I had done my student teaching down at Venice High in LA. When I used to tell people that, the usual response was "Wow, were the kids down there really bad?" or "Is it really as bad as they say?" The answer to that response is No. Of course, at my for PeeVee, my time in "the trenches" was impressive as I was about to go into what was called "a very particular demographic..."read relatively high minority, not all college bound, medium socio-economic stratum.
But I was lucky, I had access to CP, Honors, and GATE (Gifted And Talented Enrichment) students as well at the "particular demographic." In my five years there, I had students who went on to UCLA, Berkeley, Stanford, and Ivy League schools. Most of my Honors (and many of my CP) kids went off to four-year colleges. This is because most of them wanted to and their parents pushed them. And since the parents pushed, I could push even harder in my classes. I received great work from them and they were accepted into top schools. Everyone was happy.
Everyone but me. I was thrilled with the work I was receiving from the students, but not always thrilled with the students themselves. Many were beginning to grate on me as arrogant, bordering on snobbish. I had come back to this community because I had wanted to help kids like me. In fact, I had always wanted to teach back at Chumash... only I felt awkward my first interview there. I wanted to return as a successful teacher, a great one; only at the time, I was fresh out of the teacher credential program, a mere five years after leaving Chumash’s lockered halls. I didn’t think I was ready, so I took advantage of a certain pulling of strings to get me at PeeVee. Five years later, however, with Frankie over at Chumash, with my experience at PeeVee giving some level of success and respect within the district, and with my growing ambivalence with my current situation, I was ready for a move.
When that move was made, however, I was in for a shock. A move of less than five miles south seemed a continental shift in attitudes. PeeVee had been the home of not always successful, but usually motivated, students. Parents may not always have been there at Open Houses (I averaged about five per class in non-Honors level classes), but most at least seemed interested in their own child’s progress. Chumash was different.
At first, I denied there was a problem, any difference. I attributed it all to the classes I had on my schedule. Video Production and Drama were my preps, and since both classes were non-track electives, the two classes had become infamous as dumping grounds. In the first two terms, I saw only a handful of CP-level students (and all of them were freshmen... mis-scheduled). In my first year, I saw no parents at school functions and was able to make very few positive parent contacts. My visions of being at a paradise were slowly slipping away.
When I received my term three schedule, however, I saw my slide turning around and beginning to soar. Replacing Video was a SAT preparation class, titled under "Advanced Grammar." Frankie had known my successes at PeeVee and could see me starting to chafe under my schedule, so she gave me this plum. The top juniors in the school, the ones--mostly Honors-level--who actually were planning to go to college, were a part of the "two percent solution," that small percentage of Chumash graduates who went directly to a four-year university. This would be great.
WRONG.
Instead of finding a small group of motivated students, burning with an almost obsessive desire to score well on the SAT and win admission into a good school, what I found was a small group of students with their hands out, expecting a good score but not wanting to work for it. They expected, as one student put it, to be given an "A" because they had gone to so-called effort of taking an academic elective. They wanted good health because they put some veggies on their plate. Only they didn’t want to eat the vegetables.
Well, they ate it, all right. I pushed just as hard as I had the year before at PeeVee. It was like pulling teeth. But SAT scores went up in the Verbal section a little the next year. Of course, only half the class received A’s... and nearly a quarter received gift D’s (I failed no student, though--looking back on the grade sheet--four deserved it... who says I ain’t a nice guy?).
The course underscored the difference in students at the two campuses. At this end of town, students had been coddled, patted on the head in an attempt to give them good self-esteem (as opposed to helping them succeed at difficult tasks in an attempt to build self-esteem), and told that since they are disadvantaged they deserve special treatment (when they should be told that they need to work even harder to overcome their disadvantages). The students had been programmed for laziness. And these were the top students in the school. I couldn’t believe that I couldn’t expect the best from them.
Frankie learned the same thing. One thing I always admired about Frankie the Principal was that she would always teach one course a year, to keep her in touch with what was going on in the classroom. She taught the "Advanced Grammar" course fourth term (when there was a sudden jump in student who wanted to take Video and I was back in the so-called "studio"). So she got "in touch" with this different "particular demographic."
And the SAT prep course was never offered again.
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