Yesterday, I spent the day as I usually do, subbing in a school around town. A quick explanation of how my job works. When a teacher misses a day of school, they post to a website that says they're not going to be there. That website then takes that absence and makes it available to the subs in the county. They are visible to us subs through our own logins and we simply take them as they come. We can work whenever we want, and if we don't take a job for a day, its just a day off (obviously, we don't get paid if we don't work though). Typically, assignments are hard to find on Wednesdays and Thursdays, since its the middle of the week, so when a multi-day assignment is available, I usually jump on it.
A three day assignment appeared, and even though I hadn't heard of the school, I figured I would grab it. I arrived at this school and immediately noticed that there was a metal detector just inside the front door. While this not seem like too strange a thing to some people, we do not have metal detectors in the schools in this county. However, I noticed that this particular metal detector wasn't plugged in at the time, so I was not too concerned. I checked in as usual and was escorted to my room. The room itself was a standard shape with two doors in the back, one which leads to a hallway containing two bathrooms and at the other end, another room. The other door leads to a closet. I am then approached by the admin assistant, Maria, who explains to me the bell schedule, tells me that I will be teaching math, and that the bathroom door will be closed because "the kids just act ridiculous back there." Kids tend to act ridiculous in the bathrooms in all schools, so I was still not too terribly concerned. Maria's last statement would obliterate this sense of safety quite quickly.
She left and I sat in my room for a few minutes, in which I realized I left my Mountain Dew in my car. As I'm walking out of the room, I ask Maria if I have time to run to my car and grab my drink. She says "Sure. Oh, and I forgot to tell you: Don't leave any personal belongings in your room if you ever want to see them again. These kids are all court mandated to be here...they're thieves." Not knowing exactly what to say, I just kinda nodded and walked out to my car. Saying that kids are thieves is not even all that shocking. I'm used to other teachers and office staff exaggerating things. I'm not used to kids being court mandated to be there. I find out eventually that this is a school for kids that have a criminal record, and have also been expelled from regular county schools. In other words, these are the worst of the worst.
When the kids finally arrive, they all work their way into my room. I was already told that the kids were not allowed to use the computers, so I told them that they were not allowed. A few of them got on them anyways, so I told them to get off. I was directly behind one of them who I told to get off. He folded his hands in his lap, and started breathing deep. The guy next to him started saying "Calm down man. Don't do it. You don't want to get sent back. Just calm down." Dude was gonna hit me!! I should point out, that this was high school level, so he probably would have kicked my ass. Being the guy that likes to push things, I took a couple steps back and told him again "Get off the computer." He never did get off, so I eventually gave up.
As other kids came in, they noticed that the door to the bathroom hall was closed, Instead of asking me to open it for them, they would walk up to it, and pick the lock. All of the kids in the class seemed to be able to do it. They would take off their belt, jimmy the lock, and the door would pop open, This just seemed funny to me. In a room full of juvenile delinquents, locked doors are apparently not an issue.
At lunch, I learned that two of the kids had left after first period, gone to a convenience store nearby, bought alcohol (something called Locos?), got hammered, then CAME BACK TO SCHOOL!!!! There's a couple things wrong here. For one, why would you come back to school? You've walked out, bought alcohol underage, and are now drunk. What part of their feeble brain's make them think they should go back to class? I mean, sure I did my fair share of drinking before class in college, but I didn't get absolutely hammered, then go to class, and I was certainly over 21 when I did it. What's even more frustrating to me is that I was told this by one of the teachers. Apparently, all the teachers knew it, but none of them really seemed to care, and none of them did anything about it. The kids stayed the rest of the day.
Getting any work done in class wasn't even possible. I handed out the worksheet, and half of them ripped it up in my face. Then they spent their time talking/yelling at each other. I'm even used to kids cursing in class, but in this place, there was more curse words than not. It sounded like a hack comedian over doing an impression of gangsters. It was insane.
At the end of the day, there was a kid talking and acting a little annoying, so I gave him a dirty look. He started saying something about "trying him" (which I had an impossible time understanding) and then walked into the hall. I went to the hall to see what he was doing, and he was talking to Maria (the admin assistant). When he saw me, he started saying things again (which I could still not understand), and then lunged at me to make me flinch. I of course flinched, because there's no way not to, and he started laughing. I just walked back into my room, and as I did, I hear Maria laughing with him!!
Overall, it was a horrendous experience that made me appreciate even the worst classes in regular schools. Needless to say, I had the job canceled for the other days I was supposed to be there. In fact, I was already on the phone before I even got to my car.
No comments:
Post a Comment