Thank you, thank you. Ireland was AWESOME, except for my MIL and her bullshit, which I'll post on later, and on my sister blog. If I ignore her shit, then the trip was great, and I would never have come back... if that was an option. I *heart* Ireland.
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In previous posts I have given you a high level overview of an adoption situation that has come through the office. I only have the bare bones details, because things were so crazy yesterday.
In this next installment...
While I was out of the office last week, Boss got a phone call from "B," the BM. She asked, “Can we undo this?” and then later in the conversation she claims that she was on an anti-depressant at the time of signing over her rights. This is someone who went out of state and left her kid with someone else... the same someone else who has essentially been raising the kid because B just doesn’t have her stuff together...
I’m not sure what Boss said, but I’m pretty sure that he did say that once signed, it’s irrevocable. And he did say that to her in clear language prior to having her sign the releases. Once the conversation was over, Boss called adoptive parents’ attorney, who understandably flipped out.
I don’t know what was said and done next, but it’s enough to make my soul quiver...
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I have read a couple of foster-to-adopt blogs this week (at random), and I will say to you who are pursuing that path: God bless you. You are of a stouter constitution than I.
I? I am a complete chickenshit. I can’t even contemplate an open adoption. Semi, sure; open, God no.
At least I admit it.
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Boss had to leave the office early at a point earlier this week because his son had a thesis to defend. “Thesis?” I asked, thinking it was one of his older children in college (ha, like that happens in college anymore).
Nope. It was his sophomore in high school. In order to pass his humanities course at his private school, students have to do a research paper, and then the student must sit before a panel of three teachers and field questions, defending the paper.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wow! What a novel concept!
As I said to Boss, “Wow, you’d never see that in a public school.”
In a previous life, I was a teacher for a year. I loved it. You either have the touch for teaching, or you don’t; I learned that I did. I loved it, and had a great time with the kids... but I was scared out of education. It wasn’t the kids from a borderline-ghetto neighborhood (once the rules were laid down, they were great, if you don’t count the spec-ed kids who should never have been mainstreamed in the first place), and it wasn’t the hours-on-end job. It was the administration, and it was the parents. My God, the parents were awful. And it’s one of the things that my teacher friends have the biggest issues with.
And please do not get me started on the current state of education today. That will be a rant for another day. But:
Someone finally had the guts to write to the paper what everyone with a brain already knows. I will copy it here, because the archives get purged quickly. This was in Tuesday’s opinion section (5/19/09) of the Arizona Republic.
I have been teaching 5th and 6th grade for nine years in Phoenix. This is the first year I have been told to give grades. When I was in school you earned it.
Today teachers are not supposed to fail students, especially special-ed students, even if their lack of ability or effort warrants it. The new "inclusion" policy dictates they are placed with regular-ed students and expected to score as well. Sometimes they do, as many regular-ed students are lazy.
Not wild about handing out grades for nothing, I, in protest, gave some of the less capable special-ed students 100 percent on every assignment. This didn't sit well with the special-ed teachers, who told me these students should get C's.
I figured that failure to comply would earn me a visit to the principal's office and a half-hour tongue lashing during my prep period, so I gave them all 75 percent on every assignment, even if they didn't do it. The special-ed teachers liked this just fine. The underlying reality for teachers is that even if a student deserved to get a failing grade for lack of effort, you're not supposed to give an "F" on the report card.
The driving force behind all of this is that the principal's office doesn't want phone calls from parents complaining about their kid's failing grades. As long as I pass everybody, I won't have problems from the front office, or so I thought.
My latest visit to the principal's office resulted in a directive to make my class easier. A parent or two complained my class was too hard for their kids. These are probably the same kids that don't do their work. So how to stay out of the principal's office?
I give credit where none is due, and pass students on to the next grade at the end of the year whether they've mastered the skills necessary for them to be successful or not.
-- Jim Hull, Glendale
I thought this was pretty ballsy – not only openly telling the public what is happening in his school, but then he signed his name to it. Bravo, Mr. Hull!
For me, there’s nothing new within the lines of his letter to the editor. I know all about the passing-everyone/don’t-hurt-my-snowflake syndrome, about the teaching to a test, about the fallacy of mainstreaming. I also think that more teachers need to air the dirty laundry about what is truly going on in our schools – and shame those in charge into truly FIXING our educational system.
I’ll rant about education in general one of these days. Promise. But not today. :)
