Had a great conversation with some bright young students about intimacy on social media. The idea was that people will share intimate details--history of abuse, sexual escapades good and bad, drug addiction, suicidal thoughts--but will withhold other ones, like one's true name or place of residence. 

It was baffling at first, until I remembered something rather similar. What other institution allows for a nearly-anonymous cathartic purging of oneself, where the identities of both parties is secret and unknown?

No, not therapy--you know the identity of your therapist, and she or he knows yours. In fact, the opening of therapy is usually a "get to know you" session.

What occurred to me was how similar Internet relationships can be to the Catholic practice of confession.

I'll have to think about this more, but now that my mind has been open to this possibility, I'd like to see where the idea takes me. 

Be seeing you!

Hello, everyone! Please don't be put off by the title--those words aren't really scary. Let's delve into them, shall we?

First of all, let me dispel a myth. Lots and lots of folks out there seem to think that there is some kind of "word police force" that will come and pummel you with socks filled with nickels if you dare to use a word they've decided is offensive. And furthermore (comes the cry) those words keep changing daily, so how's a person supposed to talk? You can't say anything anymore! (or so they say).

As far as I am aware, exactly ZERO people have been tossed in jail for saying "female" when they meant "woman," or "handicapped" or any other non-vulgar label they are using. That even applies to a word I won't type here but which begins with "n" and is a slur against Black folk. I am not aware of any law that has been passed, or any law that COULD be passed, making all uses of that word illegal. So let's calm down. No one is saying you can't speak.

By the way, free speech is of course not absolute. You can't incite a riot, for example. You can't divulge state secrets. You can't depict certain pornographic images. And so on. Free speech was NEVER completely free, so let's make sure that's clear.

Anyway, the idea that the LEFT (scare capitals included for free) is making up new words JUST so they can entrap sensible people and condemn them for wrongspeak is simply untrue. Ain't happening. 

If your argument is, "I can't say what I want and avoid any social consequences," well, then, now I agree. You can't. You never could. Here's a little experiment for you: go sit in the home stands at Fenway Park behind the Sox dugout wearing a Yankees jersey. See how well that goes. Are you ALLOWED to do that, legally? Of course you are. Are you legally protected from being fired for doing that? Absolutely. But are you legally protected from other folks letting you know they disapprove? Of course not.

Ironically, many of those people who are clamoring for "free speech!" really want "freedom from social consequences!" which is in itself a form of censorship. In other words, they want to be able to say whatever they want but silence those who would speak out against them. That seems fully un-American to me.

And so we come to labels. Words change over time. Their meanings, spellings, pronunciations, and levels of social acceptance. Words mean different things in different contexts. Labels, especially for sensitive areas, are constantly re-evaluated for potential bias, conscious or not. Let's take a simple one: the outmoded word "Oriental." Time was that this word meant (more or less) what the word "Asian" means now. Why'd we change? What was wrong with "Oriental?" No one meant any harm by it, so how come everyone got all upset and demanded we use the new term, "Asian?" First, no one got all upset, and no one demanded anything. We just came to realize that "Oriental" had some problems. What are those problems? I'm glad you asked.* See, "Oriental" literally means "of or relating to the east," the same way "Occidental" means "of or relating to the west" (hence Occidental College, my alma mater, the sister school of Princeton and situated, you guessed it, on the West Coast). 

Okay, so "Oriental" means "to the east." So what? Isn't Asia in the east?

Sure, if you take Europe as the center of the world. Asia isn't east in any absolute sense, of course--there is no place on the planet that is inherently "east." East and west are relative ideas. Only if you take Europe and make it the center of the world do you get "east" for Asia. So, to the Europeans, the Orient was anything east of it. 

See? That wasn't so hard. We just noticed that "Oriental" had a distinct Eurocentric bent to it, and we fixed it by saying "Asian." Easy.

I think you'll find that most of the time, when we collectively decide that a label is problematic, we move on to a new one that isn't, or is less so (maybe we'll uncover problems later with the new label, but that's the nature of language). 

"Neurodivergent" is one such label you may not have heard of. 

I think it is fair to say that there is still rather a stigma attached to people who have what some would call mental illness. And that stigma is significantly stronger for mental illness, or neurodivergency, than it is for other disorders. As I am getting older, my near vision is weakening, and I find I need glasses for close work like reading. So I just put them on. I don't get funny looks, I don't get people denying me jobs, I don't get people clasping their children tightly when I walk past. It's a medical issue I have, and it's not going away, but no one gives it a second thought. But if someone has a mental illness, that's a whole new ball game. We sort of tend to believe folks with mental illnesses need to just "get over it" or we tell them to do yoga or smile more and it will all go away.

So, "neurodivergent." A term that will hopefully remove some of the stigma we have placed on what we used to call "mental illness." It's not just P.C.; it's a way of humanizing folks who might have some struggles. And who could reasonably be opposed to humanizing folks?

Be seeing you!

*Check out my podcast of the same name!

This'll be my last Coronavirus entry, as we in America certainly seem to be moving towards a new phase. My heart goes out to India and their struggles, but it looks like America is once again poised to help the world and itself, so perhaps we will be able to contain and reverse the troubling trend in that area.

Anyway, some thoughts on what schooling has been like during the past fourteen months.

As I said in the last entry, I did not believe hybrid or blended learning would work, and I have both good and bad news on that front. The bad news is that it failed to provide any significant, universal change in student engagement or performance from my perspective. Oh, I don't doubt that someone, somewhere got better as a result of this massive undertaking, but from where I stand, and from every other educator to whom I have spoken, it did not change anything significant for the better.

The good news is the reason that it didn't work. That needs explanation, so here goes.

No one's coming to class in person. I say "no one," but of course I am exaggerating a little.  Last week, I had around 2-3 students physically in class per session. Some sessions had as many as 5, while other sessions had zero. Most had 1 or 2. 

Let me repeat that.

On any given day in any given period, I may have as many as FIVE students physically present, but I have had--several times--ZERO. 

That's what I mean by, "no one's coming to class in person." I suppose, then, this could mean that the hybrid/blended model neither failed nor succeeded, since it was essentially NEVER USED. At its best, we continued on with the same kind of system we had before--as one of my bright colleagues in the Union said, "it's still Distance Learning, but with a few kids in the room." 

(Mind you, I am speaking for high school right now. I understand that the junior high schools have a slightly different reporting rate.)

Many, many parents were clamoring for a return to school, but it sure seems like they didn't follow through and actually bring their children to the schools once they got their way. I have one parent who was very, very passionate about opening up schools (even going so far as to lie and slander me about said opening) but whose child has still never actually attended in person.

Parents may say that if teachers aren't going to make in-person learning different from Distance Learning, then what's the point of going? My rebuttal to that would be that I have personally witnessed teachers interacting very differently with the students in the room as opposed to the ones online; that I, myself, interact differently and more immediately with my in-person students, few though they may be; and that with over ninety percent of my students learning online it would be a disservice to a huge number of them to favor the in-person kids. 

It's just frustrating in the extreme to be working so hard, to have changes coming at us quite frequently, to be cowed by parent pressure that never even takes advantage of the changes they forced, and on top of all of it to be called a lazy, useless, shiftless grifter who doesn't care about kids. Oh, and unions are evil. That too.

I was telling a friend and colleague* that I think we're exhausted because we pour ourselves into our students, and they re-energize us by their expressions, their humor, their realization that they've learned something--all the daily interactions we have with them keep us going. And those daily interactions are almost completely muted now by the barrier of Distance Learning. We are pouring ourselves out and not being re-energized.

I, for one, am looking very much forward to being back in an overcrowded classroom with students.

Be seeing you!

*Be on the lookout for an announcement about a possible upcoming weekly podcast with this friend and colleague!

​The demands on both teacher and student are so great as to reduce the effectiveness of teaching and learning to far below where it is under Distance Learning. A teacher will have an in-person cohort at the same time he or she has a virtual cohort (and possibly a distance cohort as well). For the teacher to teach synchronously, she will have to monitor both in-person students and virtual ones simultaneously, while also actually teaching the lesson. We have already seen that teaching and monitoring a virtual classroom simultaneously reduces effectiveness: this will all still be in place with the ADDITION of an in-person group (whom the teacher not only has to monitor for academic success, but for medical protocols as well). In this sense, the blended learning environment retains all of the difficulties and problems of the distance learning setup and ADDS not only new academic challenges but unprecedented health challenges as well.

If the argument is made that students who are in virtual attendance do not need to be attending in the same way as the in-person students (i.e., they may attend "asynchronously") then the amount of time each student is receiving live instruction drops dramatically. A move to blended learning that REDUCES live instructional time seems ill-advised. The argument that in-person instruction confers benefits that virtual instruction cannot sounds appealing on the surface, and under ordinary conditions may even be a convincing one. However, consider the circumstances under which this in-person instruction would be given: students would be physically distant from one another, so in-person collaborative learning could not effectively take place (yes, students could collaborate online while in-person, but then the whole point of being in-person is lost. Students meeting in-person in order to collaborate online is such an odd move that even a school district must balk at it). Furthermore, due to social distancing, teachers would be unable to effectively check student work, offer one-on-one assistance, or even handle materials shared by a student. In other words, the students who were present in-person would receive essentially none of the ordinary benefits of being in-person. 

Add to this the technological demands placed on staff and students--the same ones that are currently present in distance learning PLUS all the new ones present for the COVID-19 version of in-person teaching. This is not even beginning to address the additional, special problems of accommodating those students who are on Distance Learning, and who would not be in-person at all. In essence, teachers would be doing what they are doing now--conducting Distance Learning--while ALSO conducting in-person learning WHILE ALSO conducting virtual learning for students who are rotating in and out of in-person learning. 

There are arguments being made that in-person learning is vital to student social growth, that a return to "normalcy" is necessary. I concur. But the blended learning model is not only "not normal," it is decidedly less normal than distance learning is (or has become.) Students would be returning to a classroom in groups of perhaps a dozen students. That's not normal--they would not see all their friends. They would be masked and mask requirements would be a constant drumbeat from teachers, administrators, and other students. This is also not normal. Students would be required to maintain an awkward six feet of social distance, which would include entry and dismissal from class; they'd be checked at the school gate and asked to provide paperwork verifying their health status. Periodically, students would be denied entrance and sent to "COVID rooms," or would be designated symptomatic while in class and sent away to reduce the risk to others. In-person assemblies, rallies, athletic contests and artistic performances would not exist. Lunch and brunch would cease to exist as social opportunities. Where, then, is the "return to normalcy" in blended learning?

I feel I am an experienced teacher. I feel as if I could, barely, handle the various platforms I'd have to juggle simultaneously. I'd be able to take attendance and get most students engaged, either in person, virtual, or distance, synchronous or asynchronous. I feel I could manage the situation, though with difficulty. But I wouldn't be teaching very well, and therefore, I don't think the students would be learning very well. It'd be a managed classroom, not a place for much learning.

I appreciate that parents want their children to leave their dwellings and physically attend school, even if the educational benefits of so doing are dubious or even nonexistent. However, I've approached this issue from a single standpoint--that of a teacher and his students. I've looked at this from the only angle I know how: what is the best, most effective environment for my students? I realize that other bodies must take into account other factors, such as community political pressure. I am in the advantageous position where I am only able to see this issue through the prism of student success.

Blended learning will not work as well as distance learning. Students will suffer more. 

As some of you may be aware, one of my novels, Beltrunner, is soon to become an audiobook. Because of this, my publisher and I have arranged for a little "reward" to be given out to anyone who submits his or her email in advance of the audiobook's publication. 

We decided on an exclusive story featuring Captain Collier South and his trusty computer sidekick Sancho as the reward. If you don't know, those two are the main characters from Beltrunner, and I had a thoroughly enjoyable time writing them in the novel.

So now I am returning to them, and I am finding them just as fun as they were when I penned the novel years ago. I think I finally get why writers (and I suppose actors) return to characters in sequels and such--these characters are people, and if we enjoyed their company in a novel, why not return to them?

In this case, I'm writing a prequel--partially because I don't want listeners of the "secret story" to know anything about what transpires in Beltrunner, and partially because I didn't have an idea. At least, not an idea for a short story.

The prequel obviously brings up problems--I can't have anything of so much consequence happen that won't align with the events in Beltrunner, for example. I remember watching and reading prequels of other stories and wondering why these events weren't mentioned in the main story, and I am determined not to fall victim to that. 

On the other hand, though, something has to happen: the story can't be so devoid of incident as to be dull.

I have hit upon what I think is a good idea, and I am almost done. It was very pleasurable returning to these two. So much so, that I am contemplating something I never thought I would...

A sequel to Beltrunner. We'll see.

​Be seeing you!

"You should write a book about everything that goes on here!"

I have no doubt that in all kinds of professional settings, those words (or a variation thereof) are spoken among the battle-hardened veterans of the job. You name the career, and I am certain that there are stories about the workplace. 

Just look at all the "workplace" shows that have been on TV in just the past few years. It's one of the most common settings because so many of us have experience in the genre. Almost all of us know what it is to go to a workplace, deal with co-workers and superiors, contend with obstacles, and balance a social life with a professional one. 

Some of these workplace stories--comedic, dramatic, or some mixture of the two--focus on sites that we associate with high drama: a hospital, a police station, a government agency, and the like. 

But many others focus on the most mundane of places: a small paper company, a community college, a municipal parks department, and so on.

My daughter and I have noticed something, though: of all the workplace dramas, comedies, and "dramedies," there have been very few ones about a public high school. Yes, I'm sure you're naming some right now, but how many of those are decades old? Welcome Back, Kotter and the White Shadow haven't been on the air in a long time.

Rather than wait for a show about public high school I'd like to watch, I decided that I would just write one myself.

It's a little bit new--both the idea of writing something that's not science-fiction, and writing a screenplay--but I guess I just feel like writing it. And what better reason could there be than that?

Be seeing you!

Trump and Churchill

Not long ago, it was revealed that Mr. Trump has been lying to the American people about the severity of the COVID-19 crisis. The lies were on tape, with Trump's full knowledge and consent, as he participated 18 interviews with Bob Woodward. 

It took about a day for conservative media and Trump's accomplices in the government to come up with their defense. Since they couldn't claim it was fake (it was Trump on tape, after all) what they settled on was the President was being a responsible leader by trying to calm the nation. You know, like Churchill or FDR. 

That's not MY comparison. That was theirs. Donald Trump is like Winston Churchill. 

So what I've done is given you an excerpt of one of Churchill's most famous speeches. Then I imagined how Trump would have delivered it during the early months of the Coronavirus crisis. 

Last part of Churchill’s “Blood, Toil, Tears, and Sweat” speech, May 13, 1940.
Given to the House of Commons

I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined this government: “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.”

We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and of suffering. You ask, what is our policy? I can say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us; to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory, however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival. Let that be realised; no survival for the British Empire, no survival for all that the British Empire has stood for, no survival for the urge and impulse of the ages, that mankind will move forward towards its goal. But I take up my task with buoyancy and hope. I feel sure that our cause will not be suffered to fail among men. At this time I feel entitled to claim the aid of all, and I say, “come then, let us go forward together with our united strength.”

Trump’s Version

I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined this government: “I have nothing to offer.”

We have before us a job. Huge job. Big-league job. Some would say the biggest thing ever. We have before us just maybe a couple days of maybe getting a little cold. Or the sniffles. You ask, what is our policy? I can say: It is to just let this thing disappear. It’s not on the sea, on the land and not in the air, we don’t need to do anything, it’s like the flu, it will go away magically on its own. We need to not wear masks, because that is a monster tyranny, like social distancing, never made any more bigly in the big bad book of human badness. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in words. The best words: It is my re-election victory, my re-election victory at all costs, my re-election victory in spite of all deaths, my re-election victory, however long and ridiculous my tie may be; for without  my re-election victory, there is no survival. For me, at least. Let that be realised; no survival for the Trump Real Estate Empire, no survival for all that the Trump Properties has stood for (which is huge gold-plated casinos that go bankrupt), no survival for my urges when it comes to television and being spanked by porn stars, that my kind will move forward towards its goal. Of making myself and my family rich. But I take up my task with buoy...boyoy...boy-ar-dee and hope. I feel sure that our cause will make you suffer. At this time I feel entitled to claim all, and I say, “ “It’s going to disappear. One day it’s like a miracle—it will disappear.” And anyone who dies from this fake news China virus is a loser. Thank you, and may God bress the Unitit Shashe of Ur-murca.

AMERICA: Hello? Teachers? Hi, it’s America. Yeah, it’s been a while since we talked. So, how are you doing? Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Listen, if I can just interrupt--I don’t really care. I was just being polite. Yeah. Well, I’ll tell you why I’m calling. So, I need a favor. Yes, another one. Well, it’s kind of a big one. But you have to admit, I’ve been great to you so far, right? What? I haven’t? Well...what about when I said ketchup was a vegetable in school lunches? Wasn’t that a good--no? Well, anyway, here’s the favor. You know how I undertook the grand human endeavor of stating that every American would receive a quality education that surpassed anything in human history? And you remember how I hired the best people to accomplish that? And you remember how I said I wasn’t really going to pay you tremendous amounts of money, partially because I could only get the womenfolk to do it in the beginning? ‘Member that? Oh, you do? Well. I’m going to add just a tiny new wrinkle to the job. Remember how I kept adding students to your classes until it’s nearly impossible to make any significant human connection and your expertise and skill is spread out and diluted? No, I’m not going to reduce the number. What a funny notion! No, we’re going to make it where you won’t actually be with them. No, you heard me right. They’ll be at their homes. I’m perfectly serious. No, this isn’t a joke. You will be one place and they will be in other places. Oh, except in some districts in the nation--some places, I’m going to just toss them all back at you and hope that this COVID thing I’ve been hearing about doesn’t turn out to be real. So I--listen, you’ve got to stop laughing. I’m being totally serious. Yes, that’s how it’s going to be. For as long as I keep deciding that wearing masks and going to crowded bars is more important than public health, that’s how long. And here we go with the laughing again. I’ll wait. Finished? Okay. So do everything you used to be doing, just do it from a distance. I’ll call it “Distance Learning.” Sounds good, right? What? Good Lord no, of course we’re not going to take anything away. Matter of fact, funny you should mention that. I’ll tell you why. You know how way back at the beginning school was just the “three R’s?” Reading, ‘Riting, and ‘Rithmatic? Huh. No, I guess it wasn’t a good sign that two of the three of those didn’t actually start with “R.” That was probably a red flag. But listen. So that’s how it was way, way back? And then I added in a whole bunch of other stuff? Science, history, world language, visual, performing, and practical arts, physical fitness, health, sex ed...sheesh, remember that? When I said that schools ought to teach that, because I was noticing that kids were getting all kinds of weird, inaccurate stuff about...I’m getting to the point. My point is that I keep asking you to do more and more. Not just teach academic subjects, but also artistic and athletic ones, too. And hold big-time sports games. And musical concerts. And plays. And art exhibits, robotics teams, debate squads, cheerleaders, reserve officer training corps for future soldiers, firefighting training and stuff? And remember how I said you were responsible for feeding kids, checking them for lice, making sure they weren’t bullied or becoming bullies? Making sure they were safe on campus--in many cases, that being the only safe place they know? Remember how I asked you to love them, even when no one else would? Remember how I asked you to shield them from harm?

Remember how I asked you to die for them at Columbine? Red Lake High? Sandy Hook? Saugus High School?

I’m here to ask for more. 

I need you to do everything you used to do--the whole list--and do it from a distance. I need you to look out for their emotional health while you teach them. I need you to make sure they are accountable but do it in a nurturing way. I need you to do it using technology you and they barely understand. I need you to be on the lookout for and help students with special needs, language barriers, emotional disturbances, monetary challenges, and signs of abuse. I need you to find a way to nurture students who are searching for themselves, their sexual identities, their racial identities. I need you to guide them in their quest for a place in this nation and this world--a world that all too often is cold, unwelcoming, and dark. 

No, there’s no raise involved. No, there’s no extra time. Look, you already get summers off. Yes, I realize you didn’t get THIS summer off, but you got paid for all the training you did, right? No? Oh. Well, you still get summers off normally. And some other breaks. Yes, I know you’re not paid for that time. Well, you will at least have the thanks of a grateful nation. What’s that? You hear people screaming at you that you’re lazy, you don’t produce goods, you want to stay at home and relax? You have seen people post stuff about how the Union is a terrible thing, and you should feel lucky to have a job at all, since you obviously can’t actually DO anything? 

I didn’t know that. So what am I asking? I’m asking all of that. No, I’m afraid I’m not offering anything else. Nope. No raise. And I guess respect is kind of dying out, too. You have to understand, parents are pretty mad about, well, everything, and who better to take it out on than you guys? You have to admit, you guys put up with pretty much anything. 

So, what do you say? Can you do me this favor?

TEACHERS: Show me to my students.

AMERICA: I knew I could count on you. 

​

I want to go back to my classroom and see my students face to face.

I’m very fortunate to be a teacher. I’ve got what I consider the best career in the world: I get to add to the lives of others. A young person walks into my room, then an hour later she walks out better than she entered. There’s nothing quite like that.

Students lose so much when we can’t meet them face to face. Mainly, they lose the ability to interact in collaborative learning, or what most people call “group learning.” I’ve seen so much good come from students who struggle alongside each other in solving a complex math equation, understanding a layered geopolitical map, or analyzing a sophisticated piece of writing. Being able to lean in, lend a gentle guiding word or two, and then lean back to watch the students continue to fight to learn is a special joy, and one which will help these students in their lives for many years to come.

So, in short, I want to go back.

The painful truth is, I can’t yet. None of us can.

I take no joy in saying that. It’s not a political statement, nor is it designed to ignore the calls for a return to normalcy from a beleaguered parent population. If you want your children to go back to school, then please understand we all want that too. More than you can imagine. I’m ultimately on the same side as all of you. We both want what’s best for your children--that’s why we went into this profession.

It’s been said that teachers who don’t want to return to face-to-face learning are being scared, are magnifying the threat beyond what is warranted. I would respectfully remind those of that opinion that in our district, teachers returned to the classroom shortly after a deadly school shooting in our own community. I don’t see how the argument of unwarranted teacher fear stands up in light of that brave truth. 

I understand the losses in keeping students from face to face schooling. I understand the burden it is to a parent to keep his or her child at home. I am a parent myself, as are many of your children’s teachers. I understand that we will lose some of the magic that goes into face to face schooling if we keep children at home.

These burdens and losses are lamentable, and we need to work to mitigate them as best we can.

Keeping children at home is a huge inconvenience and a burden. But sending them back to face to face school is a danger. No matter how much I want to see my students face to face again, my ethics prevent me from letting my own desires override their best interests.

In the hybrid/blended learning model my school district has constructed, students will be in face-to-face schooling for less than half the time they would have been in a normal school year. They will be physically present on campus five times every ten school days, and when they are present, they will remain on campus for less time each day than they would have normally. The gains we claim to make from face-to-face instruction are already reduced to less than half of what they would be from this fact alone.

Almost all students find that school is much more than a place where they learn the “three R’s.” It’s a sort of community center where kids can enjoy large gatherings of like-minded peers: athletic contests, musical concerts, plays, pep rallies, assemblies, and the like. If the classrooms represent the “mind” of a school, then these activities represent the “spirit.”
Of course, none of these can be possible under current conditions. Again, then, a significant benefit of face-to-face school must be absent if we are to even consider this experiment.

Add to that that because of very sensible and necessary social distancing requirements--requirements that still put children at risk, but merely reduce the risk--the chief benefit of face-to-face schooling will be lost. Students will not be able to participate in face-to-face collaborative learning under these conditions. Yes, they can collaborate using computers, typing to one another over the Internet in class, but if that is the solution, what would be the benefit from being in the same physical space?

Much has been made of the social harm being done to children by keeping them at home. I agree that there is an element of stress to this arrangement: it’s one of the many reasons I long to return to normal in school. Many psychological studies have been done to show that children need to socially interact with their peers: it’s one of the mid-levels on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. 

But even more foundational and thus more important on that same scale is the need for safety, which includes health. As much as children may be suffering in their psycho-social development by remaining at home, wouldn’t they experience even more stress knowing they are entering an unsafe environment every day they are at school? Can we subject students not only to a dangerous environment in terms of physical health, but also force upon them the stress and anxiety of such a place? They will enter school only after being medically scanned for a fever, they will see their teachers and their peers in medical masks, they will be constantly admonished to remain six feet apart, they will be washing their hands with sanitizer many times a day, and they will know what it’s all for: there is a deadly virus in the air, and they are being exposed to it. If we claim that children are being psychologically harmed by stay-at-home orders, how can we in the same breath claim they will not be harmed even more so by conditions at a school?

The benefits to children of returning to face-to-face school under the paradoxically necessary yet frankly inadequate conditions we have planned are dubious at best. Face-to-face school will only take place for a small fraction of the time it would normally have and will only include half of their peers at any given time, will not include the activities that fill a school with joy and temper students’ sometimes dry experiences with much-needed flavor, and  it will not allow for perhaps the greatest strength of educational pedagogy, collaborative learning.

What, then, are the benefits?

And we stand to lose so much in this experiment. Even the most ardent supporter of face-to-face learning agrees that the risk to children is higher than in distance learning. The argument is, however, that the risk is manageable and the benefits exceed the risk. I have yet to hear what, precisely, those benefits are.

Often, the argument is framed as a false dilemma--we either return to some form of face-to-face learning, or we “close the school.” I am impressed with the rhetorical skill of those who disagree with my position: they have largely managed to frame this debate around “opening” schools, as if the alternative is to “close” them. 

That is not the choice. 

No one is advocating schools should close. The alternative--sadly, the only one that can be adopted--is to adopt a robust Distance Learning system. I used the word “sadly,” and I did so deliberately. I don’t like Distance Learning when I compare it to safe, unencumbered face-to-face learning. I would submit that every one of my colleagues agrees with this. Given the option between returning to the style of teaching we had prior to this viral pandemic and conducting Distance Learning, every single person with whom I have contact would enthusiastically wish for the former. 

Much has been made of the “failure” of Distance Learning, as if that were an inarguable truth. I would remind those who tout that canard that our district went to that model with virtually no preparation, training, or extra resources and, in the words of our own district superiors, became “rock stars.” We stumbled and made errors early, as any toddler might. But we grew quickly. We are poised now to deliver a much better Distance Learning experience than we did when we were first thrust into the situation months ago. And our students are also more experienced at the style as well.

If we committed now to training and resource procurement, to development of a Distance Learning procedure and system that would meet the needs of all students, we could deliver an exceptional learning experience for the children of our district.

It would not be as good as what we had. Nothing will replace that, and no one is advocating we remain in Distance Learning in perpetuity. The nation, and our own community, is in the throes of a massive pandemic the severity of which virtually no one alive has ever seen. We will one day develop medicines to vaccinate against and perhaps even cure the disease. We will, one hopes, one day decide to make the necessary but relatively minor personal sacrifices to reduce the spread of the virus to manageable levels.

That day is not today, nor is it likely to be on August 11. 

I want to go back. But we can’t yet.

Yours respectfully,

Sean O’Brien
Teacher of Young People

​

Our nation is on fire.

In 1992, the city of Los Angeles was plunged into chaos following the acquittal of four white police officers of the use of excessive force for the beating of Rodney King--the beating had been recorded on videotape and seen by the public, and the acquittal of the officers was inexplicable and unconscionable. The jury that reached the not guilty verdicts (including one hung jury result) was comprised of ten white people, one Latino person, and one Asian person. 

There were no African-Americans on the jury. 

The city burned for five days, during which time there was over one billion dollars in damage, tens of thousands of arrests, thousands of injuries, and dozens of deaths. There were smaller disturbances in other parts of the country as a result of the verdict: San Francisco, Las Vegas, Seattle, Atlanta, and New York City. 

In 2020, Los Angeles again erupted into disorder following the videotaped death of George Floyd of Minneapolis, Minnesota, after he had been choked by a white police officer while his three other officers watched or assisted. Mr. Floyd was choked by the officer for over eight minutes--the last three of which Mr. Floyd was unconscious or otherwise non-responsive. Minneapolis police took four days to charge the officer of a crime, and of this writing, the other three officers have not been charged at all.

The main uprising occurred in Minneapolis following the murder, but other cities soon followed suit. I am writing this while the uprisings are still happening, almost a week after the murder. Some of the major cities experiencing uprisings include Minneapolis, New York City, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, Salt Lake City, Cleveland, Raleigh, Louisville, Atlanta, Dallas, and the nation’s capital in Washington, D.C.

Today, the entire county of Los Angeles was placed under 6:00 p.m. curfew, which includes Santa Clarita, where I live with my family. My wife and I watch the news and are transported back to ‘92: twenty-eight years ago, we were newlyweds, living in Los Angeles and just starting our lives together. We’d both just started our careers as educators, and we saw our city burning. 

And now, I have to ask...what has changed? I know many of you out there are saying, “violence isn’t the answer” or words to that effect. I know what you mean, and I understand the sentiment. You can’t ask for an end to violence but use violence as your method to get there. An eye for an eye and the world goes blind. Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. I’ve heard all the homilies. The answer is to vote, they say. 

Donald Trump won the presidency despite millions more people voting for his opponent. The Russian government intervened in our election to assist him. Voter suppression tactics were used by the Republican party to tip the scales in their favor. So why would a person think that voting works? I don’t mean a person thinking “my one vote won’t matter,” but instead thinking “my vote won’t count.”

Colin Kaepernick decided to kneel during the National Anthem during the 2016 NFL season, when he was a quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers. He did so to protest police brutality. He has been denounced by many on the right for his protest, including by President Donald Trump, who called him a “son of a bitch” and said he should be fired. So what is the message being sent to those who wish to protest police brutality? Protest peacefully, but not that way? This is but one example of people of color protesting peacefully and being told that their methods are wrong. 

What methods, then, remain?

Langston Hughes once asked, “What happens to a dream deferred?” He had many poetic possibilities in mind, including that it might “dry up/Like a raisin in the sun” which inspired Lorraine Hansbury to write her masterpiece play, A Raisin in the Sun. But his poem, “Harlem,” ended with a prophetic warning, an ominous question about the result of deferring a people’s dream: “Or does it explode?”

I don’t condone the violence that these protests have wrought. I could go on and on about how much of it, if not almost all of it, is the product of fringe groups using the protests as cover for their own unrelated ends: anarchists and white supremacists and all kinds of other groups who see a chance to inflict harm upon society for no reason other than to do so. But let’s not get into that argument. Let’s just simply acknowledge that along with these protests, there has been violence. I don’t like that. I don’t support it.

But to those who look and wonder, who say, “I don’t understand why these people are being so violent,” let me ask you…

What else is left?

If you can answer that, then you are wiser than I. I don’t know what the method should be to effect change--change that is long, long overdue and which has been deferred for centuries. I can’t say what avenue a protester ought to pursue to achieve his or her ends. And since I can’t answer the question “how,” then I will just watch my nation burn, and hope that this time, this time, from its ashes will rise a better society.

​Be seeing you!