COMMENTARY
Teachers suffering at hands of administrators
By Walt Novak
Teachers suffering at hands of administrators
Instructors, subjected to rampant abuse in the classrooms, should be freed to simply do their jobs.
When Honolulu Magazine ranked my school 256th out of 256 public schools, one of my four administrators waved a copy of the article in front of us teachers.
We were seated politely, all 90 faculty members. He said that our teaching really had to improve and that he'd be coming around to check on us. We teachers not only needed to do better but also needed to "document our progress" for verification.
I fully agree with our rank of 256th.
But the real problem with my school is administration. I've spent 18 years here, suffering through some of the most questionable administrators known to man.
As we were getting Honolulu Magazine waved at us, not one mention was made regarding administrative improvements. We teachers wanted to stand up and say: "Hey! Where's your plan to improve this F-minus administration, in which NOTHING works? How about your tardy policy? Your class-cutting policy? Your classroom-swearing policy? Your swearing-at-the-teacher policy?
"None of these work — F-minus!"
But we teachers sat quietly, like sheep.
Teachers have an essential right to expect direct administrative consequences for students who are tardy, cut class, swear in class or swear directly at an adult. We cannot be effective without them. But believe it or not, my school offers no direct administrative consequence for ANY of these problems.
We have three vice principals, one principal and a long list of "educators" who receive full teacher salary without teaching any classes. Many of them haven't taught for years. They hold vague-sounding titles and can cheerlead an administration better'n Baghdad Bob.
No public school will operate with optimum efficiency when educators are denied their essential right to administrative backing on discipline. It's ridiculous for people with seven nonteaching periods to tell actual educators what to do during their one or two nonteaching periods. It's nonsensical for administrators to tell educators to do more when they themselves don't even do the bare minimum.
Effectively administrating a public school has nothing to do with dumping discipline problems on teachers.
But at many schools, this is the rule. Effective administrating has everything to do with systematically maintaining a low student-per-classroom ratio. But at my school, high student-to-teacher ratios are the norm.
Our teachers are set up to fail, and then blamed when they do. We often resemble Springsteen's protagonist from "Born in the U.S.A.": "End up like a dog that's been beat too much, 'til you spend half your life just covering up."
Our lack of teacher support actually MAKES kids go bad. At the beginning of the school year, 10 percent of our kids are discipline problems. By June, it's fully 20 percent.
Classroom teachers, although the lowest paid, are actually the most important in our Department of Education hierarchy. We educate. We don't simply cheerlead, shuffle papers or boss people around like a lot of our "superiors," who seem to mainly care about keeping unpleasant work off their desks. Therefore, they quickly rig it so the unpleasantness is dumped back upon teachers' laps. Enforcing consequences for classroom misbehavior is THE primary unpleasant thing.
Instead of inundating teachers with conduct enforcement, administrators should reclaim this burden and free teachers to teach.
If Gov. Linda Lingle and Schools Superintendent Patricia Hamamoto truly wanted to improve Hawai'i's public schools, they could. And it'd be free. But first, both need to look at what's widely regarded as among the worst public-school systems in America and realize there exist no statewide teacher rights here.
Classroom abuse of teachers is corroding an entire learning system. Unless Lingle and Hamamoto initiate minimal teacher rights — statewide — negligent superiors will continue to ride roughshod over us. Nothing will improve, and superiors will continue to pioneer new realms of teacher disempowerment.
If Lingle or Hamamoto are scared to suspend insubordinate students in rough areas, turning them loose on the streets, then they can insist upon on-campus suspension programs. When a teacher needs to remove a student for disruptive behavior, there will be a supervised place for these students to go.
Wouldn't cost taxpayers a cent. You know that long list of fully paid, nonteaching "educators" I told you about? Well, they could each be assigned one period per day to conduct the on-campus suspension. No space? Just set up a big tarp/tent on a field. Suspension programs wouldn't cost beans. Simply get infractors out of the classrooms.
It's just one cost-free way to dramatically improve things.
Walt Novak is a public-school teacher in the Leeward District.
