couldn’t pirouette, but he might own a switch blade and could have been planning a rumble, so I think it works. Bernardo apparently got into a fight at a rival school football game the weekend before and is no longer allowed to attend any school functions in that district. How sweet, his first restraining order! The way he told the story, some high schooler (Bernardo is in Middle School) was trying to “mack it with his girl” and he “punched that motha fucka in the face.” Bernardo did not feel the need to sensor himself for my benefit. Talking I can deal with, but swearing is not something I tolerate (hypocrite?). I had a former student at the high school level who swore a lot, and I told him that swearing is ok if you’re old enough to legally vote. It didn’t really help, but I thought it was clever. Anyway, I told Bernardo to watch his mouth, feeling very much like Officer Krupkie, and he stared at me and said, “Sorry, I didn’t know that ‘motha fucka’ was a bad word.”

Normally, I would have thought that a student that said that was giving me lip, but he genuinely didn’t realize that that was not acceptable language to use. What kind of home environment did this kid have? My parents certainly didn’t allow me to swear and definitely didn’t swear in front of me. I am pretty sure I would die if I ever heard that phrase uttered by either one of my parents. I learned to swear where everyone else did…high school. I guess they start them young here. Thankfully, that group of students didn’t give me any trouble, other than an obvious lack of knowledge regarding appropriate language.

The next day was not so lucky. Having been educated on the proper ISS procedures by my administrator, I now knew the kids were not allowed to talk at all, were not allowed to sit at desks next to or in front or behind of someone else, and if they did not have work to do, we were to assign them work out of the variety of textbooks located in the classroom. When I relieved the security guard, I sat at the desk up front, feeling very commanding in my light blue sweater, collared shirt, and cleanly pressed khaki pants.  As I started filling out some forms I needed to complete for the central office, one of the students started talking to one of their peers. He seemed to think that because the normal ISS person left, the normal rules no longer applied. “Nice try, kid. I know the deal now”, I thought to myself. I was prepared to enforce the rules as a private citizen, looking to keep peace and order in these scary times we live in. “We’re not talking in here” I said in my commanding teacher voice. My teacher voice consists of me raising my voice to ¾ volume and lowering the pitch of it by about half an octave, which, with my abnormally high speaking voice, makes it about the range of any normal person. This is accompanied by my eyes bulging so far out it looks like they are trying to escape my skull, my nostrils flared and ready, and the slightest lean forward. It’s pretty good. Despite my commanding voice and obviously intimidating look, the kid looked me dead in the face and said “fuck you, Grover.”

At first I was so shocked that he swore at me that I didn’t know what to do. Also, where did the whole “Grover” thing come from? I thought, mayhaps (Shout out to my Theory Classes!) it was a reference to the Percy Jackson books where Grover was a satyr and Percy Jackson’s best friend. Then I realized that, not only did that not make sense, because I have human legs and have yet to sprout horns, but this kid had probably never read a book in his life. And then it hit me…the blue sweater! He was calling me Grover from Sesame Street! That little bastard. First of all, my sweater was LIGHT blue, not ROYAL blue, and my head doesn’t split in half when I speak. I could not have looked LESS like Grover. And, out of all of the possible pop culture references, he went with Grover? That’s pretty weak. I was wearing a color that looked more like Cookie Monster (now Salad Monster…tragic.) than anything, and even then, it would have to have been Cookie Monster after he had been left in the sun too long, or gone through the washer about 30 times. The Sesame Street reference was a stretch. I called down to the office and the security guard came to escort him to his administrator’s office. Needless to say, in ISS the next day, I spent 3^rd period with my Muppet loving friend!

I wish I could say that this is the worst I have seen so far, but that just wouldn’t be true. Not only do these kids have a mouth like a long shore man, they also enjoy launching projectiles (aka, throwing things). In my experience with ISS thus far, I have concluded that it would be in everyone’s best interest to have a boy’s ISS and a girl’s ISS. I’m not trying to be sexist; it is simply because the hormone clash is almost more than I can deal with. Boys in ISS like to egg each other on, propelling the stupidity to epic heights. The girls laugh and feed into it as well, but there is always a turning point. Something sets off a spark and all of a sudden a line is drawn and the room immediately becomes boys vs. girls. Sometimes it is triggered by the gentlemen, and sometimes it is triggered by the ladies (although, in this case the more accurate terms would be Pimps and Hoes or Playas and Bitches, all terms that I have heard in ISS) but regardless of who starts it, it ALWAYS happens. 

At the end of week 1 in ISS, one of the boys triggered the divide by saying that a girl was ugly. This just so happened to be the best friend of one of the girls serving time that day. They started crumpling up paper and throwing it at each other, and the other students eagerly started joining in. Some were launching paper airplanes, some pencils, thankfully no one threw chairs, although, I am sure the thought crossed their minds. In movies, when stuff like that happens at a school, we usually laugh and enjoy in the good fun. All I could think of, in the moment, was, “And this is how I lose my job…” I brought most of the order back to class, but while the other kids returned to their work, fearful that I would assign them another day in “the slammer”, the initial pair of students was still going strong. I stepped in, confiscated all of their belongings and returned to my desk. They continued to launch things , grabbing paper from their peers nearby until I raised my voice and said “ENOUGH! Continue throwing things and you will earn yourself a trip to the Principal’s Office.” The young man dug his hand in his pocket and retrieved a handful of change, which he promptly launched at my face. I used my legal pad as a shield and missed being hit, but the intent was to hurt me. I wanted to launch the kid out the window or back over him with my sweet Toyota Camry, but instead, I called security. There is something very satisfying about seeing a kid panic with fear, especially after they tried to cause you bodily harm. Before security came, he and the girl decided that they were going to pretend to be asleep to avoid getting in trouble. Really kids…REALLY? What makes you think that being asleep is going to prevent you from getting chewed out by the Vice Principal? Also, let it be known that sleeping is  NOT allowed in ISS, so even when these kids are trying to cover up their massive rule breaking, they are still breaking rules. It’s times like this that I take a step back, observe the situation, and think to myself, “This is my life now…”

Security came, a short but terrifying Italian man from Brooklyn, and after “waking up” the 2 offenders, escorted them to face their judgment. I was mollified after hearing that the boy, let’s call him Wayne because I hate that name, received 3 days of out of school suspension for his actions and the girl, Dorkus (because that name is as ridiculous as she is), received one day of out of school suspension, because it was her “3^rd strike.” I’ll bet you it was more than her 3^rd strike, considering she was sent to ISS for slugging a girl in the head, but I digress. 

For those of you who have a duty period, I feel your pain…literally… I am pretty sure these kids are going to hurt me! For those of you who were lucky to escape a cruel fate such as this, enjoy your innocence! Don’t take it for granted!!! And for those of you who are majoring in Music Ed, or Art Ed, or anything that people don’t consider a “core” or “academic” class, change your major. Major in Phys Ed. They get to play games, wear sweatpants, and their “teaching” periods are shorter because the kids have to change for class…possible Master’s degree? I think so.