#6 – 90 or 83 to 1

Here’s what isn’t so great: my ‘classroom’ feels more like a dungeon.  The classroom is half-underground and half-underneath the bleachers in the student gymnasium overhead.  If school buildings were a subway, the music department would have been the last stop.  There is one long, skinny window on one side of my classroom, which doesn’t open.  The classroom has a set of doors to the hallway and a single door to the outside, which is forbidden to be propped open for security reasons.  Also, there is no air conditioning in my room, Only miserable late-August in Ohio heat.

If you’re the musical theater type, cue Summer in Ohio from The Last 5 Years in your head. I just did.

My upperclassman choir is from 1:30 – 3:00 pm every afternoon (I. Hate. Block. Scheduling.). It’s roughly 110 degrees in this room, with the overhead lights off.  The band has a barn fan that roars, but barely makes it livable.  I have an exhaust fan the size of a kids hula hoop, which is supposed to help, but makes so much noise I have to yell to teach.  I make the deal with the kids that if they don’t talk while I’m talking, I’ll yell over the fan; if they are talking, the fan goes off.  They keep that deal for about 5 minutes.  

The Church Lady had gotten a Britney Spears mic to plug into the classroom sound system.  I use that so we don’t sweat to death.  Now, my voice is louder, so they talk louder.  (Not all of them, of course, but enough of them that those who aren’t talking have a hard time hearing me.)

The band is playing at half-strength next door, and I have to yell, I mean, teach over that, too.  I repeatedly ask the head band director to keep them at a low volume level, as hearing is important to singing but they never do.  (He was a sweet man, but his hearing was damaged from years of over-exposure.  I truly don’t think he realized how loud they were.)

There is no accompanist, there are no funds to hire an accompanist, the main student accompanists had either graduated the year before, or were scheduled into the other class periods.  Yay for playing the piano with both hands, while watching the music with one eye and monitoring behavior with the other. 

I’m the only adult in the room and I’ve got to wrangle this circus, in sweltering heat, for the last 90 minutes of every day.  83 juniors and seniors versus me.  Some of whom want to be there and some of whom had to put a class in their schedule 4th block and maybe worst of all, some who were talented and good at music, but wanted to just screw around for class credit.  This is not conjecture.  One of the main instigators in that last group apologized right before graduation the next year, basically saying, ‘it wasn’t you, it was me.’  Choir had always been a screw around class and this student hadn’t wanted that to change when I came to teach there.

There were some very physically active male students in that group, as well as lots of big mouths and attitudes.  By the 3rd week of school, I had already had to dismiss one of such students from my show choir for what he called a rite of passage, what the victim’s parents and I called assault and what the school called hazing.  I could tell it was only a matter of time before someone shot their mouth off at the wrong time and I wouldn’t be able to prevent the fight, let alone break up a brawl between multiple 6′ or taller teenaged boys.  

After one particularly miserable day in that class, I went to Principal Hugs-a-lot to ask for another body in the room.  There is no scenario in which it was safe for one adult to monitor & control 83 students at once, especially not when playing piano was also required of the one adult. (In case you were wondering, our contract did have a class size cap per adult.  They had negotiated an exception for the music teachers. Thanks for nothing, union.). The band had about 125 kids.  They got an assistant, I didn’t. The band director didn’t have to also play an instrument and teach; when I mentioned this, I was labeled a diva, was told this kind of ratio was par for the course in my chosen area and I should be thankful to be working in such a ‘high quality program’. Why is it that administrators always equate quality with quantity, but never actual quality?  

I tried to explain that I was concerned that there was going to be a physical altercation in the room between some of the male students.  I was told that if I was a professional, I would prevent that from happening.  When I persisted, Principal Hugs-a-lot told me he would talk to the assistant band director (who had no responsibilities during most of the choir period) and have him come over a few times a week, for another adult presence in the room.  Besides, the kids all liked Mr. Assistant, so maybe I could learn something from his rapport…  Mr. Assistant made a point to come and talk to me, let me know he understood how tough it was to start teaching that young, with that many kids, and with some of the ‘characters’ I had in that class.  He also said that he would pop over when he could, but if I needed someone, I could always send a kid over to get him for back-up.

While the assistant band director was a nice enough guy, he was the epitome of the ‘do as little as you can to get through, while never outright telling anyone no’ teacher.  He was also a successful coach, so he was well-liked and left undisturbed, as long as he kept a winning record.  The choir period was his track planning period.  That wasn’t a thing he should have had planning time for, but he left his office and the band room all the time, neglecting the band kids he was supposed to be helping to supervise.  Sports events don’t plan themselves, you know.  

I’m still waiting for him to pop over into choir; although, I guess if he did so within the 9 years since I left that school, I wouldn’t know about it.  I can say he never got around to it during the next 3 1/2 years and since he’s now retired, I should stop holding my breath.