Dr. Andy Gets Around

Earl Hickey: How was your first day of school?
Randy Hickey: Great! I really enjoyed science class. Did you know that before we were humans we were monkeys?
Earl Hickey: Really? What were we before monkeys?
Randy Hickey: I don't know. I can't even remember being a monkey.

—My Name is Earl, "Randy's Touchdown" (10/4/05)

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The first day of school is different for people in my position. We're still getting our act together, making sure that teachers have the stuff they need for the Special Education students, chasing after records for the students who have transferred in, and so on. Most of us couldn't get all of this done last week because, of the four days we had last week, two of them were spent in staff development. How much of it could have waited until, say, early next week? Most of it. Not all of it, I'll concede, but most of it. We could have done a half-day, then gotten our preliminary work done, then done a couple of solid days of the staff development, and probably NOT have been as stressed as so many of the IEP Team Associates now seem to be.

My next day in the new school (Friday), incidentally, went better than the first one. I met with the principal, who'd read the email from my boss about what had happened the other day (or maybe she read the post here? Ha! Ha! Just kidding. I don't get that much readership). The conversation opened with something along the lines of "I hear you had a little trouble here on Wednesday." I didn't get too deeply into it but conceded that this was the case. She promised me the information that I needed, and later on was kind enough to introduce me to the rest of the staff, but the documentation I'd asked for didn't materialize until yesterday.

The other thing that happened on Friday was that the principal told us to be ready for a visit on Monday by Dr. Alonso and an entourage of others, and that the press was likely to be there as well. This turned out to be no exaggeration. There were two TV vans out front and about ten people in the parade of people touring the school. They probably would have walked right past my office if someone hadn't said "That's the IEP Office." Dr. Alonso poked his head in the doorway--literally--and said "Hi, how are you?" We said "good morning", he wished us a good year, and moved on. The rest of the parade, although they had stopped behind him, simply walked past because he was in motion. Picture a mother duck and her ducklings following behind: mama stops, all stop. Mama goes, all go. It was practically cute.

The tour ran throughout the building and moved on to another school. They were all over the city, based on what I later saw on Channel 13 and Teach Baltimore's post at his blog. (Dude, you need a snappier moniker.) At least three schools were visited yesterday that I know of, and perhaps they got in one more that I wasn't able to suss out. Supposedly there's more touring going on today.

But ponder this: at least three schools visited on the first day; at least two of them staffed by people who write blogs about life in Baltimore City Public Schools, and both of those people directly engaged by the CEO. That's an unsettling coincidence.

Comments

[A BCPSS Parent]

One would hope it's a coincidence, but you never know. It makes it hard to blog about being a BCPSS parent when you can't mention school names or other identifying items, but it seems the most prudent thing to do.

[BmoreTeach]

Isn't BmoreTeach snappy enough?

That is pretty strange, and, yeah, I hope it's a coincidence. Phew!

[A BCPSS Parent]

Now the Smallest Twine makes it 3 out of 3 teachers. Hard to imagine that's a coincidence...

[Calamity]

More than likely these are the 3 schools that the CEO visits a lot throughout the school year which is why the media only sees what he sees and not what many are telling him about. If he had listened last school year, teachers would not have been attacked. The CEO was aware of them but chose to ignore it and to keep it under the rug until it hit youtube.

[Claude]

Calamity, I'm going to disagree with the first part of your comment. He visited many schools in the first few days of school, so I'm inclined to believe it was just coincidence.

Overall I think he has the teachers' (and the students') better interests at heart, but he may be cutting a little too close to the bone with Central Office. I have another post in this regard brewing, but I'm not positive I'll actually publish it yet.