Drinking alone is an interesting phenomena.
Pretty much frowned upon by society, I’ve come to enjoy heading to a bar, ordering-up a cold one and just listening.
Not to say that I am eavesdropping per se, but while watching the game and BS’ing with the bartender, I tend to overhear a conversation or two.
This very thing occurred the other night, as I sat at my laptop, IPA by my side, I overheard the table next to me chatting. The word ‘Western’ caught my attention. It appeared the folks next to me were WWU alums like myself.
I went back to my surfing the net and watching the NBA Finals pre-game show. But I then overheard that the WWU kids were teachers. Again, this peaked my interest as I had gone to Western to become a teacher. Disclosure: I changed my major after I realized I didn’t like kids very much.
While I thought, ‘Wow I have a lot in common with these kids,’ the conversation took a turn for the worse.
One of the teachers, a self-described 2nd year middle school teacher said, “I am hoping to get assigned to a low-income school, where I can make a difference.”
I took offense.
Having attended a ‘low-income’ (read: minority) school myself, I am perhaps overly sensitive to the ‘great white hope phenomena’ that seems to engulf over-privileged white kids who want to ‘save the ghetto.’
I was admittedly hyper-sensitive on this particular day as I had just seen a story on the Seattle Times web site noting that multiple eastside high schools were among the top 100 best in the country…and one of the first comments left was “Where is Rainier Beach? LOL” (Rainier Beach is my alma mater.)
While I have no problem with anyone who has chosen to teach, I do have an issue with someone who has a superhero complex.
If you want to teach, you teach. Regardless of where the job happens to be.
The ghetto doesn’t need saviors. It needs schools/opportunities on par with those in the suburbs.
If the challenge of the job attracts good teachers, then great. But I doubt the sincerity of teachers who are in it for the glory. They are there for themselves, not the kids.
I came across a couple of these ‘saviors’ when I was a student, and you know where they are now? Not in the trenches, saving the ‘hood. They boned-out after a couple of years. When they realized the accolades and book-deals weren’t coming.
To the superheros I say- “Good riddance, feel free to stay on the Eastside.”
The ghetto doesn’t need that kind of charity.
2 comments:
Interesting take yo, it makes me think. Maybe if it paid more we could get better teachers in tha hood, regardless of their white liberal guilt complex.
The motivation is sound for these 'superheros' but, in the words of Naughty By Nature, "if you have never been to the ghetto, stay the f... out of the ghetto, because wouldn't understand the ghetto." Well-meaning white liberals (like myself) generally get burned by the attempts to jump-in head first armed with nothing but good intentions. I wish I could see more people from 'the ghetto' heading back to teach where they would undoubtedly have more success than their Bellevue-born counterparts.
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