Something New

Next year, North High will have a new principal. Chris Sheck is the principal of Magruder Middle School, it’s been rumored that he was going to be our principal for years, and now, or at least next year, he’ll take over for Dr. Richardson.
Let’s see if I can remember them all. I was hired by Sid Morrison some eighteen years ago. Not a lot of male English teachers were hired in those days, and he hired me and Matt Mishler. Funny that both of us are still around while many have come and gone.
Tim Scully was in there somewhere, as was Barry Gross. George Canady gave us a few years. Annette Alpern moved up from assistant principal to principal for many years. Then came two years of 28-yr-old Grant Litfin, four years of Matt Horvath, and four years of our current Dr. Richardson.
In my 19th year of teaching at North High I will be on my ninth principal. That’s a good thing, by the way. In teaching (and in life, I suppose) it’s nice to have something new come along. Not that it’s mattered for years, but there’s that smidgen of hope that the new person will come in and see things for what they really are, rather than what they are told.
I remain optimistic. Yeah, you read it right–optimistic. At least for now.
On another note, I thought I might have been too mean to my students yesterday when I wrote that they didn’t want to go on a free Peruvian Amazon trip because they might have to work a little. I thought that maybe their grumbling was just grumbling and they were just complaining to show how cool they were, secretly planning all along to go on this adventure. I had 65 honors kids today. Five said they were still interested. So maybe I wasn’t too mean.
When something, or someone new comes along, you want to be positive. However, I have to end this and shoot an email to our administration and dean telling them of an Instagram site that features our students in less-than-desirable ways and does not add to our brand. I hope I am the 100th person to do this because that would mean that others do not desire to tolerate this online behavior either.
Positive.