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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Things I see on a daily basis teaching high school:

- 100+ students lined up out the door every morning and after open lunch, waiting for late passes that mean absolutely nothing because no one tracks them and there are no consequences for tardiness.

- Dozens and dozens of students just roaming the halls, sitting in stairwells, or coming and going from local eating establishments while classes are going on, with no consequences.

- Groups of students vaping or smoking pot in the bathrooms and only being told by security to return to class when they are found.

- Students basically gaming the grading system, doing the bare minimum to get by.  Because students earn 50% now, even for assignments they don't complete, they know they only need to do a couple of assignments per quarter to pass the course.  Even the high fliers know that earning a 79.5% one quarter and an 89.5% another quarter results in an A on the high school transcript under our policy.  Semester exams are a thing of the past, so students are not held accountable for retaining what they've learned, with the exception of AP courses.  Cheating is rampant because, often we are told that we must give students another chance to complete the assignment rather than assigning a zero.  This grading policy also results in almost everyone being "eligible" so losing the ability to play a sport or do another activity of interest is no longer a motivator.

I could go on and on....

You might be asking yourself, why aren't teachers penalizing students for being late, or talking back, or spending most of a class period in the bathrooms?  The reason is because there is absolutely nothing we can do.  If we assign lunch detention and kids don't show up, there is no follow through or support from administration.  If we stop them in the halls while they are roaming during class, we just get eyerolls or worse.  Kids who get in "real trouble" are sent to restorative justice circles instead of being suspended as they would have been years ago.

I encourage other teachers to add on to this list.  I work in high school, so I know very little about the specifics of what's happening at the elementary level.

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I wish I knew which high school you are referring to because it sounds exactly like the high school where I teach.[/quote]

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