Highly Qualified Teachers

HQT is back in the PSS vocabulary of collegial discourse. Word has gotten out that perhaps the hasty application of the salary reduction on those who failed to meet the PRAXIS requirements but still in mid-contract were not only improper, it might actually be illegal! Time to test it in the courts, is it? No need, if reinstatement is an option!

However we broaden the definition of HQT, to PSS it redounds to the basic, fundamental and primary requirement: pass the prescribed PRAXIS test at one’s level. Assessment-obsessed technocrats made this a prescription without much explanation or justification for its sole, sore and sorry application, but we all know now that passing PRAXIS does not make a highly qualified teacher!

This then begs the question of what makes an HQT. I say, nothing more than what I would require any other professional, which means, the consciousness and discipline to manage TIME, organize SPACE, define ROLES, and articulate one’s operating STORY.

At my school in San Vicente, teachers do their own self-evaluation at the end of the school year before the administrators add their blue pencil. I follow in my mind the four parameters above, and were I an administrator, I would design guiding rubrics and indicators on the same as the platform of administrative dialogue.

At the level of gainful employment, the teacher is, at least, a professional. First, there is a discernible level of intentionality about one’s management of events, their sequence and the dramaturgy of chronology. A day’s unraveling is not just a blob of unscheduled happenings. There is rationality in a day’s flow, and a week’s design, a quarter’s objectives and the annual goal. There is comprehensiveness in ensuring that standards and benchmarks are considered. Time speaks of process—there is a beginning and an ending, and the intermediate points in between. If we do not manage TIME, then whimsical winds manage us!

Secondly, the unstructured is given form. Timelines are objectified and visually displayed. There is order in the placement of parts, an organization in the coverage of wholes. Space is intentionally organized. Walls deliberately assault one’s vision in a way that is pedagogically assistive, and the sound input and output is orchestrated. There is time for verbal discourse and moments of silence. Space fully impacts the five senses in an unmistakable symphony of intentionality. For example, disinfectants on the floor can be neutralized by the scent of flowers and distilled natural scents. Artforms can grace the walls, in addition to the aids for ‘riting, reading and ‘rithmetic. Table and chair arrangements honors individual students, at the same time, encourages group work, collaboration and cooperation. We overcome SPACE before chaos overwhelms.

Third, the various ROLEs are defined. Mushy emotionalism has dominated classrooms in the last four decades to a point where every teacher is expected to be a friend to the students. I told my class this year that I was not their friend, in the first instance. I was their teacher who, in some role or another, will be someone they will grow up AGAINST. When they did, I was not very popular. The professional teacher identifies the roles s/he plays as part of the context of any unit of time. Behavior-wise, I serve in loco parentis; learning-wise, I enable and facilitate self-conscious learning; teaching-wise, I command like a general overseeing many tactical strategies and maneuvers in an education “battle” field; sage-wise, I turn into a monastic abbot who open doors into the internal castles of the imagination and the soul, of poetry and inner vision. Whatever ROLE the teacher plays, it is clearly defined in relationship to and in the awareness of the students.

Lastly, one’s STORY is articulated and objectified. Stories are most boldly and effectively communicated in signs and symbols, narratives and songs. The story gives a context on the sense of time being managed; for sixth graders, for example, they are led to recollect their 11-13 year journey so far, before Social Studies encapsulates the evolution of Science, Mathematics and the Language Arts in, at least, 10,000 years of the civilizing process. Songs that establish selfhood and corporateness are sung. Signs are invitatory to a profound and comprehensive journey and are frequently on display. Symbols boldly challenge the imagination and the will to action. Stories are created, they can be uncreated; history is but a series of chosen images on previous decisions, they can be unchosen. The core of the human story is the responsibility to choose. What has previously been decided can also be undecided. Destiny is created, not revealed, and hardly determined. Stories underlie the legacies of our cultures and religions. The images they engender in the mind influence behavior.

To recap, at bottom, I would hold teachers accountable to how they manage their time, organize their space, define their roles and articulate their story. Lesson plans are the most obvious expression of one’s designs; there are others.

Teaching, however, like any other profession, is also a passion, a career and a vocation. This is what an individual as a persona adds to the stew. The passion acts from the individual’s accumulated experiences that well up as intuition and imagination. Career is enriched with the ongoing dialogue with the broad college of teaching professionals, often demonstrated in association and interrelatedness. This gets the creative juices flowing. Vocation is derived from one’s sense of raison d’être, often expressed in the poetry of the soul and the metaphors of the spirit.

None of the last three above is subject to contractual compensation. They are what define the uniqueness of the individual teacher, and gives character to the profession. They give form to what is deemed as the pursuit of excellence, or the effervescent ideals of efficiency and efficacy.

Professional development addresses the contractual requirements. Passion, career and vocation give the profession spirit. It is what allows teachers to dig into their own pockets, remain in their classroom after school and report to their classrooms on weekends, write that extra note to Johnny’s mom, and do many pluses that are not covered by payroll. We have plenty of highly qualified teachers, but passing PRAXIS is the least of their defining qualities.

This coming school year, let the real HQTs hold themselves accountable to their own standards. This is after all, an Olympic Games year, when athletes are encourage to break their own records. What standards are teachers holding on their own beyond just mere compliance with the requirements of the central office? Might this be the year HQTs translate their professionalism, their passion, career and vocation into real ACTion?