The Worst Day of Testing, Ever

After so many years teaching, some memories remain sharp even after the sandpaper of time wears them down. One of the rewarding things about teaching is having interns; it’s a chance to see the latest and freshest ideas coming out of the colleges. It’s easy to get in a rut when it comes to teaching, so I welcome these newbies to the profession with open arms. I’ve had good ones, I have bad ones, and I’ve had ones that just had the worst luck. One year, I thought he was going to melt down.

It back in the day when we had HSCT testing, the predecessor to FSA and FCAT and follower of the GTAT and the functional literacy test (the “funky lit”). This happened well before the online format became fashionable (and possible), so all tests were paper and pencil, and students tested in actual rooms instead of computer labs and media centers. I had a second-career intern that spring, Mr. Bastable, and he was doing a terrific job that semester. Since we taught freshmen that year, our testing group consisted of freshmen, and they straggled in, one by one, and took their assigned places. Pencils were sharpened; desktops were emptied; educational posters on the walls were covered up, wills to live left outside the door. We were ready.

By law, I had to remain in the classroom because only those certified are allowed to proctor the tests. I supposed all that teacher training prepared me to read directions and stare at kids more adequately. I had Mr. B read the sterile directions, and I stayed in there as an extra set of eyes for the darlings. These directions are uniform throughout the state, and it’s hard not to read text that makes you sound like you’re reading the instructions for a ride at Busch Gardens. “Please keep your arms and legs inside the tram at all times and stay seated until we reach a full and complete stop.” Once the students started, all we had to do was watch them and make sure they didn’t cheat or throw up (which had its own protocol of having the administrator gather up the “damaged” test, placing and sealing it in a plastic bag, and mailing it back to Tallahassee. I’m not kidding.)

I watched one half of the room, and Mr. B watched the other. On my side, I watched two boys finish this mammoth test in five minutes, and then put their heads down on their desks. To have finished in five minutes would be a sign that I was in the very presence of a genius. That, or of an idiot. I placed my bet on the latter. I walked over to one of them and gently shook his shoulder.

“Are you sure you’re done? We have 110 minutes left.”

“Nah, I’m good,” and back down went his head.

I moved over to the other one. “Would you like to go back and check your answers?” Having grades like these would hurt our school’s test average.

“I’m done. Leave me alone,” and he, too, joined his comrade in Slumberville. Now I was left with this conundrum: I knew they Christmas-treed their tests. Do I inform the test coordinator? Are the tests invalidated? Should I throw water on their faces to wake them up? I called the coordinator, gave her the names of the boys, and put that decision in her hands. This was well beyond my pay grade.

About an hour into the test, I started to smell something….well, off. It was unpleasant and pervasive, so I strolled around the room to see if I could determine the source. It’s a known fact that kids fart under stress. As to the layout of my room, I was one of the lucky teachers who had a sink in her room; it’s so nice to rinse off dishes and refill my coffee pot right there. I looked into the sink and saw murky water gurgling up and filling the bottom. Much to my alarm, I also saw that it was slowly rising. As in, “Ohmygod this is going to overflow!” kind of rising. I looked at Mr. Bastable, I looked at the sink. Armageddon in the basin.

Classrooms house many containers, buckets, and bowls to hold crayons, chalk, and other educational tchotchkes. I found a round container of magnets and erasers and emptied it. Outside in the courtyard we have huge, lined trash containers for kids to throw out their 3-D DNA models and lunches from Quarter One. I lugged one in the classroom – mind you, the kids are still hyper-focused on their testing. I brought the can close to the sink, and started scooping the dark, smelly water with the makeshift bucket and transferred it into the trash can. The water in the sink started coming up faster, so I had to move faster. I distinctly remember what I was wearing that day – a long, flowing boho-style dress, dark brown. I remember splashing some of this disgusting water on my dress and thinking I’d have to burn it later.

Mr. Bastable called the front office to have them contact custodians. He continued watching the kids as there were nearly finished with their tests. I was still dealing with the nauseating swill water, bucket after bucket, trying to keep this pungent goo from overflowing the sink and seeping into the crevices of my classroom. The kids were now getting uncomfortable with the smell; luckily, the last student had finished, and we got permission from admin to move them outside. They scurried out into the courtyard with Mr. Bastable tagging along, and I in my brown-newly-brown dress still dealing with the swamp water.

Custodians finally made it to my room and did whatever magic they know to stop the mess. Turns out that the plumbing in my room is the last stop on this side of the building for all sinks drains to go through. Teachers upstairs had been putting solids in the sinks for some time thinking there was some kind of magic disposal that would take care of their leftover casserole and dissected frogs. There isn’t. Instead, stuff was backing up in the pipe from as far as the parking lot, and mine was the last room before exiting the building. All their sink water (thankfully not toilet remains) came into my room for its last stand.

The end result: the students finished their tests (except for the two boneheads who slept), and I got a new countertop and sink out of the whole debacle. Most of the time state testing goes off without a hitch, but once in a while you get situations like this that cause all sorts of chaos. With high-stakes testing, you roll with the metaphoric and literal tide. And yes, I burned the dress.