FYI: Trade Secrets

I'm not a golfer, but many of my colleages are. There's a group of men who openly admit that teaching is the only profession that allows them to golf 3 months a year and have two weeks around Christmas to go to Florida or Arizona to golf. These guys usually teach business, social studies or PE/health. They call each other "Coach" since many are coaches themselves: football, basketball, baseball, so on. These guys are also buddies with the principal and other administrators who make up the 'good ole boy network.' They can give their students worksheets and show videos (that's teaching?) and are often held to different standards and are exempt from certain protocols than the rest of the staff.

An anecdote:

When I was first hired into [Name] High School, we would have observations by our department heads, principals, district curriculum heads, and sometimes the superintendent himself. Since I taught more than one content area, I had 2 department heads, 2 principals, and 2 curriculum heads visit my class (guess I was 'okay' enough not to warrant the superintendent's visit). In my first year I had 6 different people observe my class and write reports to include in my yearly evaluation.

Fine, I had already taught for a few years in another state; I wasn't too worried.

In his first year, the baseball coach next door (a nice guy) was observed once, by the principal. At the end of the year I went to sign my evaluations and discuss my year's performance with the principal. He explained that he never gives 5's to people their first year (the scale was 1-5, "poor"-"excellent," for a number of evaluation criteria). I had all 4's, he was pleased and glad to have me on staff, blah, blah, blah, and my observation reports from the 6 other people were all positive. A few days later I was chatting with the baseball coach. He confided that the prinicipal gave him all 5's. I was stunned. This guy had one observation, and though the principal doesn't give anyone 5's their first year, this guy was all 5's. It bothered me for days.

I realized these coaches are largely off the hook. It's somehow more important to run solid sports programs than anything else. In both schools where I have worked, sports came first, then standardized test scores, then everyday academics. I coached as well, but somehow cheerleading was different.

In most schools the jocks are in the popular crowd. It's like that for teachers as well. Jock-coach teachers are often the most popular among popular students (because their classes are easy), among parents (cause they give out a bunch of As), among other staff (because they throw great parties and buy rounds of beer at the bar after games) and among administrators (because they make the school look good for sports). They are not popular with people like me who see problems with all of this.

I'm NOT saying all teachers who coach are slackers or 'good ole boys', but after teaching in two different high schools (in two different states), this has been my experience. Every school district and school is different and unique, but I bet it's the case elsewhere as well.

Unless it's a Waldorf School...