Summer School Is Almost Over!

July 23rd, can't wait for that day to end! That means summer school will be finally over and I will have a short time to relax a little before school starts. Even better news, I am almost finished with both of my courses I am taking this summer and will soon be assured I can renew my teaching certificate and keep my job! Moments like this make me wish I was just a bit older and qualified to get a permanent certificate like someone I know....uh hem...uh hem....not to mention any names. This is one instance where it pays to be old. Ha ha! Sorry Donna.

Summer school always has it's hard times; face it, I don't get to work with the most stellar students. In retrospect, some of them really are great kids and just had a bad year, but others, well, maybe not. One student of mine I would like to share a story about--let's just call him "Bob" for security purposes. At first I thought Bob was just another one of my students who didn't care if he passed or not. He was always habitually late, or just plain didn't show up for class. I was writing him off. When he did show I would tell him he should put in more time or run the risk of not getting credit. Bob was very quiet, didn't say much. He appeared to be intimidated; I don't know why. Turns out with the help of his graduation coach, I learned a bit more about Bob. I figured he had a language barrier problem, but just didn't realize how bad it was. The more I learned the more I realized he should not have been with me, but with ESL tutors to help him understand the words and questions he was supposed to read. For the last week his graduation coach had come to class to read Bob the questions and help explain what they meant so he could answer them. During this time, I got to help a little more too since he was staying longer and putting in more work. After all, I had a lot of tedious things to enter in the computer for the other students as they finished up work. I had learned that Bob took care of his younger siblings in the morning, and when he left a 10 year old was in charge of the two younger ones till he returned. Turned out while not totally innocent, Bob did have a lot on his plate and undertaking a lot more responsibilities than a 10th grader should have.

Today Bob is only 3% away from passing, I thought we would get him out today, but computer problems really put a damper on that. There just wasn't enough time. We left the room in great spirits. Three minutes after he left, he ran back into my room looking for his graduation coach. I could tell he was scared. Some punk just pushed him off of his bike and stole it. His only means of getting to summer school because he lives so far away, it's too long of a walk. I went outside with him, no bike, saw some kids out in front of the school and questioned them. Of course, no one want's to say anything. C'mon, they saw everything, they know it, and I know it. They are just too scared to admit it. We saw his coach pulling around the corner, I stopped him and explained what happened. He put Bob in the car and tried to find the bike. I hope they did, his coach knows the he lay of the land and the kids quite well.

I just feel really horrible for Bob. He did nothing wrong, he was working hard, he is a good kid. When you work in the city long enough, sometimes it seems like bad things always happen to good people. Why?

Okay, so it hasn't stuck yet.

I was right, the hardest part is getting started. I was thinking that I would be full of ideas for new posts, but obviously that isn't so. Maybe it isn't coming up with ideas to blog about, but more along the lines of--what is SAFE to write about. It is a valid point. This is the Internet. Anyone and everyone can see this, and of course someone will probably use whatever I write against me. So what topics do I stick with? Just work? Superficial family stuff?

So, I got shocking message friday night from a student, it turns out her grade was completely wrong on her final report card. How does this happen? You check, double check, but I guess nothing is perfect. After looking hard myself, it turns out that the very FIRST test grade for the fourth nine weeks was missing. HOW!!!! I specifically remember grading that test and putting the grade into the network system. Since this was the very first test of the 9 weeks and given in March it is somewhat easy to understand how this was overlooked at the end of the school year. Usually, I am paying more attention to the more recent grades as this would most likely be where a mistake was made. Then again, how did this missing test grade go unnoticed for so long without the student or myself noticing???? Just more proof that no one is perfect and we are all prone to mistakes. As usual, I will learn and perform my job better.

Was this safe to blog about? : )

I can't believe I am doing this

For those of you that know me, well, quite frankly you may be shocked to see a blog on the Web written by me. I don't have a Twitter account, I recently created a Facebook account--which I hardly use, I don't post pictures, videos or any of the sort on the Web. So what am I doing? Well, to be quite honest, who the hell knows! However, as this is a course requirement for a class I am taking I guess it is high time I put the knowledge that I seek to good use. Who knows, I may take a liking to this Blogging thing and become a regular. As most things are in life, the toughest part is to get started. So, here I go, what do I Blog about? Any ideas? Are there any Bloggers out there that I know that Blog and I have no clue about it?