John Owens worked for thirty years in magazine publishing before he decided to go back to school to become a teacher. Little did Owens know, he was in for a rude awakening. He experienced the dark side of school administration and the American public education system. And only after a year of teaching, Owens quit. For good. In an interview with Hana Maruyama from Education Week Teacher, John Owens opens up about his all too real teaching experience. Owens accepted a position in an inner city school in the South Bronx. Perhaps the most heartbreaking thing Owens experienced during that year was the fact that the school district was not as concerned about helping their students succeed and become passionate learners as they were about just making sure they passed (for the school's benefit, not the students'). Owens wanted to instill a love of learning in these students, which made him the "bad teacher" on campus. Because Owens couldn't fix all of these students' problems or help them improve in their academics in a 46 minute school period, he was a "bad" teacher - according to his superiors. He talks about incidents where students were basically testifying to the awful things they have witnessed and experienced in their lives - things that should be addressed by social workers, counselors, and psychologists. Yet, administrators were all too quick to shoot down Owens when he relayed these issues to them. Owens said that it was a lose-lose situation when complying with his superiors. If he was doing something right, it was still wrong. If he went against them, he had no chance. He describes teachers as being scapegoats for everything that is wrong with the public education system in America. He gives an analogy that cops haven't been blamed for crime rates and nurses haven't been blamed for health problems; so why are teachers being blamed for America's failing education system? He says it's people's preconceived notions about teachers. Teachers have it too easy. They get summers and holidays off. Never will they have to work on a weekend. Owens was quick to say that out of the many, many jobs he has had in his lifetime, teaching was the hardest job he experienced.
After reading about Owens' experience, I really just wanted to curse and rant and bad mouth every terrible person that works in the education field. Not only is that too many people, it would make for an extremely long blog. And to me, those people are not worth it. They are just ignorant and selfish. They ended up in the wrong line of work. Bless their hearts. Reading about such experiences really make me question if my skin is thick enough to deal with these things. These harsh truths about our education system.
However, my favorite quote from John Owens' interview with Maruyama reminded me of why it is all worth it -
"I don't know what's going to be required of someone who graduates 12 years from today, but I do know that if they have a love of learning, and they have a sense of community and a good moral compass, they'll do just fine."
How true. Just... so, so true.
To me, that's what it's all about. If we can instill those sort of values in our students, then everything else like grades, passing, being ready for the future... those things will fall into place. If I have to lose or quit several jobs because I put my students' needs before the schools' -- well as scary as that sounds, so be it. As long as I have impacted my students to better themselves each and everyday, then it should all be worth it.
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