Today I received what in education should be the ultimate compliment: my classes scored higher on the district exam than other classes in the same grade at our school. It genuinely made me feel so good about myself because most of the time I feel like I’m not doing a good enough job, like I have these kids’ futures in my hands and nothing I do will ever be enough. Teaching is challenging. Every day.
The feeling is bittersweet because I guarantee my students’ scores will not always be the highest. Tests are such a load of bull*%&#. In another grade level, the classes with the highest scores are being taught by a long-term substitute. If I ever leave the public school system, it will be because we care more about whether a kid can choose A, B, C, or D correctly 70% of the time instead of caring about whether or not we made a difference in a child’s life (you see, that’s not statistically measurable). It doesn’t matter that the kid (whose father died, who’s in a gang, who works part time, who takes care of his younger siblings) refused to even pick up a pencil before he took your class, but has now given writing a chance. That doesn’t matter because he failed one test on one day in a language that is not his native tongue.