COLUMN: Why Teach?

From Nathan Smith's, "South End of the Northbound," Fall '95 From Nathan Smith's, "South End of the Northbound," Fall '95The other night, I was at dinner with two friends (one of whom I'd just met that evening), indulging in polite repartee, when a slight breach of etiquette on their part set me to thinking. Up to this point we had stuck with the bubbly banter -- O.J.'s revolting yet inevitable acquittal, the entree's resemblance to vomit, the existential and sociopolitical significance of professional wrestling -- the whole nine yards of Ms. Manners standard chit-chat. Then suddenly the man across the table whom I'd just met that evening asked me what I did at Penn. I replied humbly, "Oh, I'm a doctoral student in education." Our mutual friend looked at him with a bit of a snicker, and embellished, "You know, that touchy-feely kind of stuff." Clearly, these two computer programmers had a slight disdain for my field. I didn't judge or condemn them, even though they were two cave-dwelling geeks who slave in front of a monitor day and night for a quick buck -- rather, I appreciated their honesty about their opinions. I could certainly understand their perspective; it's not an uncommon sort of dismissal. Many question (to my face) the value of work in a generally low-paying field (I prefer to call it "underpaying"), in which any progress one makes may be labeled regression by the opposing theorists before its effects are even fully understood. And if in your defense you should give any hint of idealism, or the desire to make a change in the floundering public school systems, you'll never be taken seriously again. After all, most people think it's just a matter of stuffing the kids' heads with the three R's, which amusingly enough disregards history altogether, and even misspells two of the subjects (ritin' and 'rithmatic). I let the conversation ramble away from the subject that night, but the struggle to properly respond to the comment has not abated in my mind. So I'd like to waste your time with the conclusions I've reached. From Nathan Smith's, "South End of the Northbound," Fall '95The other night, I was at dinner with two friends (one of whom I'd just met that evening), indulging in polite repartee, when a slight breach of etiquette on their part set me to thinking. Up to this point we had stuck with the bubbly banter -- O.J.'s revolting yet inevitable acquittal, the entree's resemblance to vomit, the existential and sociopolitical significance of professional wrestling -- the whole nine yards of Ms. Manners standard chit-chat. Then suddenly the man across the table whom I'd just met that evening asked me what I did at Penn. I replied humbly, "Oh, I'm a doctoral student in education." Our mutual friend looked at him with a bit of a snicker, and embellished, "You know, that touchy-feely kind of stuff." Clearly, these two computer programmers had a slight disdain for my field. I didn't judge or condemn them, even though they were two cave-dwelling geeks who slave in front of a monitor day and night for a quick buck -- rather, I appreciated their honesty about their opinions. I could certainly understand their perspective; it's not an uncommon sort of dismissal. Many question (to my face) the value of work in a generally low-paying field (I prefer to call it "underpaying"), in which any progress one makes may be labeled regression by the opposing theorists before its effects are even fully understood. And if in your defense you should give any hint of idealism, or the desire to make a change in the floundering public school systems, you'll never be taken seriously again. After all, most people think it's just a matter of stuffing the kids' heads with the three R's, which amusingly enough disregards history altogether, and even misspells two of the subjects (ritin' and 'rithmatic). I let the conversation ramble away from the subject that night, but the struggle to properly respond to the comment has not abated in my mind. So I'd like to waste your time with the conclusions I've reached.First, I'd like to dispel one cheeseball reason many of my colleagues resort to in defense of their field. "Even if you manage to reach one student, and make a difference in their lives, it's all worthwhile." I hate to be a wet blanket, but if you're only reaching one kid in your class, you should consider carpentry. There are plenty of white supremacist teachers who might really inspire a few favored white kids in their classrooms, but those teachers deserve to be fired all the same on the grounds of their gross inadequacy and inability to treat all students fairly. They're petty monsters, abusing their dictatorship in the classroom in order to implant oppressive ideology in the next generations. And it's this very matter which I shall use as a springboard into some really good reasons to teach. Here's one special secret attack which proved extremely effective, and required only two perpetrators. During recess, one student stood outside the classroom door as lookout. The criminal mastermind, whom for the sake of anonymity we shall refer to as "Mr. Smith," snuck in the room, carrying a newly purchased electronic greeting card. He then carefully removed the musical chip from the cardboard, and dropped it into the heating and air conditioning unit. As the unit was full of wires and all the precision electronic equipment required to regulate classroom temperature at 95 degrees in the winter and 15 degrees in the summer, and as the maintenance man was particularly incompetent, the musical chip could not be reached without taking apart large portions of the unit. It was decided that the most economic solution would be to let the battery go dead. Now, you wouldn't think one of those little chips would have enough juice to play "Here comes the Bride" for three days straight. And you'd be right. After a day and a half, the music broke down into random beeping at various pitches and volumes, gradually growing softer until you couldn't really hear it -- consciously. But this is when the effect is strongest, for this subliminal cacophony can drive instructors to the brink. At the most the teacher will stuff his or her nose and ears with pieces of chalk and run through the hall screaming "Catch the bouquet!" At the least, the shaky-handed educator will flee to the teacher's lounge with a cigarette every fifteen minutes or so. Either way, it succeeds in creating an amusing disruption and endangering the teacher's health. But seriously, this is the very effect I'd like to have on my students. I'd like to help warp a new generation of kids, one that refuses to be labeled with a boring old letter like X, which supposedly indicates a lack of purpose but really indicates a lack of ingenuity in the naming. I think the next generation should call themselves "The Previous Generation" just to confuse people. I want to implant in them the knowledge and confidence to question authority (especially mine), and when it becomes necessary to undermine it. After all, America hasn't had a good governmental overthrow in its entire history. The civil war might have come close, but it wasn't a worthwhile cause. On the other (or left) hand, the forcible ejection from power of prejudiced, sexist, heterosexist, conservative authority is long overdue. So let's get out there, teachers of America, and rip apart the fabric of society thread by thread, through the education of the children of our peers! Or maybe we should stick with the three R's (or even one R, a W and an A).