Chapter Eight: The Walkie-Talkie is Calling Me!

Chapter 8: The Walkie-Talkie is Calling Me

If you look closely through the dark before dawn, you can make out my neon yellow sleeveless top as I run the one-mile loop around my apartment complex over and over and over. My husband and I are training to run our first (only?!) marathon five months from now. I run not just to train, but also to think about and solve problems. The still of the night that isn’t yet day gives me the freedom to think without interruption. Today’s running ruminations are hijacked by doubt. I am questioning the effectiveness of my strategies in dealing with my staff, especially Ernie, one of my counselors. What if I am better at running in circles than I am at running a school? Self-doubt is not my usual MO, but right now I am feeling less than competent. No matter how inspiring I try to be, my faculty meetings are a disaster, no one wants to try anything new and most of my teachers don’t even want to teach. Today’s run sheds little light on my problems, it does leave me physically sore and spiritually weary.

7:00 a.m.

“All the teachers are afraid of me and I run the school like a prison camp.” At least that is what Ernie, my difficult counselor, is telling The Boss and his boss, Clyde. I am at my desk changing into my sneakers (all the better to chase you with) when my workday starts with a phone call from Fred, The Boss’s business manager, to let me know Ernie has been calling people at Ebencorp headquarters to tell them all the teachers are ready to quit and someone needs to deal with me. Fred is often a good source of inside information but he has no loyalties except to himself and, like a double agent, works both sides against each other. Fred’s facts are not suspect, just his motives.

I meet with Ernie after the 8:00 meeting and ask about his phone calls to Ebencorp. Ernie denies, denies, denies and tells me he thinks this school is great and he has no issues with me. He then tells me he is going to resign because of how Ebencorp is treating him. He says he might reconsider his resignation if he can talk with The Boss. I suggest he take a day off to think about how he really feels about working at Prospect. He leaves my portable calmly but I hear him gunning his engine and roaring down the driveway.

I have no time to ponder Ernie because Lynne says she needs to meet with me before the busses arrive and it’s important.

8:20 a.m.

Lynne is waving a stack of papers in her hands “These all came over the fax today!” She exclaims. I shrug, clearly not getting it. Lynne takes a breath and explains what I should already have known. When a principal wants a child removed from his or her school, Henry, my liaison with the public schools, makes the determination whether a transfer to an alternative school is appropriate. If he agrees with the principal, Henry then decides to which school the child will be sent. When Henry selects Prospect, his secretary faxes a referral sheet to Lynne with a few facts, child’s name, parent’s name, child’s infraction, phone number. Someone on our staff is responsible for calling the student to set up a time for him or her to come to Prospect to sign up, what we call doing “intake.” Each piece of paper in Lynne’s hand represents a new child coming to Prospect. Lynne is holding at least a dozen pages. She wants me to be aware of this onslaught. There is no time to ask why the sudden flood, but our conversation about how Stephanie will handle all the phoning and intake meetings on top of running her orientation group is interrupted by the arrival of the busses.

9:00 a.m.

Good principals greet their students when they arrive in the morning. At least, this is what I believe. I work hard to make sure I am in the parking lot when the children disembark from the busses every day. Greeting the students and running the 8:00 staff meeting are two of the few objectives I am able to meet regularly. I have other plans and goals (stop in every classroom at least once a day, conduct a teacher observation, role model a teaching skill, meet with students, talk to parents, work on budgets, write grant proposals, respond to email) but what is constant is my inability to accomplish most of these tasks. The walkie-talkie keeps calling me.

9:30 a.m.

“Ms. Smee, Marcus is missing. Do you copy?” Several of us saw Marcus in the parking lot this morning as the students lined up for class. His hair, Marcus’s mood ring, was only half braided. Fully braided Marcus is a quiet, even attentive student. But half-braided Marcus always spells trouble. Sometime after getting off the bus, we lost Marcus. His teacher Noreen, the thief, doesn’t notice his absence until after breakfast when one of Marcus’s friends asks whether Marcus got arrested again. A search ensues and Marcus is found wandering behind the school, agitated and muttering to himself. We ask where he has been. He says he was talking to Rusty, our counselor. Rusty says he hasn’t seen Marcus today. With Marcus back in the classroom, Noreen unwisely confronts him with the discrepancies in his story. Marcus calls her a stupid white bitch (his regular moniker for Noreen when he is in his unbraided mode). Noreen calls for a Deputy and says on the walkie-talkie she wants Marcus arrested for threatening her. I am able to run across campus (sneakers, remember) and arrive in time to have Marcus escorted to my office, his mother is called and she takes him home. No arrest, this time.
10:00 a.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me: the Deputy has a problem involving Tina/Natasha and Ionya.

Tina/Natasha is a white, thirteen year old girl, who used to be just Tina. Tina’s parents were terrifyingly abusive and lost custody to an aunt. In an effort to protect Tina, the aunt had her name legally changed to Natasha. Trouble is, Natasha will only respond to Tina. Name confusion is the least of her issues. Tina/Natasha likes to tease but can’t tolerate being teased. She has a wicked temper. Minor slights send her reeling into a dervish of lashing and cursing. Tina/Natasha is articulate and bright and at times can be charming, but to spend time with her is to walk through broken glass, barefoot.

We call Tina/Natasha’s aunt in for a conference during the first week of school to enlist her help in coping with the wrath of Tina/Natasha. She arrives looking like a nurse dressed in turquoise scrubs, but she says she works as a housekeeper. When Tina/Natasha joins the conference she screams that we (principal, teachers, counselors) are all a bunch of liars. Her aunt first tries to support Tina/Natasha and ask for her version of the story, but Tina/Natasha is too far gone, howling and ranting. When Tina/Natasha senses her aunt might be going to the “dark side” and believing staff, she lets loose a barrage of curses directed at her aunt. The aunt absorbs it all without comment.

That morning Tina/Natasha decided to tell fragile, black, twelve year old Ionya, that she is gay. In fact Tina/Natasha made a loud announcement in the middle of adding integers “Ionya is gay and she eats the chewed gum from under the desks.” Ionya shouted back that she isn’t gay and that she eats the gum because she wants to kill herself.

Tina/Natasha was removed from the classroom for counseling with Rusty.
Ionya was Baker Acted.

In 1971 Maxine Baker, state representative from Miami, sponsored an act to protect the mentally ill by devising a “bill of rights” that strengthens the civil and due process rights of the mentally ill. The Florida Legislature passed the Florida Mental Health Act, which took effect in 1972. It is known informally as the Baker Act and covers voluntary and involuntary admissions for the treatment of mental illnesses as well as providing for emergency services and temporary detention for evaluation. At Prospect, the Baker Act is a verb. We try to Baker Act a child if she or he makes what we believe to be reasonable threats of suicide. But it is not up to our counselors, teachers or me as the principal to determine whether to Baker Act; it is up to law enforcement. Usually the Deputy on our campus concurs with our assessment and requests a squad car to transport the child to a mental health facility.

In 2003 Herald County Deputies transported over 300 juveniles under the Baker Act; many of those juveniles were my students. Parents are notified and typically the child is observed for three days then sent home. Some of our more serious cases are sent out of town for longer stays and additional treatment since prior to 2004 Herald County didn’t have a single bed for juveniles in need of inpatient mental health services. Ionya has been Baker Acted before. Mom reminds us that Ionya is a liar and if we Baker Act her we are just falling for more of her lies and giving her exactly what she wants. We still Baker Act Ionya.

10:45 a.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me. “Ms. Smee I need you to come remove Lorayne’s tongue ring.”

Our handbook states students may only have two stud earrings, one in each ear, no hoops and no body piercings besides the ear. The staff unanimously agrees on this rule but implementation often takes more energy than they wish to exert. Rosie, the teacher who wants to be a counselor, modifies the rule to say you can have other piercings as long as staff can’t see them. Lorayne’s tongue ring is the topic of the crisis this hour. Stone sees the tongue ring, quotes policy, and tells her to remove it. Lorayne, as is her nature, spits vulgarities rudely informing Stone that Miss Rosie allows it. Now Lorayne and I are having a talk.

In the late 1990’s fashion models with dark circles under glazed eyes defined the “heroin chic look.” Lorayne could pass for one of these models. She looks much older than her fourteen years, somewhat haggard and streetwise. She explains to me the physiology of the tongue: unlike an ear, a tongue hole will close up immediately. I am dubious, I express sympathy, but tell her she needs to give me the tongue ring. After some tears and cursing she does so. I place it in an envelope, label it with her name and lock it in my safe with the other student contraband. Lorayne advises me she will have the ring back at the end of the day. When Miss Rosie confiscates items from the students SHE returns them at dismissal. I’m not Miss Rosie. The rule with confiscated items is that I hold them until a parent or guardian comes to retrieve them. This isn’t fair, Lorayne sputters, Mom can’t come get it.

Lorayne explains: The person she calls Mom is really her Grandma. Her real mother is a “crack whore” in Orlando. Her mother doesn’t know that Lorayne knows that she is a crack whore but Lorayne knows because someone who loves her very much told her this. Lorayne has to try to be good because her Grandma is going to die soon. Her grandma is 52 and has diabetes and smokes. Lorayne doesn’t know what she’ll do when Grandma dies. Lorayne confesses that she too smokes, and hates that I made a rule of no smoking on the school busses. I escort Lorayne back to class with a free anti-smoking lecture.

11:00 a.m.

For the moment the walkie-talkie isn’t calling me, so I decide to make some calls on my list. I call Claymont’s family because Claymont doesn’t have a planner. (The planner costs $5, includes the school handbook, and is in the form of a calendar so students can record assignments and teachers can write daily notes to parents.) Every student is required to buy a planner.

Thirteen-year-old Claymont, like nearly all our students, does not live with two biological parents. Claymont has dark black skin and a solid build. He lives with an aunt and uncle. When something is about to “go down” on campus, Claymont knows about it and often has had a hand in the orchestration. It is rare for Claymont himself to get in trouble. He is “the brains.”

I speak with Claymont’s aunt. She is hostile before I can even tell her why I am calling. I wonder whether it is my position, my race or my accent. I talk about the importance of a planner and she interrupts: “Claymont gets a planner when I get the money. Can’t be buying that boy every little thing he wants.”

11:20 a.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me. It’s the Deputy informing me that LaQuanda has been arrested, again. Rosie needed to send some worksheets to science teacher Tammie’s classroom. LaQuanda, now in Rosie’s room and fully recovered from her first-day-of-school-Ionya-slapping-incident, volunteers. Rosie, forgetting about the Tammie/LaQuanda situation, permits LaQuanda to go. After LaQuanda leaves the room, another student, Lenny , tells Rosie that LaQuanda brought a knife to school and plans to stab Tammie. Rosie sends an urgent walkie-talkie message. The Deputy intercepts and arrests LaQuanda. She has a knife and admits it was to “take care of Tammie.” Goodbye LaQuanda.

11:30 a.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me with more jewelry woes. “Ms.. Smee I need you to come remove Luke’s hoop earring.” Fourteen-year-old Luke is wearing his hoop earring, again. Luke, a white boy who is small for his age, wears expensive blue tinted glasses and a scowl. He talks like his cartoon “heroes”, Bevis or Butthead (I’m not sure which, but is there a difference?) and spends his out of school hours playing video games. Yesterday Luke was told to remove his hoop earring; he refused. He was told if he wore it the next day it would be confiscated. Today is the next day. Luke is wearing it and refusing to remove it. Counselor Rusty tells him he can take it off before school each morning and put it back in his ear when he gets home; his ear holes will not close during that time. Luke refuses. Rusty calls Luke’s mother. She is at work at McDonalds. Rusty wants her to speak with Luke to reason with him so he will understand this is not an issue on which he needs to take a stand. Mom curses at Rusty and refuses to tell Luke to remove the earring. Now it is my turn to call the mother. She is still at work at McDonalds. She works about 80 hours a week to support Luke and his older brother. She left an abusive spouse in Ohio. After she curses at me she tells me that the hoop is actually a stud earring because they told her that at the tattoo parlor last night. Then she says she will get Luke a note from the doctor saying he has an allergy to stud earrings. Then she tells me I will have to pay $30 for re -piercing when his ear hole closes up. Eventually she agrees to speak to Luke and tells him to remove the earring.


12:00 pm

Not all contraband is created equal. Yesterday Riley, a tall, fourteen year old white boy, was nervously fidgeting with something that looked like a balloon. He was standing next to his grandmother as she signed him in late from a court date. I saw the balloon, but did not identify it as a problem. Ah, the mark of the inexperienced principal. Balloons are cheap, easy to carry and aren’t an obvious weapon. They can also multiply. One day Riley has one balloon, the next day ten students each have pockets full of balloons; the fad spreads like chicken pox. Soon we have an epidemic of students secreting balloons into the bathroom, filling them with water and voila, instant excitement. Now the walkie-talkie is vibrating with voices on top of voices calling for a counselor, reporting water balloon fights in PE class, in the cafeteria, on the busses and even in Stone’s math class. We run a few surprise searches, confiscate all the balloons and put an end to the fun.

Before we catch our breath, rubber band powered flight is discovered. Elastics begin to appear on wrists and the arms race takes off. Simply shooting a rubber band isn’t enough. The elastics are wrapped around paperclips and folded index cards to make flying projectiles. We confiscate not only the elastics, but also the paperclips and index cards. Fortunately when we wrote our code of conduct and listed contraband, one member of my faculty had the prescience to add the sentence “At any time Prospect staff has the right to determine anything is contraband.” None-the-less, next year’s contraband list will specifically include balloons and elastics.

12:30 pm

Athena from Sun Trust Bank has stopped by to see me. My husband and I have decided we want to build a home in Lakeboro. We apply to Sun Trust Bank for a mortgage. Although my husband is mostly in New York and I am right here in town, he handles most of the communication with the bank because I don’t have a spare moment. But from time to time there is paperwork to be signed. Athena called me at work last week to set up a time so I can come in and give her my signatures. As we talk, Athena, notices my profession, (it’s listed on the loan application forms) and says: “It must be hard for the principal to leave the school. Why don’t I swing by your school with these papers. My lunch hour is 12:30-1:30, will that be a good time?” So now the bank is coming to me! Athena arrives just after 12:30. I sign the forms and she is off leaving me to marvel at how she just delivered a quality of customer service the likes of which New Yorkers can only dream about.

1:00 p.m.

Principals are supposed to observe teachers. I like to observe teachers and I feel it is a valuable and worthwhile use of my time. It permits me to give concrete feedback and coaching. But the walkie-talkie is the enemy of observations. I have been trying to do an informal, unannounced observation in Stone’s classroom all morning. After lunch I finally get the chance. When I enter he is sitting at his desk writing in planners while the students cavort – tossing two footballs across the room, looking at car magazines, writing on the chalkboard. Every now and then he looks up and yells at them. I observe no teaching or learning. Before I have a chance to talk with Stone or demonstrate some other teaching techniques, the walkie-talkie calls me to the Boys room, I make an appointment to talk later with Stone and leave the classroom in the unproductive state in which I found it.

1:20 p.m.

I head to the Boy’s room. This is not my favorite place; it always smells. The custodians claim the urine has seeped deep into the cinderblocks and no amount of cleaning can get it out. The six classrooms in the cinderblock building share one boy’s room and one girl’s room (our portable classrooms have their own bathrooms). We can’t let our students use the bathroom unescorted, therefore whole class bathroom breaks three to four times a day are necessary. Today, during the mid-afternoon break, Neeley’s class discovers a strange young man in the boy’s bathroom. He is supposedly a crack addict who used to attend school here. The Deputy and I arrive on the scene and the Deputy chases him off.

1:45 p.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me. Noreen wants help with her class. I observe her students walking across campus. Noreen, like many of my teachers, does not insist on correct line protocol: silence, arm’s length apart, hands behind back. I compliment those teachers who make any attempt. Her students resist not only the line protocol, but also the uniform policy. Noreen is unable or unwilling to enforce either set of rules. The school uniform consists of a navy blue collared polo shirt to be worn tucked into blue jeans or khakis (shorts or pants or skirt). I see Noreen’s girls rolling up their shirts to show the top of their thong underpants and rolling down their collars to reveal their cleavage. Noreen usually plays blind to avoid confrontations, but in our morning meeting today I emphasized the responsibility of the teachers to enforce all our rules especially related to lines and uniforms. Noreen wants me to be the heavy and chastise her students. As I approach Noreen’s class, I don’t have to open my mouth since the students know the rules and who will and will not enforce them. When Noreen’s students see me heading towards them, there is a shuffling as shirts and collars are unrolled, shirts are tucked in and the jumble of students forms into a straight line.

2:00 p.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me. “Tina/Natasha is AWOL.”
Rosie has been running a counseling group on anger. She tells the students they need to work on containing curse words inside their heads rather than speaking them. “Thinking a cuss word won’t get you in trouble; saying it aloud will.” Torrey raises her hand to ask a question but before she can speak, Tina/Natasha is out of her seat and screeching at Rosie. “You fucking bitch, I don’t need to listen to none of your bullshit. You ain’t my goddamned mother.” In mid tirade Tina/Natasha charges out the door. The class is momentarily stunned but Claymont eases the tension: “Miss Rosie, I bet you’re cussing in your head right now. I bet you’re thinking LOTS of cuss words!” Rosie smiles, “I might be, but you’ll never know!” Meanwhile I’m half-way across campus when I see Tina/Natasha heading into Rusty’s office. No need to break into a sweat this time.

2:30 p.m.

The walkie-talkie is calling me. Stephanie, the orientation leader, asks me to come to the orientation classroom. She explains the boys in her room have been calling Tyryona “Dollar Girl” all day. Listening to Stephanie I am reminded that this morning I saw boys’ heads hanging out bus windows shouting “Yo dollah girl, lookit, I gotta dollah.” I was distracted at the time and ignored the taunts not fully realizing they were hooting at Tyryona. Tyryona, a thirteen-year-old black girl, wants to be an actress and even when angered, she manages to keep her temper and smile her butter-melting grin. Unlike so many of my students, Tyryona doesn’t have that lean and hungry look (the problem of childhood obesity in America is not reflected in my student population; I have maybe two students who are overweight). She’s not overweight, but she doesn’t look scrawny either. Stephanie explains the problem with Tyryona. She just started here two days ago but rumor is that on the way home on the bus yesterday, Tyryona masturbated Luis and Claymont for $1 each.

Stephanie continues saying that yesterday Tyryona performed a lap dance on a student in orientation. It is unclear to me when Stephanie noticed this and how quickly she stopped it; so many questions and so little time. I leave the orientation class and ask Shasta, my transportation coordinator, to remind Quentin, Tyryona’s bus driver, to seat the girls in the front of the bus. My students brag that their assigned seats are a joke and as soon as the busses leave the school, the drivers let them sit wherever they want. I phone Tyryona’s guardian, who asks to come meet with me right away. I agree.

By 3:15, Tyryona’s guardian, Beryl is here. Beryl tells me she is upset we didn’t call sooner. Then she tells me a little about Tyryona. Tyryona was living with her mother and some men, related and unrelated. Tyryona was sexually abused and generally neglected; Mom has an alcohol problem. When Mom was arrested Tyryona was going to go “into the system” but Beryl, a friend of Tyryona’s mother, stepped-in and took Tyryona. Beryl isn’t receiving money from the state of Florida nor is she a blood relation. She is unsure how long she can keep Tyryona. She has two little children of her own and her husband is not supportive of Tyryona’s presence. Beryl offers to pick up Tyryona from school for a few days to avoid any more $1 jobs. I walk her to the orientation classroom to get Tyryona.

Tyryona inspires me to contact the health department for material on adolescents and sexuality. When I call, I am introduced to Mallory who organizes and runs free abstinence training. I am dubious about the efficacy of that approach with my students, but we schedule sessions to start next week.

4:00 p.m.

On Tuesday afternoons I hold a staff meeting from 4:00-5:00. This gives us a chance to work on those projects and problems we can’t handle in our fifteen-minute morning meetings. Today’s meeting does not go well. Stone makes sarcastic comments under his breath about his coworkers, his students and about me. Stone is the most hostile of my employees. He has two responses to all ideas: “What I need in my classroom is a cattle prod” and “Cover the kid in honey and put him on an ant hill.” While Stone sharpens his tongue, Rosie complains about all the changes and not enough prep time. Meanwhile Ernie fumes about my Marcus arrest lecture and Rusty talks loudly, getting on everybody’s nerves. Noreen is upset that two students keep calling her a bitch. Tammie complains that the school day is way too long. Tammie is having trouble with LaQuanda, the graffiti-writing foster child. She says LaQuanda hates her and she hates LaQuanda! Rosie offers to take LaQuanda. I change LaQuanda’s homeroom assignment to Rosie’s class. Of all my staff only Neeley is silent and alas, this is probably not a good sign.

5:00 p.m.

Officially my workday ends at 4:00, but I‘m rarely able to leave on time. The walkie-talkie keeps me running most of the day, leaving no time to read email, work on reports and grants, return phone calls or do the other 101 things principals do in their offices.

After the students and teachers depart I work on the Memorial Hospital grant. Ebencorp expects Prospect principals to obtain grant money so they can use the public school contract money to pay debts to Ebencorp. The actual writing of a grant isn’t difficult, but it requires research and is time consuming. Mel, my predecessor, obtained the Memorial Hospital grant but I can’t receive the money this year because of Mel’s poor reporting last year. The grant representative is very nice. She simply wants me to explain how the money was spent last year (prior to my arrival) before she will free up the money for this year. $61,000 is riding on my ability to do this correctly.

Lynne, always organized, has some receipts, but Mel “fudged” a lot of expenses and didn’t keep records. The grant was designed to decrease drug and alcohol use among our students but Mel used the money for salaries without defining how these staff members’ work helped on the substance abuse front.

7:00 p.m.

I have had enough of the grant writing and my growling stomach reminds me of another item on my lengthy to do list: order candy. Plain and peanut M&M’s, Snicker Bars and Skittles. I order hundreds of bags to sell at our open house next month. Rex Stewart, my mentor, tells me this is a great way to make some money for field trips or to buy books. I’m a little uncomfortable from a health perspective but I feel desperate to obtain some books. Right now, our school has a library without any books in it.

I was going to leave as soon as I faxed the candy order, but I feel the need to work on hiring more teachers. I spend over two hours calling prospective employees and manage to find three who are interview worthy. When I get back to my apartment, I am too tired to open a bag of salad and microwave Lean Cuisine.

10:30 p.m.

I pour a bowl of Product 19 and lie on my bed digesting cereal and the day’s events.
My predecessor Mel focused on counseling the children. Under his guidance, there were few academic lessons, lots of basketball, playground time and therapy sessions. Mel’s degree is in counseling and therapy, not education. Am I wrong to shun the therapeutic approach? Am I neglecting Maslow? Do my students need to talk about their problems before they can conjugate verbs? On the other hand, their problems are so many, so horrendous, and require so many resources we don’t have. In the meantime their basic reading and math skills are pathetic. I believe we can accelerate their learning and give them a rich education while applying band-aids to their gaping emotional wounds.

In the blurry world just before sleep I see the faces of Marcus, Ionya, LaQuanda, Tina/Natasha, Tyryona, Lorayne and Luke. Their needs are so many and time is so short.