WHY I TEACH-Part 18: I Always Feel Like

I walked slowly to the front office, not really wanting to check the substitute teacher list. On average I’d subbed 4 out of 5 days a week, sometimes more. I had been out zero days.

Today, I was subbing for Mr. Lories, the science teacher who had so graciously given me his old tables and chairs. After lunch, at the beginning of third period, I headed to his room. I was surprised to see him sitting at his desk.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hello,” he replied.

I waited for him to leave, but he just sat there.

“The sub plans are on the front table. They are taking the mid-term test,” he finally said, though he made no attempt to move.

As the kids began filing in, he just sat there.

“Are you leaving?” I asked.

“Oh, no,” he replied. “I just need a break. I’m going to be in the back office. If the kids have a question about the test, they can come and ask me.”

I started to say something but just shook my head. I needed a break, but as a new teacher, I had exactly two sick days, which I was planning on using when I was actually sick.

As I gathered up the tests at the end of the period, Mr. Lories emerged from the office.

“Thanks so much!”

“You’re welcome,” I grumbled.

“You know I have a weather station on the roof of the school,” he said.

“I didn’t know that,” I admitted.

“I’m tapped into the school's video feed so I can monitor the system,” he continued.

I nodded as I straightened the pile of test papers.

“The other day, I was scanning through the feeds and I found one that had a live feed into your classroom.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“There is a live audio-video feed in your classroom. It’s pointed, oddly, at the front of the room, where your desk and whiteboard are.”

“There’s a camera in my room?”

“Yes. I’m guessing you didn’t know anything about it?”

I laughed out loud. “Nope, no clue.”

“It wasn’t there last year,” Mr. Lories stated. “Just so you know.”

I walked numbly back to my classroom. I stared at the white circular thing on my ceiling. I’d noticed it, but thought it was just a wifi router.

After school, I headed to Mr. B.’s room. I found him rearranging boxes of stuff.

“Hey, Mr. B., tell me something.”

“Yup,” he said as he stopped and gave me his full attention.

“The cameras in your classroom, did you install them?”

“Yes, I’ve got some expensive equipment in here, so I have six cameras, four of which are motion activated.”

“Have you ever heard of a camera being installed in a classroom?”

Mr. B. crossed his arms and looked hard at me. “They’ve bugged your room?”

I nodded.

“Myers is one piece of work.”

“What do I do?”

“Keep teaching, pretend it isn’t there.”

I nodded.

Mr. B. reached out and offered a fist bump. “You can do this.”

“Yeah,” I mumbled.

The following morning I received an email stating my mid-term evaluation observation would be during second period.

The kids were knee-deep into an online coding course, so there wasn’t much to observe. I was expecting one of the assistant principals to show up but was quite taken aback when Mr. Myers appeared, clipboard in hand, ten minutes into the start of the class.

“I’ll be conducting your evaluation,” he said curtly.

“Welcome,” I replied cheerfully; faking the biggest, cheesiest smile. “The students are working on an online coding course. Here are my lesson plans and the objective is on the board.”

Mr. Myers nodded, refused the lesson plans, and strolled through my classroom, briefly stopping behind each student’s chair to observe what was on their screens.

He stepped back and watched for several minutes. Not once taking a note or writing anything down on the paper on his clipboard.

“How do you get them to do that?” he finally asked.

“Do what?” I replied.

“They are all on task. Not a single person has another window open or is playing a game.”

“They are doing their work. Why would they be playing games?”

“Because it’s a computer class and kids play games.”

“My students are all on task, doing their work. Is that not what they are supposed to be doing?”

“Did you inform them I’d be coming?”

“No.” I hadn’t. What was the point? My students were on task because that’s just the way we did things.

“This just seems odd.”

“Well, you would know what’s going on in my classroom. You’ve got a live feed watching everything I do.”

Mr. Myers turned sharply toward me. His eyes quickly glanced up at the not-wifi-router-camera box.

“Why did you put a camera in my classroom?”

He moved closer to me and said in a low voice, “You’ve got a lot of expensive equipment in here, we just need to protect it from thieves.”

“Oh, OK. So you are worried someone might steal something off my desk or take the whiteboard?”

Mr. Myers shifted uneasily. “I haven’t done anything illegal.”

“Good to know,” I replied. “Good to know.”

He scribbled something on the paper on his clipboard, tore off the top sheet, handed it to me, and quickly left.

On the 0-5 rating, he’d circled all 2s for Fair. I wanted to cry. Instead, I hopped on a table and turned the camera around to face the Einstein quote on the side wall of my classroom. Maybe it would inspire Mr. Myers to be better.