Fidgety: It's a Bird, It's a Plane, No, It's "Teacher on Summer Vacation!"

July 18, 2008

It's a Bird, It's a Plane, No, It's "Teacher on Summer Vacation!"

"So, How are you enjoying your summer?". As a teacher, we hear this question all of the time. This question usually follows with the inevitable, "You are so lucky to have off". "Yes", I think to myself. It is one of the reasons that I became a teacher. In the summer, I am, "Teacher On Summer Vacation" or "T.O.S.V."... (Not "Rubber Room Inmate Enjoying Time-Off") -what an empowering feeling. For most teachers, this means a relief from writing lesson plans, grading tests, freedom from the harassment of inexperienced administration, rotten kids(not all) and their rotten parents who are in extreme denial. For an inmate like me, summer is a time when I get to be a 'real' teacher- doing what 'real' teachers do.

Teachers need summer like fish need water. The summer recharges and breathes new life to the impoverished spirit of a 'June' teacher. In the past, I have enjoyed many free and liberating months while others continue to trudge miserably to and from their more prestigious, higher paying jobs.

This summer, however, has brought new meaning to 'free time and liberation'. For me, it means, not having to report to the Rubber Room until 'school' as most of us know it, resumes at the end of August. I am "T.O.S.V!". I have to keep reminding myself of this. When you have been confined to sitting still all day in a crowded room with the daily task of doing nothing particular except punching the clock on time, the arrival of summer is *(^_^)* freeing beyond comprehension. For two whole months I get to experience what it feels to be ungoverned. I get to do what real teachers do. I get to sleep late, go to the beach, soak up the sun, drink iced coffee, tend to my garden, shop in empty stores, speak loudly on my cell phone and drive on traffic-free roads. I can loiter as long as I want in a restaurant, in a bathroom(not that I want to)or anywhere that I choose to be, undocumented and untimed.

As I reap the benefits of summer, I can almost pretend that everything else in my life is "status quo". I can freely mingle and interact with children in my neighborhood. I can go to a playground and observe the untainted innocence of children at play. I can enjoy the beauty of the day as god designed it. Afterall, I am, "Teacher On Summer Vacation." That's all I really need to be right now.

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Origin of The Rubber Room...(From Rubberroommovie.com)

Exact specifics as to when, why and how The Rubber Room came into being are next to impossible to come by, although wild speculation abounds. The likelihood is that, rather than being consciously created by any one person or group, The Rubber Room slowly but surely developed over a period of years through a process of trial and error, whereby teachers deemed unfit to remain in the classroom where "reassigned" to the nearest empty and available administrative space.
The term "The Rubber Room" appears nowhere in the formal legislative code governing New York City schools. When a New York City educator is sent to The Rubber Room, that educator is not openly or specifically told that he or she will be going to a place called "The Rubber Room". Moreover, if you telephoned an official in the New York City school system and asked for directions to "The Rubber Room", you may very well likely receive a response, possibly masked in faux confusion, telling you that there is no such place called "The Rubber Room". Nevertheless, "the room" undoubtedly exists and, because it has no official name, those three provocative and inflammatory words, "The Rubber Room", make up the default epithet by which it has come to be known, even by high-ranking school officials, many of whom find the phrase distasteful.
The exact meaning behind the words "The Rubber Room" is a topic of hot debate, particularly for occupants of The Rubber Room itself, some arguing that it is a reference to a padded room where mentally ill patients are placed, others proposing it is a room where once normal people are slowly and steadily driven crazy, still others believing it to be simply a generic allusion to a prison cell. There are even some -- more than one might initially suspect -- who claim to have been present during the exact moment when the phrase was coined, or even to have coined it themselves. Aside from etymological differences, however, almost everyone agrees that "The Rubber Room" is a pejorative term used to describe a room where New York City teachers are sent, usually involuntarily, to sit idle day after day while still collecting their salaries, often for months and sometimes for years at a time.
Over the years, many have made efforts to eradicate The Rubber Room entirely. For example, in March 2002, then Chancellor Harold Levy vowed to close The Rubber Room after becoming frustrated with a particular case, and in January 2004 Randi Weingarten, UFT President, called for an unconditional end to all of New York's Rubber Rooms. Despite best efforts, however, "the room" remains. http://www.rubberroommovie.com/

Do not believe...

Do not believe because you read it in a book,
Do not believe because you saw it on television,
Do not believe because science says so,
Do not believe because a famous person says so,
Do not believe because a wise person says so,
Do not believe because a wise person believes it,
Do not believe because your best friend believes it,
Do not believe because everyone else believes it,
Do not believe because others have believed it for a thousand years,
Do not believe because you've heard it many times before,
Do not believe because you are told you must,
Do not believe because others expect you to,
Do not believe because it gets you accepted
Do not believe because it will make your parents happy,
Do not believe because it will get you noticed,
Do not believe because you want to believe,
Do not believe because you can't afford not to,
Do not believe because it helps you cope,
Do not believe because you'd go mad if you didn't,
Do not believe because you must believe something
Do not believe because there's nothing else to believe,
Do not believe because it feels good to believe,
Do not believe because it makes sense,
Do not believe because your eyes tell you it is so,
Do not believe because it is your own experience,
Do not believe because it feels true,
Do not believe because you know it is true,
Do not believe any of this, Believe only that you are,
And do not even believe that,
For that is beyond belief.

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