{"id":302,"date":"2019-02-22T13:38:59","date_gmt":"2019-02-22T18:38:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/donnadufresne.com\/~donnadu1\/?p=302"},"modified":"2019-02-22T13:39:05","modified_gmt":"2019-02-22T18:39:05","slug":"no-more-apologies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/donnadufresne.com\/~donnadu1\/no-more-apologies\/","title":{"rendered":"NO MORE APOLOGIES"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

            What they don\u2019t tell you in\nteacher\u2019s college or EDU grad programs is that you will spend the rest of your\ncareer apologizing for everything that comes out of your mouth. I suppose there\nare some teachers out there who have never had to apologize for making a decent\nliving, for their education, the way they dress, the way they look, the way\nthey talk, their religious and political beliefs, for having standards and\nstanding up to bullies, for implementing the curriculum and for simply doing\ntheir job. Oh, wait a minute, those are the men in our esteemed field. To be\nhonest, I\u2019ve always liked working with my male counterparts.  They bring levity and a much-needed male\nperspective to children starving for the presence of a man in their life and a\nprofession which takes itself all too seriously. But the fact is, they slide\ninto elementary schools, landing their home run with a certain amount of\nentitlement and authority, a rare bird sighting in the early grades and thus\nrevered. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their\nbooming voices can be heard in the hallways, putting errant children in their\nplace, without so much as the batting of an eyelash from parents and\nadministrators. Now I don\u2019t like to harp on sexism, but surely you may have\nnoticed the beating that Hillary Clinton took in the 2016 election. Scrutinized\nfor every word she said, and beaten by the press not for the content of her\nwords, but for the contours of her voice. \n\u201cShe sounds like she\u2019s screaming,\u201d people said. If you think there was a\ndouble standard imposed on Hillary Clinton, multiply that by a thousand times\nand you just might get a sense of the landscape female teachers must navigate\nin public schools.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s\nnot that I don\u2019t like my male colleagues. I have worked with some wonderful\nmen, who are caring and hard-working, and who fill the lonely gap left in\nchildren\u2019s lives by their all too absent fathers.  And, to be fair, they are not to blame for\nthe systemic and deeply entrenched sexism female teachers encounter on all\nfronts. Administrators and parents, male or female show more respect toward our\nmale colleagues whether they deserve it or not. It is as benign and insidious\nas the fact that parents pay their sons a higher allowance for doing nothing,\nwhile their \u201cCinderella\u201d daughters earn their pittance by doing most of the\nhousehold chores. The unfortunate consequence is that the lone male in an\nall-female staff can take a beating in that passive-aggressive way that women\nhave.  Not being one to participate in\nthat girl posse behavior, I have often aligned myself with my male colleagues.\nI mean you\u2019ve got to feel sorry for the poor bastards, right?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But\nwhen I see my male colleagues (or anyone for that matter, including the\nPrincipal), waltz out the door as soon as the contract allows, with not so much\nas a briefcase of work to do at home, while I am slavishly chained to my desk\nuntil 5:00 and looking forward to a \u201cwoo-hoo!\u201d evening correcting papers \u2013\nwell, you can understand why I may have built up a tiny bit of resentment\nagainst them.  It\u2019s not just the lack of\nwork ethic and effort that ticks me off, it\u2019s the fact that they can get away\nwith it.  And what\u2019s up with the \u201ccoach\ntrack\u201d? How is it that any male gym teacher, or basketball coach, who has never\ntaught in a classroom, and who has no background in implementing an academic\ncurriculum, can slide so effortlessly into the principal\u2019s chair? How does\ncoaching the baseball team qualify one to become Superintendent?  Qualifications? Experience in governing?\nWell, I guess that all went out the window with the recent elections since we\nnow have a President whose only qualification is the fact that he has a penis.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not\nonly is the system rigged against women, it\u2019s downright hostile.  We are compelled to work ten times as hard as\nsome of our male colleagues, not including the double life we lead as mothers,\nwives, and heads of households. We have earned our rightful place in the\nmiddleclass through hard work and dedication. And yet, our authority is\npersistently questioned. If a woman earns a well-earned place as the head of a\nschool, she can look forward to a tsunami of sexist assumptions from parents\nand staff. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whereas\na male administrator can get away with doing nothing other than passing a\nbudget and shooting a few hoops with the kids, a woman can\u2019t do enough.   She can work her ass off (which is one of\nthe perks of the job), she can implement fabulous school-wide initiatives that\nmake children better learners and better human beings, and she can lift the\nquality of teaching, but she will never be enough.  Every miniscule task will be scrutinized,\ncritiqued and politicized. Even worse, the moms and the female staff will not\nsupport her leadership. Like those women who chanted \u201clock her up\u201d referring to\nHillary Clinton, their internalized oppression will get the best of them.\nApparently, we all have our mother complexes, and get catapulted into a\nperpetual state of teenage rebellion once a woman takes charge.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\napologize for the diversion. It was not my intent to rant about sexism and the\ndiscrepancies between male and female teachers, but I have noticed that my male\ncolleagues don\u2019t get nearly as harassed as I do.  When was the last time they were asked to\napologize for their existence? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\nI really wanted to say, was how sick and tired I am of having to apologize.\nIt\u2019s not that I am opposed to apologizing. I learned right away that if I\nwanted to cultivate a positive relationship with a parent I\u2019d have to stuff all\nmy righteous indignation and, well, \u201csuck it up buttercup\u201d.  Most of the time, all it takes is a simple\n\u201cI\u2019m so sorry\u2026\u201d to deflect a raving maniac who can\u2019t understand why his son got\na D when he was entitled<\/em> to an A. And\nGod-forbid you raise your voice at a child who is standing on a desk, \u201cKnock it\noff, already!\u201d.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve\nhad to apologize for some crazy shit in my 23 years of teaching. My initiation\nfor teaching in the classroom came after the first week when an irate mother\nbarged in with a list of complaints, most notably that she didn\u2019t like the fact\nthat I had a community jar of pencils so that kids could grab one if their own\npencil broke. Apparently, I was single-handedly responsible for spreading Aids.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\nis it about being a public-school teacher that makes parents and the public\nfeel entitled to tell you how to do your job? \nIt doesn\u2019t matter how many degrees you hold or how many years of\nexperience. Even the most moronic high school drop-out thinks he knows how to\nrun your classroom better than you, and he don\u2019t\nmind sayin so<\/em>. I guess the key words are entitled,<\/em> and public<\/em>, but\nI think the real crux of the matter comes down to gender and class. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being\na woman is hard to hide, but people often make assumptions that we teachers are\nmiddle class. What they don\u2019t know about me is that I was raised lower working\nclass and rural and that my parents were both high school dropouts.  They don\u2019t know that I worked my ass off,\nsometimes juggling three jobs to put myself through college because my parents\ndidn\u2019t really value education.  In fact,\nthey had the same kind of attitude toward my teachers when I was growing up,\nthat I have to put up with from the parents of my students. They also don\u2019t\nknow how many times I was mortified by the rantings and ravings of my parents,\nand how petrified I was of having them show up at a conference for once. What\nmy parents didn\u2019t know was that whatever my failings were in school, it wasn\u2019t the\nteacher\u2019s fault. It was theirs. Had they supported my intelligence and talent\nwith higher aspirations than marriage and children, I might have found my way\nsooner and in a less round-about route. Had they realized that having a high IQ\nwas not enough, and that there was more to it than breeding, as though I were a\nprize milk cow, it wouldn\u2019t have taken me fifty years to become the writer I\nalways wanted to be. A little help with homework, or least setting the\nexpectation that it was more important than chores wouldn\u2019t have hurt\neither.  I try to remember these things\nwhen I open rabid e-mails from parents. I think about the mortified child in\nthe background, who feels guilty, because in order to deflect the rage from himself,\nhe blamed the teacher.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

So\nhere is my litany of apologies:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n