A Teacher's Lament

I'm a teacher. My title is a little different, but I've got 81 students this semester. Let's call a spade a spade. I'm a teacher.

For all you parents out there... I know your kids. You know about your kids...you've fed them and clothed them and influenced them and talked to them and loved them. But you have to deal with the Heisenberg Principle. Whenever you're around, your kids aren't themselves. Not close. The only time you see your children is when you are watching, unannounced and unnoticed. It isn't often. Most of the time, you are relying on speculation and optimism and prayer. I feel for you.

Once I am out of the classroom, I am next to invisible. Your kids say things they would never say when I am in class with them. It's like people in cars who pick their noses and perform personal tasks and rituals that make them appear boorish and disgusting. They think they're cut off because they're in cars. People, you are surrounded by glass. We can see you. And students that walk out of my classroom immediately get in the cars, so to speak...only I can see and hear them. They talk about life and people (and me, occasionally and sometimes disparagingly) as though they are in a bubble from the world. I move among them like a ghost.

The average grade in my classes is a mid to low B. To be technical, the GPA in my courses is around 2.75. It doesn't vary much--sometimes I'll have a semester with a terrific upper division class filled with English majors. Sometimes I'll get a Freshmen comp class filled with the slackers and athletes who are having a second go at a class they failed previously. If I've got 20 people in a class, it's rare that I have more than 3 or 4 As. That's 15 to 20 percent. All parents think their kids deserve or should get As. 15 to 20 percent do. That's a good class. Most of the students that get As are doing it in all their classes. They're driven.

The other ones--the other 80-85%--are largely aimless and unfocused. And totally unconcerned about it. Maybe half of the students getting As actually work hard to get those grades...maybe 2 or 3 of the others put in an effort to get a well-deserved B (or C). The vast majority just sit there and let eduction wash over them, hoping that when the tide pulls back it will leave as little trace as possible. Half my students get grades of C or below. Almost none of them care about it.

I teach writing, for God's sake. I teach rhetoric. I teach students how to form reasonable arguments, and support their ideas. I teach them how to write professional documents, including resumes and cover letters. It is not an esoteric subject. I love history, but it's not common that an employer will ask you to talk about Robber Barons in the Gilded Age. She or he will, however, ask you to submit a travel report, or a project overview, or an in-house memo. You will be asked for your opinion about the project your department is working on, what to do about the break schedule, or how to improve the lunch buffet. I teach students how to do these things, how to do them better. Practical things. I tell them that a resume that gets a B will not get them a job, because someone will submit a resume that's an A. I tell them coming in five minutes late to a fifty minute class on a regular basis, or missing 10% of days for vague, inspecific reasons won't be accepted in the workplace and they will be unable to get or keep a job. Doesn't matter. Almost none of them care.

They are good kids. They are adults, but I can't help but think about them as kids...partially because of their incredible naivete about how to function in the real world, a job I am supposed to be preparing them for. I get along with students. I genuinely care about them. I like them. But they don't care; I know this. I see it every day. The passivity about their own future. The lack of concern about thinking as opposed to memorizing. The frighteningly narrow world view and inability to articulate their part in it.

One out of a hundred is truly different. He or she thinks about what is going on. These aren't necessarily the best students, but I hear from them on occasion after they have gone. "I got my job because of the stuff I learned in tech writing." "I joined the Peace Corps because of what we talked about in World Lit." "I'm going to grad school because I want to know so much more about what's going in this area." One in a hundred.

I know your kids. I care about them. But, like all teachers, I live for that one. Otherwise I'd go crazy.