The waiting game

This Express Mail envelope full of bank statements, bank letters, copies of checks, pay stubs, pictures, passports, school transcripts, tax forms, phone records, emails and any other like item that I could think of is on its way to be reviewed and approved. I thought I would feel relieved and excited about getting this application completed but I didn't.  I started worrying that the envelope would rip open because I didn't tape it on the bottom (the postal worker told me I didn't need to) and all the contents would be lost.  It's just a scary thought to have your whole life in a large envelope with the potential of it getting lost on the way to its destination.  I have a tracking number and the envelope contents are insured but, wow, it's freaky.  I was way more nervous leaving the post office instead of feeling excited.  Now the waiting game starts.

I've been watching Teach: Tony Danza again tonight.  Now, what strikes me the most about this show is the way they accurately show that no matter what a student does, it's the teacher's fault.  Tonight on the episode "Teacher's Pet", Mr. Danza is teaching the students a five-paragraph essay.  The class gives little effort and Mr. Danza goes over the format again.  Continually he gives them on-on-one talks, telling them that they need to try harder and offers help.  The next scene, they show the guidance counselor telling the principal about how Mr. Danza's class didn't do the essay well.  Immediately the assumption is that heisn't teaching them well and is just coasting through the curriculum without caring about if the kids actually learn the material or not.  Ridiculous.  These kids are not failing except for one student who refuses to turn in work and Mr. Danza has talked to the student's mother repeatedly.  So what is he, as a teacher, supposed to do in situations like this?  It's his fault because he doesn't "connect" with a few students?  Please!

On the days that I think I want to work in the public school again, even as a librarian, I watch this show and remember how it is to be put under that firing squad.  I guess that this isn't the kind of situation that all teachers get into but, again, blaming the teacher for the students' lack of care of interest in what is going on in class is just absurd.  I gave the FCAT to students who Christmas tree-ed the whole test and slept or danced in their desk through the rest of the test time.  I feel for poor Tony Danza.  He's not alone in getting this kind of treatment.  He's had way more training than a lot of first year teachers get and he's qualified.  It just seems like he's been made a target and given even more pressure on him because of who he is (and those students, by the way, had no idea who he was).

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