Monday, Aug. 09, 2004
Orientation for incoming 9th graders, posted at 12:57 p.m.
Epiphany in Baltimore has moved to epiphanyinbaltimore.blogspot.com Today was Day One of a two-day orientation for incoming 9th graders. The day started out weirdly, with the woman in charge going into labor before I got there. It wasn't unexpected, but it made the day slightly more disorganized than if her kid could have waited until its due date to come on out.Still, it felt good to get back there. I might be uncomfortable in social situations, but I'm in my element with the kids. While the other teachers are off sitting around waiting for the guest speaker to show up, I went to the front of the auditorium and - without a microphone - I asked for the kids' attention and went on to tell them all about summer reading, in case they had missed out on that info. I then walked around, asking kids individually if they knew about it. Once the speaker started, I greeted all the late arrivals, mildly chided them for being late, and told them about summer reading. Yes, I'm a little obsessed with summer reading. I know my job will be that much more tougher if they don't in being prepared.
After hearing the guestspeaker, I gave my little session on how to write a critical essay. I'm not sure how useful it was, but it was still nice to get up there in front of a group of kids. I'm ready to get back, as soon as I get all my reading done. I'm a little daunted by this 11th grade Brit Lit curriculum, to be honest.
My school is such an interesting mix. Like, I really do feel like the American Dream is being achieved. I overheard a parent tell her little girl, "I hope I can afford a car by the time you start school, so I can pick you up every day." On the other end of the spectrum, we've got rich kids of lawyers and doctors whose parents realize that, hey, there are some pretty damn good public schools in the city, plus their kids get an experience of graduating from a public school with kids much different from their own backgrounds and not from some rich snobby private high school. So we have a lot of poor, mostly black kids, a lot of middle class black kids, and a smattering of upper/middle class black and white kids. But all of them, just about, will go to college, many will graduate with an IB diploma, and they'll all become a future of this city. That's pretty inspiring. 90% of our kids receive lunch assistance, but an even greater percentage (98%), will go to college. Our expectations are high but the kids meet them.
Anyhow, it's good to be back at school.