Mile High!

I'm sitting on a Delta plane online! The pilot just announced we are heading into sunny, 83 degree weather. If only my battery was fully charged. Oh well. Sorry, no picture. I don't want to waste my battery time looking for one.

Here is a post I wrote sitting in the airport, waiting for my flight. I wrote it in answer to a commenter on a previous post regarding data analysis and Mr. AP's teacher bashing.

Ms. Nervous had reasons to be nervous. Mr. AP was always on her case about something. He put a letter in her file when chastised she passed a child with a 63 average, he chastised her for failing a child with a 72 average, he bitched when her stats were low and he accused her of being too easy when her stats were too high. He wrote a counseling memo when she arrived in class one day (out of a 20+ year career 3 minutes late.) In fact, Mr. AP did not even like the way she breathed and threatened a “U” rating because of this.

One semester, when Ms. Nervous felt she was going to have a nervous breakdown, she applied and received a sabbatical. Her classes that semester were especially trying and she could not take another minute of them or Mr. AP. Mr. AP was happy to see her go and immediately hired one of his precious teeny boppers to take her place.

Ms. Teeny Bopper found the same problems and more with these classes. The only difference was Mr. AP wanted Ms. Teeny Bopper to succeed so he removed the three worst offenders from each class. Surprise, surprise, the class began behaving and Ms. Teeny Bopper had a very good first semester.

This wouldn’t have been so bad except for the fact that Mr. AP began each and every meeting praising the Teeny Bopper’s control while he bashed the veteran teacher. No mention was ever made of his intervention on her behalf and it was only after Ms. Nervous returned from sabbatical that the truth was discovered.

Can you guess who got these difficult students? If you guessed another teeny bopper, guess again. If you guessed me, guess again because I happened not to be teaching the same subject. If you used your last guess to pick another veteran teacher, you win!

Yep, statistics say it all and if the same teacher gets the same bad results over and over again, it must be the teacher. After all, no one gets all the same type of students term after term after term.