“Oh please, you know that this group of students is so completely unmotivated and utterly slothful!” she protested, as she leaned against the counter and wound up to let loose with her list of student sins.
“Actually, I’ve found that all they really need is some gentle guidance,” I said, knowing full well that I was understating the problem. I’d actually had quite a bit of trouble keeping the 10th graders engaged in History lessons, but then, I was also able to recall what it felt like to actually be a 10th grader. I doubted that Betty was able to go that far back in her memory in order to conjure up some empathy for the hormonal drama that teenagers experienced on a daily basis.
“Gentle guidance, my ass,” she muttered, as she turned and grabbed the powdered cream, pouring it into her cup. “More like a slap on the ass and a good grounding.”
“Different strokes for different folks,” I said a little too cheerfully as I returned the pot to the warmer and grabbed my mug. I knew that I’d pay for this later when Betty began gossiping about how I was entirely too lenient with the students, but I also knew that, like me, most of the faculty found Betty’s assessment unkind, to say the least. She was two years away from retirement, and there was nothing anyone could do until then. I headed for the hallway calling, “Have a great day, Betty!”
Thankfully, the door closed behind me before I could hear her reply. Back in my classroom, I prepped for the first class of the day. As the students filtered in, I said good morning and reminded them to pull out the assignment so we could go over it. Several students groaned as they realized they’d forgotten the homework and a few others shrugged to indicate they’d never intended to do it to begin with. At the back of the room, a few students bent across the aisle whispering and laughing as Nina Gaston entered the room and slid behind her desk.
“All right, let’s get started on Massachusetts history!” I said, as enthusiastically as I could. The class let out a collective groan, and in a good-natured voice, I said, “Aww c’mon, this is some scintillating stuff, folks! You read it for homework, so I know you know what I’m talking about, but we still need to fill in some of the details.”
I launched into a short lecture about Irish immigration to Boston in the wake of the Great Potato Famine and talked about how Bostonians viewed the new immigrants as part of the servant class.
“Keep in mind that this allowed employers and landlords to exploit the fact that the Irish had no economic or social standing,” I said, as I used a handheld device to click through the PowerPoint slides I’d organized to show the dire conditions of the new immigrants. I quickly moved through a series of photos that showed newspaper headlines, flyers, and signs on businesses that all read “No Irish Need Apply,” and heard an audible gasp from the class as I stopped on the front page of the American Patriot, a mid-19th century newspaper devoted to the task of excluding all immigrants from participation in the labor force, schools, and social activities on the basis that they were depriving real Americans their rights as citizens.
“So, what do you think about this?” I asked. The class was silent. Students looked down at their desks as they tried to pretend that I couldn’t see them. I smiled a little as I waited. I knew I could out-wait them all.
“I think it’s weird,” a girl in the front finally muttered.
“Why is it weird?” I asked.
“Because it’s the Irish; I mean, what’s the big deal?” she said.
“But how did the city view them?” I pushed to get her and her classmates to further analyze what they’d learned.
“They saw them as totally different from everyone else who was already here,” a boy in the back said, without raising his hand.
“And what did that mean?” I asked, looking around the room. “Nina? What do you think?’
“Huh?” Nina said, as she looked up and then averted her eyes.
“I wanted to know what it meant that the residents of Boston saw the Irish as totally separate from them,” I said, repeating the question.
“I dunno,” she shrugged. I let it go and moved on asking questions until the class was almost over. I passed back the essays, saving Nina’s for last.
There were the requisite groans and muttered curses, but no one complained too loudly. I held Nina’s paper in my hand as the rest of the class filed out after the bell.
“Nina, can I see you for a moment?” I said. She walked up to my desk with a stubborn expression on her face. I knew that there had to be a little b
it of worry mixed with the defiance, so I said, “Here’s your essay. You did very well in the introduction, but you didn’t back your argument up with evidence this time.”
“Okay,” she shrugged, as she took the paper from me and stuffed it into her backpack.
“Nina, you’re a smart girl. I’m concerned about the fact that you’re barely skating by in this class,” I said, as I studied her face. “I’m concerned that you’re going to get too far behind to catch up and that you’ll miss out on scholarships for college if you don’t bring your grade up.”
“Uh huh,” she said, looking past me out into the hallway.
“I’m going to have to schedule a conference with your parents so we can talk about how to motivate you to get your grades up,” I said, trying spark some kind of response.
“Okay,” she shrugged. “Anything else?”
“No, that’s all,” I said, shaking my head. Nina walked out of the room without so much as a backward glance. I watched her leave and then sighed as I pulled up my email and began composing a message to Nina’s parents, inviting them to meet with me.
Chapter Five
Blake
By the time I got to the firehouse, Tony was already standing by the rig waiting for me to help him do the morning run-through on the equipment. I quickly stored my gear in my locker, refilled my coffee mug, and then headed back out to the garage to complete our morning task.