Back to the controversy of whether or not the Obama Administration bungled in its earnestness to give face time to the President during school hours. I seem to hear more about the "outraged parents" whose children were "deprived," if not by racist, then by partisan school officials. What I don't hear enough of (why are they silent?) is the reaction of teachers themselves. What did they think of the administration's suggested lesson plans?
As a teacher at the community college level, I enjoy a certain amount of autonomy and independence. I am at once both principal and instructor of my classroom. There's very little oversight, other than a five-year evaluation in which someone (either a fellow English professor or the head of the English department) sits in on a class, takes notes, sends me out of the room and distributes student evaluations, and then meets with me later to discuss her observations and give me a printout of the student comments. I'm not told which text to use for my classes. I'm provided information about the standards my course is expected to meet but given freedom and latitude in how to meet those standards. I am gloriously free from the "hot breath" (down my neck) of oversight.
How would I feel, then, if some higher-up--a department head, say, or worse, the college president--sent out an announcement saying he had prepared a speech and would like all professors to air the speech to their classes, and oh, by the way, there are accompanying lesson plans as a follow up assignment. Which of us--be honest now--would actually welcome such an intrusion on our space? Remember, this is my carefully crafted world. My "lesson plans" are constructed around certain outcomes, specific objectives. To what degree would the administrator's speech and supplemental lessons fit within that construct?
This, to me, is what's at the heart of my aversion to the Obama Administration's recent foray into the classroom. Those who are protesting or crying "foul" over school boards' decisions to delay or not air the speech seem to assume that classroom teachers all around the country welcomed the intrusion. I can't imagine why they would welcome it, especially if you mentally substitute "Principal Smith" for "President Obama." Would classroom teachers really welcome the idea of their school principal "suggesting" lesson plans as a follow up to their motivational speech? I'll go on record of saying, Of course not. It's inappropriate, it's intrusive, and it's insulting, just as it was when the Department of Education did it.
My best and only reaction was then and still is: A firm but polite "Butt out."
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