My New Life in Boston

Sorry it’s been so long! After arriving in Boston, I didn’t have any opportunities to take bike breaks to write blogs. Instead it’s been training, training, and more training. I’ll try and catch you all up as briskly and succinctly as possible through numerous FAQ:

What’s it like to live in a high school?!

Well it definitely has its ups and downs. First and foremost, I have the capacity and the resources to recreate the scene from the Breakfast Club every morning. Secondly, you know how in high school you always just wanted to wander the abandoned halls, sliding on the floor in your socks. Yep, done that, and it’s just as cool as you think it would be. Thirdly, when I’m running late, or decide I need those extra precious moments of sleep, I’m only a flight of stairs away from work. At the same time, being in the same building for 18 hour spans of time is enough to drive a man INSANE! When we do get outside, it’s a reoccurring sense of freedom and relief—which I suppose is a positive in and of itself.

Is that a Titanic-esque stair case that you get to climb EVERY DAY?

Heck Yes.

What the heck are you actually doing?

Part of the training this week has been to figure out what our particular tasks are. Here’s a rundown of what a normal day looks like:

07:45 Get Ready/Help Serve Breakfast
08:30 Tutor two freshman for two hours in English and Algebra
10:30 Break Time
11:30 Lunch
12:00 Tutor four sophomores for two hours in English/History and Geometry/Algebra II
2:00 Break Time
3:00 Individually lead an Independent Reading Group (Where I facilitate the reading development of a group of similar skilled gentlemen. I even get my own gradebook :-)
4:00 Co-supervise a behavioral/academic intervention for struggling youth for two hours

Other than that, Fridays and Saturdays I have 16 hours of class on learning how to be a teacher, and two days a week I spend tutoring 4th grade math at a local elementary school, instead of tutoring sophomores here. Additionally, I am the “Student Activities Administrative Assistant.” As soon as I figure out exactly what that means, I’ll be sure to fill you in.

What type of school is it?

It is a “No-Excuses” Public Charter High School—meaning that the kids that go here were randomly selected via a lottery system. The school's motto is: Courage, Discipline, Perseverance. Most of our funding does come from the state, though we have some private donors as well. The No-Excuses portion describes the way in which we do things. There is NO EXCUSE for why a student would fail in this environment. The academic and behavioral rigor are written in such a way that for those who stick it out, failure is not an option. This creates a very black and white code of conduct.

• If you arrive to school out of dress code, you’re sent home to change.
• If you are not sitting in your chair working silently when the bell rings, you are tardy.
• If you are being inattentive/not focused/not professional you can receive a demerit.
• If you are seen with a cell phone, the cell phone is taken and held by the school for a week.
• If you receive three demerits in a day you receive detention.
• Detention is simply sitting and staring at a wall. (They found the traditional homework detention to not be an effective deterrent.)
• If you don’t receive above a 70% in a class, you fail that class. If you fail two classes you have to repeat the year.

While these rules may likely seem harsh and strict, which they did at first to me, when one thinks about them more deeply, they begin to make a lot of sense. Many of these kids already have a lot of odds stacked against them: behind grade level in reading and math, socioeconomic conditions, poor neighborhoods, etc. We have to make sure that this environment and this place is AS CONDUSIVE to learning as possible. Seeing the gray in a black and white situation is too big of a risk to take. Charter schools receive enough of a bad rap at times, that we have to make sure that at the very least we have gains to prove the success of our methodology.

So what happens after you’re done in Boston?

Well my last month in Boston will be next July, where I will have my own class of Summer School. 20 minds all to myself :-). After that I’m committed to two years at any at-risk school in the country. They encourage us to go to Charter Schools because the methods they teach are most applicable there. But as of now there is little chance that that’s the direction I’m headed in. My sentiment is that we don’t have enough time nor resources, to get all of our children into charter schools. We have to fix public schools, and if all the good teachers run to charters, that change is only slowed. I believe in the No-Excuses approach, but I also believe that it needs to be fostered in the public schools that need it the most. (Can you tell I’ve had a lot of educational policy conversations here :-)

What’s it like living in a community with 41 other high-achievers who are all here to make a difference?

So far it’s good. It’s only the second week, so everyone still has their friendly faces on. Most of the staff here are really easy to talk to and get along with. It’s great because all of us have different kids and different tasks, so we’re not constantly comparing ourselves with one another. It’s easy to each blaze our own trail and celebrate each other’s success. Having said that, the kitchen has already turned into a sty and that’s likely to be a hot-button issue of contention.

What other highlights have you had from your first weeks there?

I’ve already sang Karaoke to “Summer Nights” twice at a local bar. I have crashed my bike once in the rain. I have created a second “Big Desk” out of a cardboard box and subsequently added shelves above and a pantry below. I have played basketball with a bunch of the other tutors and did well enough to trick them into thinking I had some basketball ability. A friend shared her extra sheets so I’m no longer sleeping on a sticky mattress with a sleeping bag. Since I have to cook for myself, I’ve decided to cook in mass quantities. Today I made nearly 4 dozen pancakes and 3 lbs. of chicken for consumption over the week. Last week I accidently added way to much milk to my pancakes…so I ended up making a cake. I drink about a gallon of milk a day, my next door neighbor is convinced I have a problem. The Goodwill people are starting to recognize me simply because of the numerous times I have been there. We live right next to the Charles River which has a gorgeous bike path. We had the opportunity to do a scavenger hunt in one of the impoverished communities where some of our students come from. It was in this place that we met a crazy nun who talked AT us for at least 10 minutes about the state of the world and what’s leading to its demise. Greatest nun ever. We’ve had “Teacher Face” showdowns in which you go head-to-head with someone and each put on your best teacher face, first one to crack loses. We had a Name Test in which each of the 227 students in the school’s faces were flashed on a screen and we had to write their names, spelling counted. 90% was considered passing. I passed. Thank God. (And in order to pass, I had to creepily walk around Boston carrying children’s faces in my pockets….). I'm applying for food stamps. I've already earned the title of creeper by trying to start secret handshakes that involve ear stroking.

WOW MITCH! This sounds AWESOME! What’s next?

Well I get my children on Wednesday. So I’ll finally get to put all my teaching strategies to work. I’ll be sure to let you know all about my wonderful buckets of knowledge. This weekend the parents are coming in, since they weren’t able to drop me off. So I’m sure they’ll be more good stories soon :-) Hope all is well wherever you are in the world! If you’d ever like to discuss educational policy or the school that I’m working at, just send me an e-mail @ zoelmi01@luther.edu. I’m sort of kind of addicted to it.

If I wanted to send you a cake, to what address would I send it?

You would send it to: MATCH Charter School, 1001 Commonwealth Ave., Boston, MA 02215