Mrs. Scribe Has Left The Building

This is a guest post by The Scholastic Scribe.

This just in to the Scholastic Scribe newsroom…

Mrs. Scribe has finally lost it. After one too many inservices, smarty pants Cherubs & general malaise, she’s finally gone & done it. She’s Mad as Hell & She Might Not Be Able to Take It Anymore.

A little background, if you please. Your Humble Scribe trained as a professional journalist. I labored in the trenches, as it were, for what seemed like eons, before I got into this teaching janx. The 4th Estate is no stranger to moi.

I’m used to disorder. Mayhem. Hell-for-leather, whisky-sodden, ink-stained wretches, who’d rather cuss and spit tobacco juice my way than dispense the time of day. But with the New World Order at Our Humble High School these days, things are just. too. neat.

Nothing like pigeon-holing our problems to urge a cynic like me to the barricades.

It started with the Pep Rallies. Mandatory attendance. Forced spirit. Enforced camaraderie. The idea is One Big Happy Family, I guess.

Then there were the plasma TVs. Purchased with leftover Student Government Association funds, these expensive behemoths broadcast our announcements in various parts of the building on an endless PowerPoint loop. No more Morning & Afternoon PA Announcements. No more gleeful, inane, goofy, off-the-wall teenage humor. Can you say Big Brother?

The kids call them the Silent Announcements. I call them the Unannouncements. No one ever knows when practice starts or if Mommy dropped the forgotten lunch off in the Main Office. Just silence. On an uninformative, televised loop. Doesn’t Principal Man know that no one reads these days?

Of course, our trusty PA was not silent for long. Principal Man, natch, sees fit to interrupt “instructional time” several times a day with dire warnings and pompous pronouncements. The man seriously loves to hear the sound of his own voice.

It’s enough to make a gal wanna move to the beach and spend her time collecting pretty shells.

But then I think about what attracted me to Our Humble High School in the first place. The kids who labor to put out an exceptional school newspaper. The kids who do the same on the yearbook staff, fighting exceptional odds every day. The kids who spend their time hanging out on the classroom couch, with no thoughts of ever doing any work at all.

I guess I’ll put my Howard Beale imitation on ice, for now. Teaching’s not such a bad gig. I can ignore the inane inservices & the pompous principal for a couple more years-I think.