How am I Liking Them Apples? To be honest, I'm not liking them at all.

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world" - Nelson Mandela

I've been a fan of the tacky holiday sweater fad ever since the kitschy trend began a decade or so ago. The teacher sweater thing, however, always bothered me, except on days when my colleagues and I came to school as substitute teachers fashioning ourselves in dorky teacher clothing. We did this tongue-in-cheek, making fun of the careers we chose for ourselves and the ways we got positioned by society. We knew we were professionals, so the campiness was sardonic wit meant to celebrate the excellence we chose for our lives.

I am reflecting on 'teacher idenity' because in the classroom I was the sort of teacher who lost sleep over ways to better accomplish the impossible work in America's urban public schools. No matter how many degrees, how many books, how much professional development, and how much luck, I couldn't accomplish everything I hoped to do with a group of students. I feel the same is true, today. If a kid was failing to attend school, didn't turn in homework, grew disgruntled with his peers, or looked at me with sad eyes, I knew I needed to bring my A game to help him. There were no ticker-tape parades for such work - no golden apples - but there was always the thank-you that came at the end of the year. This was what I cherished before top-down management arrived and Sauron-panoptica began its teacher surveillance and scrutiny.

Yesterday, Diane Ravitch wrote on how Teach for America is receiving charity donations this holiday season because of their corporate ties, partnerships, and collaboration: Is TFA Your Favorite Charity? I read her post after spending two days doing professional development in urban school districts: one that was K-8 and another that was a high school. In both locations I witnessed passionate, dedicated, devoted and hardworking teachers doing everything in their power to succeed with students. Both serve nearly 100% free and reduced lunch and repeatedly fall in the bottom percentile of state achievement reports. Their "high needs" stature, which is true, and the faltering literacy and math skills, that are also true, are not an indication of the hard work and perseverance the staff in both locations puts forth every day. They deserve extra funding - not TFA. We should be investing in the professional educators already in these schools and not the experimental silliness of inexperienced do-gooders who are looking for a two-year commitment on their resumes.

I am trying to figure out the logic behind Teach For America. When I first learned about the organization, I thought it was designed to bring highly educated graduates from rigorous, ivy-league institutions into underperforming schools to help close achievement gaps. Now, I reading that TFA is actually a charity for wealthy individuals who want to teach. Let me restate that. TFA is a charity for the wealthy (it is postmodernism and late capitalism at its worst - or best...depending on the angles we look at it).  The design of TFA has the following logic:

• Because some students attend more elite institutes of higher education than others, they are superior to students who do Masters degrees in education (or even doctorates)
• A five-week training program (arguably based on the Amway model) trumps research-based curriculum and practices that are integrated within Graduate Schools of Education that are held accountable to accreditation programs.
• Those accepted to TFA (who often attend schools and universities that cost $30,000 or more a year+) deserve financial handouts.
• Two years of commitment with limited support and training is all it takes to change the nation's schools: experience, commitment, and sustainable investments are unnecessary.
• Young people who arrive to TFA are, by virtue of their birth and privileges, placed in schools where children need the BEST teachers. More likely than not, they are college graduates who have benefited from traditional curricula that upholds the cultural traditions and histories of people just like them. At the same time, they are sent - as missionaries - to work in failing schools with curriculum that traditionally fails to represent the cultural identities of heterogeneous populations.  
• The Federal government supports this.

It is institutional racism gone amok. 

We, as a country, are talking out of both sides of our mouths. Wait. That's not true. National leaders are talking out of both sides of their mouths. How can they claim they are working to fix the disparities in American schools yet send undertrained, naive youngsters to do the professional work that ALL students in the United States need? Would TFA be recruited to affluent school districts? No. Why? Parents would not stand for that. They seek intelligent, seasoned and professional educators in their district. Yet, for the poor, TFA suffices. That's social injustice and simply wrong.  

I have been an urban school educator for over eighteen years. I am man with two Masters degrees, a doctorate, training through the Annenberg Institute, teaching experiences in the U.S., Japan and Denmark, additional coursework from Cambridge University and the Bread Loaf School of English, and 18 years of urban classroom experience. I have benefited from the National Writing Project, the National Council of Teachers of English, the Critical Friends Group, the Literacy Research Association, and several state organizations that support best practices in teaching reading, writing, thinking, and speaking. I feel students deserve all the excellence we can give them. They deserve better than TFA post-bachelor vacationers on holiday for two years before they return to President Snow's Capitol and comforts. I'm thanking Diane Ravitch for acting as Katniss and demonstrating that we can fight with finesse, strength, intelligence, and commitment to exploit the nonsense of our nation's Teaching Games. 

Yes, I've met a few excellent TFA teachers, but they are the exception and far from the norm. They admit they do not receive the support necessary from their organization to sustain them in the profession. So what are we doing? Why is this allowed to happen?

There has never been a post-colonial period in history and the Imperialism of the 18th century continues on the TFA road of good intention. Yet, TFA is a charity and teachers who have dedicated their lives to the youth of America are no longer professionals. Our nation's poor - 'uncivilized' natives in the core of postindustrial cities - need salvation from the TFA elite.

The Gods Must Be Crazy.

Ubuntu, Mandela. Rest In Peace. Look over the foolishness of our species and help us to do what we can to make the world a better, more equitable place. Guide us from above as you did from your days on earth below.