The day in the Life of a RIFFED DCPS Special Educator

This article was originally posted in the DCUM Forum thread "229 Teachers RIFed, see DC Wire for full story". It is being republished here with the permission of the author, who has chosen to remain anonymous.

Most of yesterday was a normal day for me, a third year special education teacher. I wake up at 5 am. After getting up, getting ready, and feeding my four month old baby, I check my DCPS email, respond to a question about a student, and enter grades from the day before. Everything I need to do online I do at home in the early morning, because I don't have internet access at school.

I take the metro to Anacostia and then walk the mile to the high school, arriving to work at 7:30. On the way in I see the assistant principal who tells me that there will be 10 students added to my caseload of 20 and I should consult with their general education teachers about their progress. I go to my classroom and prep. I set up learning stations for my group of diverse first period learners. Some will be doing a math activity, others a reading activity for the first 20 minutes of class. All teachers are then called to a meeting. We are told that DCPS has lost their contract with Hawk One Security, and therefore today there will be no security guards. All teachers will need to give up their planning periods to man the halls.

I go back to teach my first period, a special education resource class. After students work in their learning stations, we read from the book, The Pact, a book about high school students from inner city New Jersey, who make a pact to go to college and become doctors. As we read I demonstrate the technique of asking questions to monitor comprehension. Many of the questions I ask are different than the questions my students ask, and we have a meaningful conversation about how the different perspectives we bring to reading shapes the way we read. The students seemed to be engaged in the book, which pleases me. I have spent my own money (about $200) to make sure that all students have their own copy. At the end of the class I remind students about their essays which are due on Monday and we do our end of the week raffle. Students win tickets for the raffle when they hand in homework, are on task, participate well, etc.

Second period I go to my Algebra II inclusion class. In this class I am supporting the general education teacher to meet the needs of all the students. In the beginning of the period I assist the students who need help, and then I pull a student who needs more individualized attention. This student I've been working with for three years. Before he came to Anacostia, he was at another school and he made almost all D's and F's. His grades now are B'c and C's. He has improved a lot, but he still faces challenges dealing with frustration. Earlier this week I had had to call his uncle in for a behavior conference. The uncle talked to his nephew about his behavior, and told him that it was important that he respect me, because I had been working with him for so long, and was like family to them. The student apologized for his behavior. It's because of students like these that I love(d) teaching.

Next class is English IV inclusion. For the first half of the class I assist students who need help with a grammar lesson on semi-colons. I then teach a mini-lesson on reading strategies. The behavior during this class is not good, so after the class, during my lunch, I brainstorm ideas with my co-teacher on how we can improve behavior next week.

Second half of lunch – a student comes to me for help with reading. He is another student I have worked with for three years. In the beginning he would not come to my class, as he was embarrassed about being 'in special education.' Slowly we have built a relationship and he now participates during class, and comes for extra help. Today we review vowel sounds and I tell him I am impressed by the progress he has made.

Fourth period is my planning period, which today is taken up by hall monitoring. I monitor the halls, telling students to get in class, and also stop by general education teachers to check in on the progress of students on my caseloads.

The only thing atypical about my day was the ending. At 3:15 an administrator sees me in the hall and says she needs to escort me to Room 102. In Room 102 another administrator reads from a script informing me that my position had been cut. I am to leave work, take all my belongings, and not report back. According to the letter I am given, a competitive level documentation form was used to determine who would be cut. School needs, relevant, significant contributions, and experience, and length of service were all considered. I am not given a copy of this documentation and I have a hard time understanding how they decided to cut me. Last year I received "exceeds expectations" on my end of the year evaluation. This year we have all new administrators. An administrator has only been in my classroom once this year, for less than five minutes. Furthermore, an administrator never once talked to me about what I was doing in my resource class or inclusion classes.

Before leaving, I go back to my classroom to collect belongings and say goodbye. In the hallways I meet other RIFFED teachers: An art teacher, a music teacher, a math teacher. There are probably more that I didn't see or hear about. I run into a SPED teacher, who is in his second year, and has also been RIFFED. Our school had been reconstituted last year, so we were a few of the only returning special education teachers. With us gone, the department is now made up almost entirely of first year Teach for America teachers.

As I walk to the metro I have many emotions. I am angry at the system. For more than two years I have worked so hard, invested so much, and for what? I am also worried about losing the income and health insurance. My husband and my baby are both on my health plan. How am I going to find another job in the middle of school year? Finally, I am sad for my students. I hope they know I didn't quit, and I hope they know I care about them and believe in them.

-- anonymous