BOYU sans Soju

Boyu (pronounced ‘bo zu’) is Chamorro for bald head. Soju is wine favored by east Asian imbibers. One has nothing to do with the other, save in my context, to indicate that my shaven head has nothing to do with the influence of alcohol!

“I’m in a dancing mood,” blares the Hawaiian music my students are choreographing for aerobics in their Phys Ed class. This education month, I am singing, “I’m in a protesting mode; I’m in a protesting mode,” to the same music.

Numbering among the contingent of selected PSS teachers of the year, I joined the throng at the Governor’s Office conference room with my school OIC for the proclamation of Education month in November. Having declared earlier my intent to boycott events if Education Day designs proceed as planned, with the Rota and Tinian contingents limited to bare representatives were the festivities be held in Saipan, I was faced with the challenge of how to present myself to our leaders at Capital Hill so that one’s being is a testimony to one’s stance towards the sorry state of education in the Commonwealth.

My students call me “boyu” these days. Filipinos tease with “kalbo,” while the Koreans politely whisper “to-de-ri.” My wife recites a children’s ditty about a “gwang tuo,” a playful pun on the bald. None is meant to be flattering. Yes, I went to the Governor’s conference room with a shaven head. It was a gesture of protest over PSS intransigence over teachers’ legitimate issues. It is a judgment, among others, on the silly requirement of teachers’ assessment to be HQT (highly qualified teacher) that has not proven to be adequate measure for gauging effective pedagogy.

The word “protest” comes from the Latin “pro testari.” “Pro” means calls forth; “testari” means “testimony, or testament.” To protest therefore, is not simply being against takes the form of the bald head. Not a skinhead, a boyu eduhead!

As a boyu eduhead, this is akin to the medieval monastic tonsure with vows of detachment (poverty), single-mindedness (chastity), and commitment (obedience). The shaven head clears the cobwebs of the mind, and the toxic vapors of the heart. In my new shavenness, I am pledged to a lively dialogue with the powers that be on PSS’ own four priority strategies. These are 1) high student performance, 2) safe and orderly schools, 3) quality teachers, administrators, and staff, and 4) effective and efficient operation. Obviously, my most immediate arena of obligation and engagement is the first third of item #3.

Quality teacher is like motherhood and apple pie—very American, and definitely, everyone’s favorite cause. Teachers after all are the critical linchpin in the whole educational enterprise. Not that they always get the support and training they need, nor has professional development been serious to meet pedagogical challenges, but it is axiomatic to say that the morale and competence, self-esteem and integrity, knowledge and skill, attitude and eptitude of teachers is of crucial importance for an educational system to function effectively.

Among teachers themselves, corporate selfhood and individual self-sufficiency has not come easy. The recent resurgence of the Association of Commonwealth Teachers was jolted out of its complacency lately when it realized the old Pogo wisdom: “we have met the enemy, and it is us!” Every social movement carries within its emerging structure the seeds of its own destruction. Not unlike the societal body to which we belong, the wily human factor reared up its ugly head right on the head table to usher the dreaded contradiction of native suspicion and nurtured fear. The diversity of ACT’s make-up, a promise of complex synergy, turned out to breed a quicksand at its core. Not to dally in poetic analogies, armchair psychobabble, or strained sociological analysis, ACT plainly shot itself on the foot, and is staggering to recover its bearing. The triumph of the human spirit has been known to survive the vicissitudes of just causes, and I suspect that the Association shall not be deterred by the follies of its members, or the ego massaging requirement that human desire for recognition is heir to.

The shaven head in secular society has been reserved for the incarcerated criminals, or the visible contrition of the religious penitent. Recently, it has also become fashionable and chic. This boyu eduhead leans heavily in the direction of penance, first, on behalf of my bumbling organization, PSS and all its shortcomings, and for my tribe of teachers whose bungling efforts to promote its own cause is becoming legendary. Forgiveness follows the contrite heart. Herein lies the depth symbology of this barren pate-of-a-tete, executed as a solitary act of protest. It is a move not from the towering strength of power grabs or status search, but on the perseverance of the humbled service. From this stance continues efforts along with a few colleagues in the current drive to enlist active membership to and engage participation in the Association of Commonwealth Teachers.

If quality teachers be our mantra, quality administrators and staff follow close behind. For the PRAXIS fiasco and its mercilessly punitive consequences, along with the confusion in the certification process, the assessment process on teachers must now also pour over the administrative domains. Accountability is good. To be effective, however, it must proceed not from the posture of tyranny and coercion but from the enabled acceptance of the absolved in spite of their haughtiness and pride. We await BoE’s moves and the Commissioner’s initiative in this area.

Other efforts among PSS stakeholders to focus on PSS priority strategies require teachers’ support and alliance. Parent Daisy Mendiola of Kagman Elementary calls for PTA representatives from all the schools to join Saturday, Nov. 18. at the Multi-Purpose Center to strengthen the presence and participation of PTAs in PSS affairs. This is a laudable and necessary effort to broaden the base of conversants in the multifaceted multilogue that needs to accompany reflections on education this focused month.

Meanwhile, this boyu eduhead will nurse the glitter on his crown. Ala Harry Potter’s scar, it will be worn as a sign of vulnerability and fragility before overwhelming tasks and seemingly insurmountable odds. It shall remain a sign of commitment both of protest and assertion, determination, and resolve, and if colleagues be inclined to lend a hand, the welcome is genuine, though they may refrain from giving the tender pate a pat.