Hard Stuff

I walked down the hallway just as students were packing their backpacks before heading out to the buses. The teachers looked professional, but haggard after a long Monday. The girls were squeally and the boys were squirrelly. Some students wore flipflops and hoodies, others lanyards and sneakers. Some students carried themselves with confidence, others with the shear awkwardness that is only found in the halls of a middle school.

One of my fears about leaving teaching was loosing touch with the realities of the classroom and its students. In my desire to keep connected to public education, I decided to volunteer one afternoon a week mentoring/ tutoring at a local middle school. Today, I was paired up with my student whom I will refer to as S-. To say that S- didn't want to be at an afterschool tutoring program is a gross understatement. To say that S- hated coming to school is accurate. When I approached the table where he was seated, he said, "I'm not moving."

All of his friends agreeably left the table with their respective tutors and I sat next to him. He wanted no business with small talk or introductions. He flipped open his book and got to work. I watched him set up his paper for his math homework. He took such care to align his numbers into two perfect columns. His penmanship put mine to shame. He dashed though his assignment and said I could check it once he was done with the first page. Rounding- tens, hundreds, thousands. Most of his other classmates were working on pre-algebra. S- was rounding. When he got done, he said "Alright, you can check it. I hope they are all right." They were all right until he got to the rounding to the thousands place. This confounded and frustrated him. I admit, I felt the same as I tried to talk him through rounding.

Statistically speaking, S- has a high probability of dropping out of school at 16. I couldn't help to experience some of his frustrations with him today. He has experienced relatively little success in school. I'm sure more than one teacher has given up on him. This is not a commentary on the teachers, he is a tough student to reach. But I couldn't help sensing that he was being written off as a waste of time. As if the school forced him to come, just to cover itself when he failed. I can hear it now, (because I've been there before) "S-, you had all those opportunities in tutoring, and still you have done nothing." This is not a commentary on the school, they have a very difficult job. I mentioned to him that he had a lot of persistence today when he was trying to plow through his math problems. I asked if anyone knew he was persistent. "No." he replied, hiding behind his shaggy hair.

When the tutoring sponsor brought around popcorn to all of the students, she chatted with all of the mentors telling them what a great student they were working with. When she came to our table, she just politely grinned and shook popcorn onto a plate. S- got the last of the popcorn, mostly old maids. Somehow, it just didn't seem right.

As the hour closed, I could tell he just wanted to leave. He was not interested in me like the other students were in their mentors. He felt downtrodden, like he just demonstrated to another person that he couldn't do school. I told him I would see him next week. He ignored me.

I walked to the bus stop and another student, L- sat with me. I spoke with him briefly at tutoring. He too let it be known that he hated school. We chatted on the bus stop bench and at one point I turned around and S- was behind us. He came over and S- and L- chatted.

L- said to me, You tutored him?

Yes, I did

S- in a sincere voice, We worked on really hard stuff. Wasn't it?

Yes, it was. (I knew for him, it was very hard stuff.)

We all got on the bus together, but sat in different sections. I in the middle, S- in the front, L- flirting with a girl in the back. None of us talked to each other. I couldn't help think that maybe I earned a little tiny bit of street cred with S- and L-, waiting with them at the stop and all. It was certainly a way I connected with some of my students in Denver.

We all rode downtown, S- got off before my stop. He didn't say anything but gave me a smile and a quick wave before he got off the bus. I smiled and waved back.