Skip to main content

I Seeeeeeeee Youuuuuuu

Teaching the last period of the day is the worst, especially in a school like mine. During this time, I'm completely exhausted and for good reason: I've been on my feet all day explaining, lecturing, discussing and entertaining. I would much rather have this period off and use it to recharge my batteries than to have to deal with a 25% (or less) attendance rate.

Most students in my school decide it's okay to ditch 7th period. You know, because staying an extra 54 minutes is just asking for too much. Last Wednesday, four students who I know for sure were in the school building didn't make it to my 7th period class. Instead of simply letting it slide and hoping the administration does its job, I decided to take the law into my own hands. I paused the class mid-lesson, hopped onto my computer, logged into my e-mail, and began crafting this in front of everyone:
date          Wed, Sep 23, 2011 at 2:45 PM
subject      cuttin' class

So yes, I saw you all today in school, and yet, here we are in 7th period and you are not here. By the way, the entire class is watching me type this on the SMARTboard...

Okay, so given for most of you, this is your THIRD year in a TWO-YEAR school, I assume you will have all the stuff we learned today (and days before) mastered.

Do not expect that I (as your teacher) will make EXTRA TIME to baby you and re-teach this stuff to you.

If passing this class isn't a concern, I suppose at least not looking like a fool in front of everyone else is. I expect you'll make a bigger effort to stick around til the end of 7th.

Ta ta,
- Yo Mista
The next day, all four of them showed up. In fact, two of them even responded with an apology that very night. Lesson learned: always call out your students. I seeeeeeeee youuuuuuu.

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Anonymous said…
Keep up the good writing, seriously. You need to write more posts.
September 26, 2011 at 7:31 AM
Anonymous said…
That was genius! I reported one of my cutters last week, and lo and behold, he showed up for class today! Perhaps I should craft a similar email. No wait, never mind. My students will still have a read a book....
September 26, 2011 at 9:59 PM
Anonymous said…
FALSE: I'M INVISIBLE THEREFORE I AM BOSS.

YOU LOSE.
September 27, 2011 at 7:51 PM
Yo Mista! said…
@ Anonymous #1:
Thanks!

@ Anonymous #2:
Nice work!

@ Anonymous #3:
lol
September 27, 2011 at 10:52 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On My Visit to My Old High School

I had the incredible opportunity to visit my old high school while I was in Chicago last week.  This was something I was really looking forward to; I was worried I wouldn’t have enough time to cram in a visit. I wanted to not only visit my old teachers, but also to walk around the hallways aimlessly and remember what it was like to be me eight years ago. It still blows my mind that I’ve been out of high school for that long. Okay, fine. The voice of accuracy in my head desperately wants me to clarify how long it’s really been. Technically, I had gone back to visit a few of my teachers shortly after I graduated high school, but I choose not to count that as a “proper” visit as I was still in college and coming back home quite often. It’s not like I was living out of the state as I am now. So it doesn’t count, okay? So Wednesday morning, I walked into the visitor’s entrance at gate 3 and received my visitor’s pass for the day. It was odd because as a student, I neve...
Post a Comment
Read more

We Need to Talk About Tenure

The idea and privilege of "tenure" in public education has garnered a lot of attention as of late. Most people who have never worked in education a single day in their lives seem to feel that tenure is unfair and teachers should work under the same expectations that other "regular" and hard-working Americans work under. At least, that's the narrative being presented in the media. Three years ago, I would have agreed, but I didn't know any better. At the college and university level,  tenure  is difficult to obtain and can take 4-8 years. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but from what I think I know, the candidate usually needs to have published some sort of research and have demonstrated a strong teaching record, among other things. Before becoming a high school teacher, I understood why tenure was necessary at the college and university level as it protected academics when they published work that went against the mainstream, and thereby prevented profes...
16 comments
Read more

How to Not Run a School

Thomas Edison once said, " I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work."   I'm going to be honest: it's only midway through November and I think my school is on the verge of falling apart. Maybe that's an exaggeration, but it seems as if we're trying to go out of our way to make things more complicated, pointless, and ultimately, not fun . School should be a fun place for teachers and students. As it is being run right now, it is not. Over the past week, I've spent a considerable amount of time during my off-periods wondering what the hell happened. Three years ago, this place started with such a great culture and attitude. That feels like a long time ago. There's a long list of things that have been eating away at me and everyday, something new gets added on. Decisions are being made without foresight. Things that I thought would obviously be implemented have not been implemented. I thought we would have figured out at ...
7 comments
Read more