Yeah, I'm here

October 26, 2005 –- 10:23 PM – I failed my first student

Yeah, I know, it’s been awhile. I apologize. I’ve been dreadfully busy as of late, but busy is good. I like being busy. It keeps me from being bored.

First quarter just ended. This means a few things – one, I’m ¼ of the way done with my teaching stint here. Whoa. Two – I’ve been working like crazy trying to finalize grades. Three – I GET TO GIVE GRADES TO STUDENTS. Have you ever been on this side of the equation? It’s nuts. The number one myth that I have personally debunked as a teacher is that teachers don’t want to see some of their kids succeed. That is absolutely false. Nothing would make a teacher happier than to watch their students succeed. Not only is it heart-warming on a general level, but it vindicates who knows how many hours of toil and effort. And a successful student indicates that I have been successful in teaching him, and of course I like that.

Unfortunately, neither the world nor I am perfect and not all my kids are achieving equally. Some are flying off the charts, and it gives me great pride to give them a high grade on their report cards. But alas, some are not flying as high, and it pains, PAINS me to give them low grades. It’s almost criminal how many times teachers fudge grades just so they don’t have to fail a student. I will even admit that I am still holding one student’s final exam because I can’t bring myself to show him how he did (not well).

Forget patience. Forget diligence. Forget sincerity. If anyone ever asks me what it takes to be a teacher, my immediate response will be ice in one’s veins. The hardest part of my teaching experience thus far has been coming to grips with the fact that some of my students whom I see on a daily basis and of whose education I am personally in charge will not graduate from high school, will not attend college, and will not become socially mobile. Regardless of what I do, even though it’s my responsibility, I am not going to be able to change all my students’ lives for the better. That is a very daunting reality to accept, and it’s very easy to doubt yourself as a result. This job requires ice in one’s veins. You have to accept it, be unfazed by it, and move past it. I’m not sure I’ve been able to do that yet.

In other news, I’ve managed to land a permanent spot for my high school’s newspaper in the local/regional/national/only newspaper of the Marshall Islands, the Marshall Islands Journal. Every other week a few submissions from my newspaper club will appear in the weekly issue of the Journal. My kids were pretty excited. The article that drew the editor’s attention? The advice column, a.k.a. Ask Baby and Kim. Go figure.

Also, I’ve latched onto the college preparatory activity at the high school. It was started last year by a volunteer teacher and this year a full-time school counselor is leading it. By pestering him enough I’ve managed to firmly insert my foot in the door and have already interviewed a few students, administered a practice TOEFL exam, tabulated the results into Excel and analyzed it, and am about to begin teaching TOEFL prep. Full teaching load, debate, newspaper, college prep, TOEFL prep, weekly radio show, hmm… I should probably slow down. I’m not at the U of C anymore.

This weekend I’m going on my first SCUBA dive that’s worth writing about. It’s another volunteer’s birthday and we’re going diving on an outer island. That means pristine conditions and in upwards of 200 feet of underwater visibility. The divemaster’s specialty is shark calling (meaning he crinkles a plastic bottle underwater and sharks are attracted to the noise) and we expect to see some big ones. Definitely excited about it.

Alright I should write a lot more given how long it’s been but I have to end it here and go back to agonizing over grades. I’ll leave with an excerpt from a piece of writing by one of my 10^th graders. Phonics is often difficult for the kids here because many English sounds just don’t exist in Marshallese, so they are unable to correctly pronounce some letters/sounds which leads to synonymous usage of those same letters/sounds when they write (think “r” and “l” from east Asians who speak English). Anyways, “g” and “c” are often confused here along with “b” and “p.” This resulted in the following masterful prose:

“Yesterday my friends and I were walking. I snapped my friend on the forehead so he crapped my skirt. It fell down so I quickly crapped it.”