I’m a really nice person with the majority of people I interact with. I treat them with respect. I love them as my neighbor, and I try to give the gift of grace to everyone I interact with. With adults, I don’t judge. With kids, I generally don’t judge either and try to give as many second chances as possible.
But when those kids are under my care and I’m in charge of keeping them safe, I’ve had to alter my mindset after a series of traumatic experiences for myself and my students. I’ve presided over a classroom where a student threatened another student with scissors, where a student threatened another student with a razor. I saw hallways where a boy would drag a girl across the floor by her hair. I saw rampant bullying and tried to stop it, but could not do so despite trying everything at my disposal.
I reprimanded them. I referred them to the office for further consequences. I called their parent or guardian. But nothing ultimately happened. It felt like there was nothing I could do.
Now, I am the bad guy whenever I need to be. It’s not like I’m a mean teacher. I would say I’m still a very nice teacher to my students and treat them with respect, but not if they’re not following school rules, and not if they’re disrupting the classroom environment. I don’t advocate for students to be put out of school — I want them to learn as well.
I am generally not a stickler for rules in my daily life. However, I have reconciled that if these school rules are there, they’re there for a reason. Someone didn’t conjure them out of nowhere because they loved power and control.
I don’t let students leave the classroom in the hallways, go on social media, or bother other kids for a reason. When a student is straight-up harassing another student or calling them names or derogatory slurs, that needs to be shut down right away.
Just being a nice person who doesn’t maintain a safe environment is not indicative of good teaching. I used to stomach students cussing me out. A lot of people would say I was a patient person, and I was.
But what message did it send to other students that a student could say (pardon the language, but this has happened a lot more than once) “you’re a fucking faggot, Mr. Fan,” and I did nothing about it? It sent the message that it was an absolute free for in the classroom and students could do whatever they wanted to their peers because their teacher wasn’t going to do anything about it.
To be strict means standing up for myself and my students and maintaining a safe environment. No matter what stereotypes you may hold about my school district in Baltimore, 90% or more of students want to learn and want to listen and participate in class. They want an education. And it’s not like the 10% that disrupt the classroom do not want to learn, but they need a lot more support than I can give them at once.
I used to cater and bend over backward for that 10%. I want to help them and support them. I want to be the teacher they remember as the person who cared enough to never give up on them. I knew the trauma they went through in their home lives. I knew how much of a miracle it was for them to be in high school in the first place and make it that far.
However, I cannot tolerate them disrupting the learning environment for everyone else any longer. And if I completely ignore the kids who listen, don’t disrupt the classroom, and don’t bully their peers, then I am doing everyone a disservice and am not being a good teacher to the majority of my classmates.
I don’t mean to toot my own horn, but a student who called a classmate a bitch and told me to go fuck myself was immediately put out of the classroom.
I am not a natural disciplinarian. But I put him out of the class, and called his guardian. She didn’t answer, so my boss and I went to his house after school and talked to his guardian in person. The guardian told us to tell the kid we would visit his house again if he didn’t follow school rules and treat his classmates in a respectful manner.
Again, being a disciplinarian doesn’t come naturally to me. A lot of friends would call me a very nice person. But when I was a nice teacher who didn’t enforce consequences and rules, someone else had to. And I ended up being a burden and liability to the people who had to be the bad guy, as a result, to maintain a safe learning environment when I couldn’t.
I know in some circles, this might not reflect well on me. I am very self-aware of the role the narrative of consequences plays in the school-to-prison pipeline. My district has been moving to have a more trauma-informed and social-emotional response.
However, a big part of social emotional learning has meant making sure the classroom environment is safe, which means consequences need to be there. The students who need more support behaviorally are kids I’m responsible for, but this time, I know I’m not alone. I have other people in my building, from psychologists and social workers to social-emotional learning specialists who can help while I focus on other students.
I am more seasoned and experienced now. I know what I can and can’t do. And I know I’m not a miracle worker or a savior even if most people would consider me a good teacher who has good classroom management. Furthermore, I have to look out for myself. I can’t drown myself in my sorrow and hate my life every time I go home. I have to protect myself and stand up for myself too, and can’t put up with students calling me a chink, telling me I eat cats and dogs, or calling me otherwise derogatory slurs or profanity either.
It sucks to be the bad guy, but sometimes, it’s necessary. That’s a lesson I’ll need as a future parent as well as a teacher.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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