Is This a Failing School?

In 2011, a former graduate student of mine ran an Internet search for the term “failing school.” It was almost never used until the mid-1990s. Then each year, it appeared with greater frequency. After the passage of No Child Left Behind, it become a cliche: Any school with low test scores was “a failing school.” The term “failing school” is especially useful to those who want to close them and turn their building over to charter operators, which may not accept the same students.

A reader writes:

The term “failing schools” is a weapon. I have worked in a public school in the south Bronx for almost 20 years. Our students come from poor, often stressed, families. Many are English Language Learners. Most are socially and academically “behind”. And I love seeing them every day. We LOOK like a failing school when you judge us through the prism of standardized testing, but when my kids win the Thurgood Marshall Junior Mock Trial Competition, or come back to tell me about their college experiences, or stare in wonder at the city in which they live but don’t really know while we take them on field trips, or beg me to continue reading To Kill a Mockingbird or Of Mice and Men instead of turning to test prep material, I KNOW we are not a failing school. Eva Moskowitz has chosen our building for her next conquest, and we’ve been told that no matter what we do, “it’s a done deal”. Need a laugh? The vote is scheduled to take place deep in Chinatown! How many of our parents do you think will be able to show up for that? My kids are not failures, no matter how many times they are told so by the VERY PEOPLE WHO RUN THE EDUCATION SYSTEM IN THIS CITY.

It’s humiliating and soul crushing to be a teacher in an inner city school. The people who should be getting accolades for working in such places are beaten down instead. I’ll go to work tomorrow and discuss the symbolism of the objects that Boo Radley leaves in the tree in To Kill a Mockingbird. My kids will ask great questions and make wonderful observations. Many of them will score poorly on the ELA exam in 2 weeks. They, and I, will be labeled failures. It’s so very, very sad.