dreamcatcher

The junior high was different than the senior high. By high school, if they're not somewhat interested in getting an education they just don't come to school. That means the kids that are there are pretty wonderful. In junior high they're young enough that their foster parents still kick them outdoors every morning at nine o'clock, and since they have nowhere else to go, they come to school.

I felt like I was watching a spoof on Saturday Night Live when the school secretary introduced me to the "cook", and she was teaching a class. I've never been in a public school that serves free hot lunch to its students - and this, of course, because without that service these children would not likely be fed. The cook looked about sixty with thinning and greying hair and very few teeth. And still somehow had the prettiest smile I've seen in a long time. She told me her brother had killed three moose that weekend. I wondered if that was what she would make for lunch. Her accent was the same as Shawn's grandmother's.

One of the students in ninth grade was incapable of reading or writing. And yet his teacher had left him no modification or alternative work to do while his class studied economics and dissected short stories. (Realistically it's not fair to say the rest of the class was doing these things, but allegedly they were capable of it. I saw little evidence to back this up.)

Impulse control was near zero. One student swore at me when I told him he couldn't leave the room, and I decided to ignore him because I was pretty sure he would escalate if I tried backing him into corner. He didn't leave the room but went to his desk to sulk. Shortly afterward he apologized and told me it was nicotine withdrawal that made him react so badly, not because he was trying to quit smoking but because he hadn't had one for a couple of hours. The students swore at each other all day long and it was so prevalent that there seemed to be no point in making a big deal out of it. The bigger issues were just things like keeping them from punching each other out or stabbing each other with the scissors, and keeping the drugs in their pockets until the bell rang.

By the time these kids reach high school age, most of them will have dropped out. Many will be living on the streets or in jail. These children, because the government has found a way to house them in a separate school, have been forgotten by the mainstream education system that is supposed to be providing free and equal education for all. Their teachers have given up on them and are letting their behaviour decline to a level from which it becomes harder and harder to recover. No support is provided for children who can't read or write at the age of fourteen. The last hour and a half of their day was wasted with colouring pictures of Christmas scenes to decorate the hallways of a school that no one ever visits. Why? Because teaching them is too hard. Letting them colour is easier.

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