And we’re done!  Twenty four days in the bag.  I’ll tell my truth:  I miss kids like this.  I do.  I like my regular year students, don’t get me wrong, but I miss kids like this.  I miss kids who are honest about their bads, worse, and their goods.  I miss ones who make me cry but still challenge me.

I think I checked out for some of the regular year; threw in the towel, phoned it in, whatever you want to call it.  There was something in me that felt dead this year.  It was a disservice to my students, and to myself.  I need to change that next year, or I need to look for a new job.  Hopefully, these 5 weeks somewhere else will rejuvenate me enough to make it through this school year.

My second truth:  unless there is a miracle this year, I’ll be placing transfer papers in April.

8:01 on a rainy Tuesday morning after having Monday off.  No students in the room.  One student in the other classroom.  Not the most auspicious beginning, but my guess is that it’s a bit crazy because other students are starting “regular” summer school today.  (As opposed to intensive summer school, like these kidlets.)

I fear I may have become soft in my years away from NEARI.  I’m not as thick-skinned as I was after 8.5 years there.  That’s neither good nor bad, just an observation.  I continue to find that I am horrified by the experiences that kids have outside of the classroom.

Kids shouldn’t be able to make statements about how whenever they get picked up, they always are given to Officers XXX and YYY because they know them best.  How many times are you getting picked up to know this?  One of the other students talked about selling drugs for her parents.  Why are parents involving their kids in this?

These kids need so much more than a Common Core based education.  They need love, guidance, mental health support, physical health support.  How do they get to knowing the parts of an Open Response without those things first?