A Tale Told of WASC: Part Thirteen

In October and November, the emphasis shifted from the departments to the focus groups, which now looked at their responses to the WASC rubrics and questions and the evidence that had been turned in, and the focus groups, too, had to come up with narratives of their own. This was an even more unwieldy process. Whereas the largest department, English, has only twelve members, the smallest focus groups had over twenty. To get twenty individuals to agree on anything, let alone a narrative for the entire campus, is a scary prospect. But the focus groups banged out the narratives.

Meanwhile, the leadership team culled over the narratives, and in December set out to devise an Action Plan that would create a process for improving the school’s program in an attempt to address the concerns and weaknesses that were brought up in the narratives. This is where I excused myself from the process. I would help to edit and fine-tune the report, but there was no way in hell I was going to submit myself for days of wrangling over the writing of this part of the report. This was the beginnings of my new winter of discontent with teaching. It was around this time that I started sending my résumé out to companies looking for writers, editors, managers, trainers, administrators and the like.

Before the school recessed for winter break, Aimee tried to present the concept of the Action Plan to the staff. With two days to break, no one listened. I had seen the rough draft of the plan. It was a shame no one listened. It was remarkable. It would have sent many off to break with a new sense of excitement and hope for the future.

Of course, by the time we returned from break, the Action Plan had been watered down some--especially in its criticism of the counseling department (and their mis-assigning and -scheduling of students)--at the behest of the administration, old-schoolers who still feared that even though this was a new WASC, any WASC should be upbeat, positive, and free from blunt criticism. Aimee fought for the retention of the tone of the piece, but she lost.

All would be right in Warrior Land, damnit.