Friday, Feb. 13, 2004
Calm before the storm, posted at 11:37 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com The mood at school today was sort of calm, even with the two-hour delay. The CEO imposed the delay because of rumors of a teacher sick-out, but that didn't happen at our school and I haven't heard of anywhere where it really did except for a few schools here and there. After all, what would we have to protest? Nothing has happened yet. We've already lost so much instructional time; it's not fair to the students to walk out when we're just waiting to see what happens next.Right now, it's like the calm before the storm. Next week will be a doozy. I honestly have no clue what will happen. It appears we're pinning our hopes on Ehrlich and Grasmick, which doesn't give me much confidence but it's better than nothing.
I'm trying not to talk about the issue with any teachers who have been there longer than I have (three years), as every veteran I know voted against the pay cuts. People voted for what they thought was right, and I certainly see the argument on their side. But, without getting holier than thou, I also saw it as an ethical issue. While it sucks that they were asking for a paycut, it would suck ten times worse for me to get laid off and my kids end up with someone who doesn't care about their success like I do. That's where my ethics are. I really feel like I know these kids well, and it's been amazing to see their growth this year. I would be devastated if I wasn't allowed to continue with them. Today, I was able to have some very serious conversations with kids about getting off to a good start, and ended up calling about ten parents. I didn't call the mother of the kid who kicked her own son out earlier in the week, because I didn't want to make any problems worse. Otherwise, though, I'm trying to be extra tough with kids. A quarter of my kids failed first quarter, but that number has dwindled to about 12 percent as of the semester. I still have those last 12 percent to whip into shape and meet my standards. I think they'll do it.
So I just checked my answering machine. I give these parents my home number. The message I just got said this: "So you don't know me at all, but you left a concerned teacher message for me on my voice mail today, and I just wanted to let you know you had the wrong number. You sounded so concerned, though, and this student didn't do his homework and you wanted some backup at home with him doing it and he has some journal entries to do. Anyhow, I wanted to call you and let you know that the number you dialed was wrong, and here is the number (###-####), and I hope the student wasn't giving you the wrong number but now you know if he did. Sounds like you need to get ahold of them."
I gotta chuckle at that. The message I left was probably four minutes long, and this poor woman listened to the whole thing and then took the time to call me back.
***
Fairly long night at the restaurant. I had six tables, all couples. Two really crummy tippers. One was a table that did the whole "verbal tip" thing - they're really, really nice to you all night, say great things in the guest book, then totally screw you over ($18 on $134 bill). The other were a members of specific group of people that stereotypically don't tip well, and unfortunately that stereotype stood tonight ($8 on $72, even though they wrote "great service" in the guestbook).
I let that kind of stuff roll off my back, but it's hard not to be obsessive about it when you work for eight hours after school for $50. I work a double tomorrow on Valentine's Day, then another eight hours on Sunday Brunch. I'm a freaking madman this weekend.