As the 2019-20 school year came to a close this past July, we accompanied the buildings and grounds staff of St. Basalt's School, a "typical" independent school (if such a thing exists), as they prepared to relegate the detritus of another school year to the dustbin of history, the dustbins of English, science, and the other departments being already quite full. (The detritus goes to the dustbin only because the school archivist, a faculty member emeritus who had retired in 2011, had at last succumbed to the temptation of a multimillion dollar offer to become an independent college counselor in a major metropolitan area.)
In a musky corner behind a gargoyle with the face of former President Cheney and redolent of cheap whiteboard markers and the sickly sweetness of stale vitamin water, we followed our noses to a disused storage closet – or so we thought until we opened it and realized that at one time this tiny space must once have been a faculty office, now long since supplanted by the specially built cottages from which St. Basalt's teachers now proudly practice their industry via telechip.
On the wall there hung a calendar dated "2006-07" and featuring a photograph of a scantily clad young woman holding a tuition insurance policy and smiling coyly at a tousle-haired boy in a school blazer surreptitiously hiding a cigar in one hand and a beer bottle in the other.
What we found among the sweepings, the crumpled papers, the file folders spilled carelessly under dried puddles of coffee spilled carelessly, and the unopened letters from professional development providers gave us a profoundly revealing picture of the life and work of a "typical" independent school teacher (if such a thing ever existed) in the early 21st century. This is a picture both terrifying and awe-inspiring, timeless and ephemeral.
Fastened carelessly to an office wall with a 10-penny nail was an article torn from the pages of the school magazine, The Carminative. Apparently a regular feature of the magazine, it was entitled "Out of the Headmaster's Pipe Bowl," and it contained some moving ruminations on the nature of teaching and the nature of students:
The trustees shall soon announce a campaign for our school. Never has the case for St. Basalt's been stronger. In every way, the excellence of our faculty and student body has never been surpassed. Our teams dominate the Fields of Honor in every sport, and our students regularly sit rigorous national examinations to demonstrate their perspicacity and proficiency. The excellence of our faculty speaks for itself. Heroically overworked, these men and women from whom the school draws its life's blood have hurled themselves into the life of the school this year with Dickensian fervor. In this area, above all others, St. Basalt's must maintain its leadership in attracting and holding the most excellent teachers available in an ever-dwindling pool.But beyond the spectacular achievements of the school, it is the enrichment of the lives of the individuals within that we hold most precious. Each boy and girl who attends St. Basalt's expects to find here the excellency that is the ground on which rests our extraordinary reputation. Whether parsing Xenophon in Latin III-B, pummeling an adversary on the lacrosse diamond, or frolicking in the wood beyond Wheeler Brook, each St. Basalt's student is engaged in a unique, personal quest – often fraught with peril but likewise with joy – for the excellency in his world and in himself.
Falling languidly over the corner of a faculty desk we came across a tattered sheet of paper that had once been folded in what looked remarkably like the shape of a paper airplane. When we were on our feet again we saw that the paper was an official "to do" list, in memo form, "From the Office of the Academical Dean." Entitled "Faculty Competencies, 2006-07," it enumerated the following "Goals for All Faculty:"
- Increase the use to technology in all classrooms. Faculty should strive to make St. Basalt's a leader in technological innovation, as specified in the recent strategic goals enunciated by the board committee on Leadership in Technological Innovation. (Some of you, I notice, have not opened the email on this. Please see the Tech Department for assistance if you are having problems using the email system.)
- All curriculum should be designed using the "Understanding for Teaching" model seen at last October's afternoon workshop. If you missed this workshop, please ask me to lend you the PowerPoint; Chris November, Class III, can help you view this.
- All curriculum should be designed backwards.
- Assessments should be evaluated based on backwards curriculum goals.
- Evaluations should be assessed forwards but understood based on standards developed backwards. See numbers 3 and 4 above.
- Departments should plan on retreating on standards several times during the year. The headmaster's snuggery will be available for such activities; please reserve this space with the head's assistant.
- Please be certain that you are multicultural in all aspects of your teaching. Remember, diversity is a terrible thing to waste and that we are committed to making this happen!
- When communicating with parents, whether via email or telephone, please use language. This also applies to guardians.
- At St. Basalt's, students are always the centerpieces of our Harkness tables. Please make every effort to remember that our students have many kinds of minds and that laziness is mythological. Our female students also have different ways of learning, not just boys.
- Do not let up in your efforts to be excellent and rigorous! St. Basalt's is not a leading independent school for nothing! The students are watching!
- The new schedule has been designed to enhance student learning. Please ask students for help if you are having trouble understanding the principle of the rotation, which is really quite simple: In the seven-day rotation, all even-numbered classes meet on odd days and all odd-numbered classes meet on even days. Classes with neither meet on the other days.
- Teachers should plan to assign group projects this year to meet the strategic goal set forth by the board committee for Collaborative Learning in order to help students learn to work with diverse kinds of people. It is recommended that weaker students be grouped together so as not to hurt the performance of smarter students.
- Dormitory supervisors need to understand the importance of building intense relationships with students, with boundaries of professionalism always foremost in mind. The school counselor can assist with complicated relationship issues during her visits on alternate Thursday mornings. If you are busy during those times, please just drop her a note in the box provided in the faculty lounge. You may also ask her personal questions in this manner. (Teachers concerned about specific student behavior should also feel free to ask the counselor. Last year's epidemic of staring and gulping at inappropriate times was, we are told, was actually a stress-release exercise suggested by Mr. Jenkins. Incidentally, some of you have inquired, and he is now on sabbatical.) Teachers are also gently reminded to refrain from adult behavior in the dormitories when on duty.
- If coaching, work to ensure fair play at all times and that team records are in line with the Strategic Goals of the board committee on Leadership in Athletic Superiority.
Also, just a reminder: All materials for the accreditation self-study should be forwarded to the dean of faculty by the close of school for the Parent Conference Festival.
It was clear from this memorandum that the work of a teacher in those days – a time of great reform, when no child could be left behind on purpose – had achieved a level of complexity and professionalism hitherto unimagined. Many years ago, when independent school teachers taught only Latin, often in Greek, the three R's were sufficient to make one a competent, memorable teacher, destined to be immortalized in student doggerel engraved in the oaken lids of iron desks. The teachers of 2007 needed more: "competencies," skills defined by educational experts in many fields who took their time to inculcate teachers in the subtle art of being "guides on the side" instead of "sages on stages;" the days of teacher as actor were apparently well and truly over! One guru of the era, we are told, regularly delivered more than 200 lectures on discussion-based teaching to independent school faculties each year.
Another document we discovered, labeled "Final Examination, English 11 Honors," gave ample evidence of the kinds of difficult work that students were asked to perform. One essay question asked students to write on themes of gender equity and social justice in Robert Frost's famous poem, "The Raven," while another posed students the problem of matching words with their parts of speech – no rulers or even calculators allowed! Lying next to the examination was a single bluebook in which someone had scrawled in red pen the immortal words of Joseph Conrad, "The horror! The horror!" Such devotion to literature impressed us mightily.
Our sentimental journey to St. Basalt's (from which, we blush to say, we had ourselves been retired early in the Carter presidency) inspired considerable reflection. What has been lost since the days when gimlet-eyed school cooks fought obesity and pregnancy by serving chipped beef laced with saltpeter? Had we been the last children to learn in a true Age of Giants, when a teacher was not judged by the number of seminars she had attended but by the accuracy with which she could awaken a dozing student with a hurled fragment of chalk? Schools had seemed simpler, gentler places, then, where expertise and professionalism took a backseat and trunk, respectively, to those time-worn values about which we had chanted so often in the school chapel. We now remember our own expulsion with sadness and pity; how well they had misunderstood us! Our bitterness now is sweetened by the knowledge that our co-conspirator, the hockey captain, was later fired from the Enron Corporation for certain irregular practices, though St. Basalt's had kept him on while whisking ourself, an intramural scrub, onto a train to the East. We are sure that they were able to find better uses for our scholarship money.
But we digress.
The last slip of paper we discovered seemed to us to embody all the significance of being a teacher in that time:
Dear Ms. – [it read],This year has been a year when I learned many things about myself and also about algebra. I am also really glad that you taught me what X was and also how to use binomials, I think they are very interesting. When my fiends and I talk about algebra after we have graduated from college and everything, I think we will always talk about you. I also really liked how you made all those jokes about your cat. Some of them were funny! (Ha-ha!) I also learned this year not to put things off until the last minute.
My father said he thought you were really cute at the Parent Conference Festival. My mom liked your shoes. I think my dad may try to call you.
I think you are a really good teacher and also a good coach. Don't worry about all those games we lost because we had fun, and I'm sorry if they didn't hire you back for next year. Speaking of games, I really liked that one we did about rectangles where we had to move the desks and the light happened. It was lucky that Timmy had a wrench, huh? That guy from the business office was really mad – it was sooo funny! Being a teacher sure must be hard!
Well, gotta go now. Whatever, you are cool!
XXXXOOOO Des