teacher

Teacher at Point Blank: Confronting Sexuality, Violence, and Secrets in a Suburban School

alicia — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 20:00:00 +0000

When Jo Scott-Coe began teaching in the same suburban California high school she’d graduated from four years earlier, she had to overcome her reluctance to call former teachers by their first names. Once that was accomplished, she set out to bring new life to the literature and writing classes she was assigned.

In seventeen essays Scott-Coe lays bare the disappointments and frustrations that marred her eleven years in the classroom. While the book is highly anecdotal—and cannot be read as a general indictment of the educational system--she does hit several general themes, including the way educators—eighty percent of them female—are mistreated by Boards of Education, parents, and students.

To begin, Scott-Coe notes society’s “schizophrenia of reverence and contempt” for teachers. On one hand, she explains, teachers are presumed to be “angels,” long-suffering nurturers and enablers of youth. On the other, they’re treated with contempt, disparaged as overpaid civil servants or lazy paper pushers. The real issues they face—in terms of educational policy, pedagogical proficiency, and their own personal and professional development—never see the light of day in these discussions.

Nowhere is this clearer than in an essay called "Recovering Teacher." In it, Scott-Coe painstakingly chronicles the decline, and then death, of her colleague Neil Webb. A scholar who began his career as a Latin and German instructor, Webb was arbitrarily reassigned to another discipline once the district gutted language programs in the late 1980s. Scott-Coe posits the shift as the administration’s way of emphasizing “the interchangeable nature of subject matter while also disrespecting his primary expertise.” Whatever the bureaucracy’s motivation, the end result was the same: Webb had no choice but to accept the transfer if he wanted to retain his job.

Still, after the shift ,Webb’s peers and students noticed his discernible decline: He lost weight and, always a heavy drinker, began coming to school drunk. When his driver’s license was suspended, they snickered, sidestepping conversations that might have addressed his out-of-control behavior. When he was finally terminated, people breathed a sign of relief, as if his firing was inevitable.

Somewhat later, his home burned down; not long afterwards he was found dead, alone in a seedy motel room. “I still wonder what might have happened if the school staff, as a community, had confronted Webb,” Scott-Coe writes. “We might have seen him as a struggling human being instead of scapegoating him as the problem employee, the exotic and tortured genius who would never fit in, or the pathetic colleague who made us feel less bad about our own problems.“

It’s a painful, if moving account.

Scott-Coe also writes of sexual tension in the classroom, and of the violent undercurrent noted by most of the teachers she worked with. That she and her colleagues had no forum to discuss these issues is absurd. Even more ridiculous, when legitimate questions were aired, administrators served up meaningless platitudes in lieu of practical advice. On top of this, Scott-Coe had to contend with preparing her students for a multitude of constantly-changing standardized tests and had to counsel them—with little-to-no prior training—for personal problems, from eating disorders, to cutting, to domestic abuse.

Small wonder that Teacher at Point Blank is angst-filled. A deeply personal and sad narrative, Scott-Coe lambastes the enormous commitment that is expected of teachers. It then begs the question: How can their stature be elevated while preparing them to cope more effectively with complex classroom and bureaucratic issues?

Written by: Eleanor J. Bader, February 17th 2011

Meredith Monk: Inner Voice

admin — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Directed by Babeth M. VanLoo

Buddhist Broadcasting Foundation

Dutch Filmmaker Babeth VanLoo’s compelling tribute to sixty-seven-year-old choreographer-musician-teacher-composer-artist Meredith Monk does many things. In addition to introducing us to this enigmatic Jane of many trades, it showcases the artist’s creative processes and worldview. Along the way, it looks at the ways Buddhism has infused Monk’s work. “Silence is her source,” VanLoo explains.

The engrossing eighty-two-minute film includes footage of Monk performing, writing, and living in both upstate New York and New Mexico. The 2002 death of her life-partner, Mika, is mentioned, but this is not a film about grieving. Instead, the life force that propels Monk—she has been awarded numerous honorary degrees as well as a MacArthur “Genius” award—is both celebrated and explored.

Monk’s thought processes—and the questions that keep her up at night—are shared. "How do you practice fear?" she wonders. “So much of what we do is fear based. We’re afraid of the fear, of walking through it.” That realization led Monk to begin writing a piece of music that eventually became "Scared Song." Like everything she does, the final product was developed collaboratively. Her process is fascinating, since the massive ego of most composers is wholly absent in Monk. Instead, her colleagues describe her welcoming attitude, and site her willingness to accommodate suggestions and contributions by the musicians and actors she performs with.

Philip Bither, Senior Curator at Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center, calls her “one of the seminal people of our time. She resists categorization and has created great work in five, six areas of art. That’s really rare. We tend to categorize people as actors, singers, dancers.” Similarly, choreographer Phoebe Neville marvels at Monk’s ability to avoid what she calls “the trap of success. She has always maintained her integrity and has been able to say ‘no,’” Neville says. This, she continues, has fired Monk‘s creativity for forty-plus years, and has helped her avoid burnout and exhaustion.

In the end, it’s a question of balance—and Monk is the poster woman for this value. Whether working alone or with others, she acknowledges the need to take periodic timeouts. This has allowed her to continually recharge, think, and observe. “As a soloist,” Monk says, “I can be very precise and rigorous, but at the same time I am open and fluid to what is happening in the moment. That’s why I like to work without words. It throws the mind into a very different state.”

Indeed, listening to Monk’s vocalizations—her range is enormous—is virtually guaranteed to take listeners on a journey. Since the words are essentially nonsense—made up of sounds that have no literal meaning—you can infuse the music with significance or can simply let your mind wander and experience what you’re hearing. It’s a sensual, exciting, and unusual encounter—and VanLoo captures it brilliantly.

While the film could have used a bit more background about Monk’s early life—it does mention that a childhood eye infirmity led her to listen closely to music and notes that both her mother and maternal grandfather were successful performers—and might have included footage of Monk discussing the ways aging has impacted her efforts, it is nonetheless lovely. In the end, this short introduction to Monk’s life’s work—and the way she integrates spirituality into her artistic process—is inspiring. Van Loo’s love of Monk shines through, but the fact that she avoids fawning makes Meredith Monk: Inner Voice an insightful look at one of the most innovative and fearless artists of our time.

Written by: Eleanor J. Bader, July 23rd 2010

Freedom’s Teacher: The Life of Septima Clark

admin — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 01:00:00 +0000

By Katherine Mellen Charron

University of North Carolina Press

When Septima Clark began teaching in 1919, she quickly learned that good education is very much like community organizing. Both start by identifying pressing needs, involve the affected in formulating solutions, and give them a stake in the final outcome. Freedom's Teacher tells Clark’s story, and while the writing is drily academic, the book is an important reminder that each of us can make a dent in the status quo.

Clark was a teacher’s teacher, a skilled motivator and a driven, hard-working, proponent of human equality and the power of the classroom to encourage and provoke social change. Her personal life was not easy—her husband died young and she was forced to send her son to live with his paternal grandparents—but her ability to shift gears and accept new opportunities, even in late middle age, is inspiring.

Born to working class parents, her first job was on Johns Island, a tiny underdeveloped farm community off the coast of South Carolina. Clark did not go to the island by choice. In fact, the position was the only placement she could find since her native city, Charleston, refused to hire African Americans to teach in the city’s segregated schools. Johns Island, populated by largely illiterate Black farmers, challenged the fledgling educator whose would-be students lived in such intense poverty that they had to work in the fields instead of attending classes.

But what to do? Clark understood that getting islanders to allow their children to study would be difficult so she began going door to door, speaking about the benefits of formal coursework. “At every turn, Charron writes, “success mandated creativity.” It also mandated that Clark get involved in people’s everyday lives, not only learning Gullah, but also helping them write letters, fill out forms, and determine crop prices and proper wages. What’s more, free evening literacy classes for adults—taught by Clark—gave residents the tools to expand their options. Decades later, Clark brought this experience to the civil rights movement, crafting adult literacy classes to activate and empower those who attended.

The few years Clark spent on Johns Island radicalized her, and Charron describes Clark’s increased agitation over the miserable conditions her students had to contend with, including a decrepit, unheated school building, inadequate supplies, and non-existent text books. Protests against racial disparities set her on a course that would last six-plus decades. Furthermore, her quest for justice prompted her to get involved in numerous civic and civil rights groups including the Highlander Folk School, the YWCA, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s Citizenship Education Program [CEP].

Women formed the crux of the CEP, teaching unschooled southerners how to pass literacy tests so that they could vote and then discussing everything from racist laws to activist strategies for changing them. Clark was the force behind much of the CEP’s work, toiling behind the scenes but receiving few accolades for her intrepid work.

Unfazed, Clark never lost sight of the big picture, continually condemning government spending on war and the concomitant failure to provide adequate funds “to end joblessness, slum conditions, and to correct educational deprivation in the ghettos.” Similarly, she never lost her faith in movements for world betterment and her cautious optimism—which lasted until her death in 1987—was infectious.

Clark’s example reminds us that change is never linear or free of backlash. While she picked her battles, Clark knew the importance of nonviolent resistance. As she saw it, watching from the sidelines was never an option.

Written by: Eleanor J. Bader, January 25th 2010

The Forest for the Trees

admin — Tue, 04 Sep 2007 13:14:00 +0000

Directed by Maren Ade

Sundance Channel

The Forest for the Trees details several months in the life of a schoolteacher in Germany who leaves a small town to attempt teaching in a more suburban atmosphere. She arrives in her new life with great hopes for friendships, romance, and touching the lives of children in the high school. We soon learn, however, that Melanie Pröschle will not transition into the new setting easily.

Melanie first has difficulty fitting in with her new co-workers, who are predominantly older. The administration seems to be run by the males in the school, who view Melanie as naïve and inexperienced, and do not go to lengths to hide their opinions. Melanie intends to be “a breath of fresh air” to the school, however, is immediately met with the impression that no one believes in her ability to succeed at teaching her assigned class: a group of disrespectful teenagers.

Our protagonist then attempts to make friends in her new neighborhood, even sitting down with strangers and trying to start conversation, but finds herself among a sea of already-formed groups and relationships. She’s fortunate enough to find a friend in a woman living along the same street, but struggles with social skills in intimate and public settings.

This film does an amazing job at depicting awkwardness, isolation, despair, and the feelings one gets when they feel that their options have been depleted. The viewer is left with an empathetic grasp of the feelings that Melanie experienced, along with a strong anger towards her for making mistakes and not being stronger. This film led me to desire to be a stronger woman overall and to develop stronger interpersonal relationships with other women.

Written by: Lisa Renae Mikus, September 4th 2007