Climate Refugees

Disheartened by news of more bushfires in Victoria, devastatingly dwindling water in Syria and Iraq, typhoons in Hong Kong and floods in Greece (releasing more rain in one day than they receive in a year), I looked up the worst case scenario for the world as a result of climate change. While exploring the World Economic Forum website, I watched as the map showed the projected temperature changes across the world to 2099. Pretty much across the equator the temperatures were in the red zone; unsustainable heat, particularly across Africa from Chad, Niger and Sudan up. Saudi, Pakistan, northern India, Iran, Iraq and the Stans will all be heavily impacted.

If you’ve read Kim Stanley Robinson’s harrowing opening scenes in The Ministry for the Future, you’ll know what I was thinking. No one can live through that kind of heat; nothing can. It will all become a lip cracking, blood boiling, skin blistering, tree withering, floral annihilating inferno. You know what that means, don’t you?

Climate refugees. Millions upon millions of people left utterly destitute. With nothing but their very lives. If they’re lucky.

But already there is rampant hatred against refugees across the world: Anti-migrant rhetoric dominates politics in Poland ahead of October vote is the headline in one AlJazeera article. Italy’s recently elected far right leader, Giorgia Meloni won in part with promises of clamping down on immigration. The president of Tunisia, Kais Saied, is using refugees from sub- Saharan Africa as scapegoats to deflect from a failing economy resulting in a wave of racial violence and over 2,500 refugees being confined to a small beach on the island of Lampedusa without access to food, water or health care.

In the U.S., Border Patrol made 181,059 apprehensions along the southern border in August alone (US Customs and Border Protection). The United States-Mexico border is the world’s deadliest land route for migrants, with at least 686 deaths and disappearances recorded there last year. Hundreds of thousands of migrants and asylum seekers have taken long and perilous paths through South and Central America and Mexico in hopes of reaching the US border to apply for protection. A dangerous jungle passage between Panama and Colombia known as the Darien Gap, which is rife with violence and natural hazards, including insects, snakes and unpredictable terrain, also recorded 141 migrant deaths last year.

Many are fleeing rampant gang violence, poverty, political persecution and other crises in their home countries.

In Honduras, “Violence…skyrocketed after the military removed the elected president, Manuel Zelaya, from office in 2009, with the country recording the highest per capita homicide rate in the world outside of an active warzone the next year.”

Across the world, more than 80% of ethnic Armenians have fled Nagorno-Karabak because of fears of ethnic cleansing by Azerbaijan forces. More than 800,000 people may flee Sudan as a result of the ongoing conflict (United Nations refugee agency) including Sudanese nationals and thousands of existing refugees living temporarily in the country.

You get the picture. It’s already happening. And apparently we’ve not learned our lessons from Hitler’s playbook. Your average Joe is still happy to blame the ills of the country on refugees and immigrants (often despite being from immigrant stock themselves).

You hear rhetoric about the immigrants stealing your jobs. But the U.S. found out the hard way that that is simply not true. In Georgia, a survey of 233 farmers found that there was a shortage of 11,000 workers following passage of its new immigration law, which saw all the mainly Mexican ‘illegals’ disappear overnight, fearing arrest…Over the course of a monthlong experiment to give the jobs to ‘homegrown workers’, about 75 Alabamians worked on one farmer’s lot; 15 of them showed up more than once; only 3 lasted the entire month... Georgia farmers lost about $300 million worth of crops, which in turn drained $1 billion from the state’s economy (Center for American Progress). The locals didn’t want to do the backbreaking work for minimum wage. Who knew? Yes, immigrants often come in and undercut wage earnings as they are so desperate to do anything for any small amount. It’s simply not so for the home workers. The same experiment in the U.S. tried the homeless and even prisoners to take up the slack, but even they refused and were incapable of the relentless physical exertion and gruelling hours.

So what are we going to do about all the future refugees? Because they are coming. Are we all going to close our borders in order to safeguard our own ‘national and financial security’? Is that really the answer? Are we set on a dystopian future where, at the outskirts of civilisation, such as currently on Lampedusa, the dispossessed are relegated to living and dying like animals? Like the refugee camps such as Kakuma in Kenya that was opened in 1992 and still houses over 200,00 people seeking refuge somewhere, anywhere; for over 20 years? Is that who we are?   

What’s the answer? People are afraid, that’s obvious with the increase in far right politics taking over everywhere, with their rhetoric of racism and hatred. People have always feared ‘the other’. When people panic, they lose sight of their compassionate side and fight for their own. There is such a ‘scarcity’ mentality prevailing that only worsens with irresponsible media fanning the flames of fear. We fear losing what little we already have. Your existing way of life is threatened so it comes down to kill or be killed in the toilet paper aisle.

We seem to have lost sight of our blessings. Here in the West, we are so very rich in so many ways. Just go onto https://www.gapminder.org/ and browse through Dollar Street to see the reality of most of the world; children showing off their favourite toy- an old bicycle tyre. Or living on dirt floors in a one room shelter with no amenities. Millions upon millions of people live like this. Yet we fight over toilet paper? We’re frightened we may lose access to Winter avocados?

Safeguarding our perceived prosperity should not preclude a sense of humanity. These current and future refugees will have NOTHING. They will have nowhere to lay their head. They will be trapped in a vulnerable place between worlds. They will be prey to traffickers and thieves. And they have done nothing wrong; they have in no way contributed to the climate catastrophe that will destroy their homes. That is down to the West.

We need to stop listening to far right trolls and their fear mongering, threatening our hip pocket with the flood of refugees that will destroy us all. What diminishes us is being led by fear and loathing; bowing to our amygdala and throwing logic and reason to the wind. We would actually lose little in welcoming the destitute. We know how much immigrants enhance a country. Once they’re on their feet, they are the ones that build a prosperous nation. We know because we were those immigrants once. Perhaps not so desperate as those to come, but as with all humans, wishing only to build a future for our children and find community and belonging. If our hearts are willing, we will find a way to ease the suffering of those who will then become part of us.

The world is facing a crisis. It’s no time for selfishness and hunkering down in our toilet paper laden cave. We need to face this together as one humanity, irrelevant of country or ‘race’. We need to see that part of being human is banding together to face the enemy; the destruction of our world as we know it.

Let me walk you through my week

Let me walk you through my week.

I hit the ground running at 7.45ish on Monday morning as most days. I need to wrap my head around what classes I have that day and what and how I’m going to teach the content and organize any resources I need for the lesson. I need to check that the relief lessons for absent colleagues (I’ll just put Covid here) are in the tub for the relief teacher to grab. I have to then explain to the relief teacher what is needed as a Science teacher nervously waves the relief lesson around for clarification.

I need to grab a cupcake from the canteen for a birthday in my Pastoral class at 8.30 and find matches for the candle. I have to ensure I have all the paperwork for my Pastoral students– camp letters, overdue absences… I have to check in with Jack as something’s happening at home- I’m not told, but told to ‘ensure he has TLC’ this week. Bit hard to support him when I don’t know what I’m supporting. What if I ask about his dad and it’s dad that’s been diagnosed with cancer last week? (No pressure). We take the roll, have prayer, read notices and rush off to class.

Two classes this session; walk around helping all the students navigate the lesson, spend time clarifying with the kids that need extra support.

Teachers are said to engage in something like 1300 decisions every day. How am I going to put the content to them? Just how am I going to reiterate the concept and say the same thing in different ways so that everyone gets it? What anecdote can I think of to help clarify? How am I going to explain it to Johnny and Eloise who have cognitive processing issues? What examples can I use to further clarify the concept? What questions do I ask to engender discussion and check for understanding? What specific resources am I going to use to support their learning of the concept? Does this article or that video help them best? And between transitions, review and admin, I really only have 40 minutes to do it in. Mostly you only have this time due to curriculum demands, to teach this particular concept. There is not the luxury of following it up in any real detail. (In junior classes, we only have 5 hours a fortnight and in senior, 7). That’s few precious learning hours and days between reinforcement. But it’s needed to support the assessment in a few weeks so you can’t really afford to get it wrong. (No pressure).

I have 3 senior classes for Social Justice. Do I teach the same lesson 3 times? Well yes, and then again, no. They are 3 very different groups. One engages more in discussion but I have to spread the discussion around to ensure the quiet ones get a say. I have to maintain a vigilance. I have to keep the talk on topic without unhelpful tangents yet encourage sharing. It’s a fine line. One class is more sociable so I have to keep a firm reign on the talk and cajole attention to the task at hand. I pull humour out of thin air and gently tease to maintain some control and walk around more. The third class is a mix of amiable and ardent. I have to ensure the mix keeps all of them attentive. Challenge and engage in equal measure.

And all the while you have to keep an eye on the clock- just the right amount of cajoling to keep them on task, just the right amount of time to allow them to engage with the topic and make notes, just the right amount of time to allow for review of learning and cognitive closure before they all leap to their feet and their thoughts turn to maths…

A quick silent review of the lesson in your head. What did you miss covering? Which important point needs further clarification next time? Make notes in your book so you don’t forget next time.

Cancel Susan’s mentoring time during lunch because you’ve picked up a duty cover.

We all work straight through recess, grabbing bites of something as we check emails and reply, chase up whatever the parent/student/exec need and prep for the next class. Quick loo break.

Ok, next class, the one where  you know squat about the content. You need to keep vigilant; the assessment is due next week. Time’s got away on you. The planned lesson needs to be scrapped because the assessment takes precedence. Review the assessment task. Remind them of the deadline. Check in with each student about where they’re at. Focus young Justin (autism spectrum disorder and horrifically immature to boot) on his priority tasks. Go over it yet again with him. (He’s going to fail, I just know it. He just can’t focus on anything but his games. He throws a tantrum every time you push him to work). Manage the tantrum quietly, try to refocus him and calm him down. The strategy that works at home to get him what he wants, doesn’t work here. It enrages him further. He’s out of strategies so he storms off. You have to fill in a report to send to the Year Co. You have to contact someone to ensure that they find him and take care of him as you can’t leave the class.

Debrief in the staffroom, listen to everyone’s breathless download of their day. Wolf down a sandwich and go to duty on the oval. The grass is soggy and Year 7 boys are diving into mud puddles. Drag them out verbally and send them to the office. Keep walking and be vigilant. Stop Year 8 from turning touch tag into tackle. “Hands off!” Keep patrolling. Keep scanning.

Last lesson; a long one to comply with BSSS requirements. The kids are restless and talk somehow moves to scrotums. Get them back on task.

I debrief with the new guy and listen patiently to his complaints and try to offer constructive advice, but he only wants to vent and receive affirmation.

I have a pastoral meeting.

At the end of the day, as every day, I can hardly say my name. I drag myself home. It’s 5pm but feels like 10pm.

No day is the same, but the rushing is. I have 2 mentorees to see on Tuesday, in both breaks. Teenage angst and anxiety. Try and find some way to give solace and advice (I’m not a trained psychologist). Full day teaching, same problems but different faces, so different solutions. Get that frontal lobe working overdrive on the problem solving! I should eat more seaweed.

Wednesday is my light on day with a few free hours to focus on work. I have to encapsulate Noam Chomsky’s Concentration of Wealth and Power. The film is wonderful but 16 year olds will not be able to handle it. But the learning is invaluable. They need to understand that they cannot just trust in the status quo. They need to learn about the machinations of industry and the wealthy if they are to be engaged, thinking citizens of the future. I am not an academic. This is going to take me quite a few hours to make the ideas accessible. And short.

I’m interrupted by a panic with our new teacher. He’s run afoul of his students. I’m the only one in the staffroom. I need to intervene and make peace with everyone. Peace afterall, is a major theme of Jesus’.

I have another mentoree. He comes early. He’s in the mood to talk.

I skip recess and just get breakfast down. Need to have a meeting with my boss. We sit down and I take notes for an hour while he runs through the next few weeks and things we need to be on top of. We need to redo the Yr 11 powerpoint on 7 Theories of Social Justice as it was too heavy and the kids missed the main points. It needs to be on the list of things to do for next year. We need to be rethinking the schedule for Year 10- there have been too many Pastoral days, at home learning days and incursions and we’re running behind to get them to the next assessment due in a couple of weeks. I need to update the learning platform with the new schedule. We have Moderation day coming up…

Duty.

Get back to Noam. No, there’s a report I need to do on an at risk student. I reply to the email with my feedback. I need to go talk to In Ed Support to discuss how best to modify the assessment for this boy; how do we best support him and allow him to achieve success? No Noam today.

Thursday, pretty much the same as Tuesday, different classes. What did we do last lesson? Pull out the lollies to elicit the review. Ideas are sluggish, pages turn. Offerings are made, most rewarded. Move into the next concept. Get them focused with some provocation. Pull, tug, press, coax, do the dance of the 7 veils…sing them into submission… I’m tired but energized; can be a deadly mix.

Suddenly it’s Friday. It’s been a blur of faces, laughter, frustration, swearing at the photocopier, biting my tongue, pulling advice out of some nether region, consoling, empathizing, glaring pointedly and hugging a colleague in desperation. Spent last night preparing food for staff morning tea today. We’re on prayer. My boss is on duty so I have to run it. Someone accidentally cooked Bron’s dinner she’d brought in for her weekend away and offered it up to the masses. It was delicious. Two other faculties forgot they were on morning tea so it runs light with only our offerings (and Bron’s).

Stop in during my prep hour to another teacher’s class to make sure his kids are on target having had 3 weeks of relief teachers during his absence. Run through the assignment again. Answer questions. Reiterate expectations.

Onto my regular class, one of my seniors asks to speak to me. He’s been through hell with a divorce and admits he was suicidal. I am horrified that he didn’t reach out and madly scramble to alleviate his distress at fallen grades and his own personal suffering. (I’m not a trained psychologist. Talk of suicide is a minefield of possibly saying the wrong thing- no pressure). Talk him into talking to the counsellor as he’s averse to the idea. He’s not alone. Every one of us is here to ensure his wellbeing and do everything we can to help him complete college successfully. I want to hug him but can’t. We have both teared up. I am not his mentor; I won’t really have time to talk to him out of class, but must find it somehow. Our muttered conversation is taking place in front of the class. We need to turn to business so I talk him through an outline for the upcoming essay. I do a quick search of resources to get him started. The next student comes up and I need to help her with her plan.

Last lesson with seniors. They are working on their assignment but I still need to check in with each one to ensure they know what they are doing. I clarify some points. Again, I have to be on the ball. I need to be all over each of the options. If I give wrong advice here they may get graded down because I misspoke when not thinking clearly. (No pressure).

Friday night, as every week is spent by my throwing myself onto the sofa and turning on some mindless drivel on Netflix with nice hair and a thin plot. The kids in Home Ec have provided dinner tonight; there were pizzas for lunch. Bless them. Maybe I’ll get onto Noam on Saturday…

Expressing yourself or not really...

Expressing Yourself

Every teacher’s groan zone is assessment uploads. It’s time for the arduous task of marking. Most of the time it’s actually a joy, to hear your student’s voices and hear about what they’ve been learning and how they’ve put it all together. You laugh at incorrect word choice (some trying out a thesaurus- the wrong way!), you smile at their turn of phrase and your heart melts at their beautiful thought evolution. Other times you’re plain disappointed at the lack of effort or understanding (read engagement in their learning). It runs the gamut of the teenage condition- evolving nicely into a beautiful human being to the ego-driven, button-pushing-just-for-the-exhilarating-hell-of-it clown.

Yup, it’s a roller coaster ride. And one I wouldn’t trade for anything on this earth.

Teaching Religious Education means I have the joyous job of teaching all the soft skills; teamwork (respect for each other, working with the nerd/weirdo they wouldn’t be seen dead with in the canteen), leadership skills (learning about their strengths and unique talents to raise their confidence and self worth), communication skills and emotional intelligence (how do you really feel- exploring the tough topics and getting them to respond from their authentic selves), flexibility (teaching about how others see the world and the importance of acceptance)… I challenge them at every turn. I push them and provoke them desperately trying to get them to think.

And I gotta say folks, I'm a bit despairing. I truly worry for this generation.

I hope I'm wrong. I hope I’ve forgotten how enmeshed I was in my own anus at the same age, happily (well actually I was a pretty miserable teenager) engrossed in the minutiae of my own miniscule world of high school and who liked who and who was hating on whom… So trying to draw the heads out of the current crop of pubescents butts is an onerous task and one leaving me with the conclusion that perhaps I need to disappear back up my own fundament and save my time and energy.

But I won’t. Because that’s not the way I roll. I'm passionate about education and young people if you haven’t guessed.

It’s pretty horrifying to read essays that run like texts- using ‘u’ (yes they do), coz, cause (because), and informal language that reads like they speak. That’s not the way of essay writing. And before you say what does it matter, let me explain.

It shows a distinct lack of thinking. It’s merely stream of consciousness and blurting out opinions. It clearly demonstrates that no research has been undertaken. They are so wrapped in the protocols of social media platforms that they cannot disengage nor discern audience, purpose or even genre which is imperative in communication, particularly in the world of employment that they’re hopefully heading for.

You don’t expect the CEO to address the staff in memos with “Yo, BTW u been spotted parking in the rong slots yeah?

Judgements are made. Employment status is threatened. Clear communication is so limited that it’s an oxymoron. You just have to watch Outer Banks (it’s to keep up with the kids in my class- honestly) to know that language, as always with each generation, evolves to the point that those outside that generation are honestly flummoxed. It’s like watching a mystery- only the enigma is what the hell the campfire chat scene actually disclosed rather than the plot. That’s nothing new, but the lack of social education is.

Here’s where I'm going. Language has evolved over thousands of years. We’ve moved from the protolanguage to the modern version. Only now we’re regressing.

            “Protolanguage is generally characterised as having broad similarity to the language of young children and language trained apes: a confined vocabulary size, a focus on meanings related to concrete objects, actions, and attributes, and relatively free word order. Some theories have proposed that protolanguage was predominantly or entirely gestural (Corballis, 2017), but emerging consensus is that it was likely an integrated combination of speech and gesture, much like modern language (Kendon, 2017).”

And by gesture read emoji. Much of the social media world, including texts, is filled with emojis in lieu of actual words. It’s cute sure, but the whole regressing of language is becoming endemic.

I can’t tell you how many times in a lesson I have to ask if the kids know what a word means, and find they’ve no clue. They don’t read books any more. And I know that sounds like I'm being an old fuddy duddy (what the hell’s that miss?) but reading exposes you to a wide vocabulary. They don’t read.

When I were a young ’un when the teacher wheeled in the trolley with the television set on it, we were beside ourselves with joy that we’d be watching a movie. Do you know what the reaction is now? A groan (not about the tv – we have smart screens) but about the time. “How long does this go for?” 6 minutes. SIX MINUTES and they were complaining. They have the attention spans of gnats and I am not joking in the slightest. I have to leap around the classroom and change topics every 5 minutes with them to keep them engaged. Asking them to have a discussion on ANYTHING, even themselves, and you’d think I’d sprung a pop quiz on them about chromosomal disorders or a Scriptural analysis of Leviticus.

            “A language is not just words. It’s a culture, a tradition, a unification of a community, a whole history that creates what a community is. It’s all embodied in a language.” Noam Chomsky

It frightens me because this lack of vocabulary is turning point in their own growth and ability to express themselves.

When young people don’t engage in their own culture- or rather, limit their ‘culture’ to that of their peer group, not much is learned. There is no link to history and its lessons, the knowledge of elders, the value of traditions through rituals. In addition, as Manoush Zomorodi says, the imagination of young people is being seriously eroded- stuck on platforms and games all day- they are merely engaging with someone else’s imagination or agenda. There is little face to face communication- most young people don’t like making phone calls. They tell me it increases their anxiety. Without the cues of facial and physical gestures, the nuance of communication is lost. I notice too that social etiquette is vanishing; they have trouble holding a conversation, difficulty composing sentences, too used to speaking in the staccato bursts of emojis and cliches of the digital world. It’s like they can’t speak without their thumbs.

It’s impacting their thinking in that they’re not given time to think. Just consider when you go to the GP - the waiting room has a tv on and often a radio or piped music as well. When you go to a bar, the same; various screens and distractions around a place created for socialisation… Kids are bombarded with stimulus from womb to room. When walking round the lake the other day I saw the picture perfect family; mum, dad, babe in pram, dog walking toddler. Lovely. Out the in nature. Engaging with the world. And then the toddler gets tired so mum puts the toddler in the pram as well and hands him an ipad.

Wait, what? Or more importantly, WHY?

By the time we get them, they’ve got what looks like a genetic modification- a white growth on their ears so they resemble AI’s, listening to music, or watching YouTube on their phones. One funny snippet, music clip or viral video to the next without respite. They do not know how to entertain themselves. And again, I'm not being a fuddy duddy- it actually matters.

This constant bombardment of stimulus drains the brain’s processing ability. It makes kids tired and the brain has difficulty staying on target for long if they are listening to music, checking email, replying to texts all while supposedly working on assignments. Apparently there is no such thing as multi tasking (see Zomorodi above).

And what upsets me the most is that it is severely reducing their capacity to express themselves at their deepest level. So the most awe inspiring sunset is met with a “Cool”. Or the love of their life with a “she’s blaze”. In reducing their ability to express themselves they are shrinking their own world. Language opens up the world to the nuances of life and experience. Don’t forget we think in terms of language. I believe for example, that it’s the source for much violence in men- the inability to express themselves adequately leading to frustration and acting out because they don’t feel they’re being heard. Because they’re not. Because what they say is incomprehensible, simplistic and riddled with meaningless cliches or garbled adages gleaned off memes.

I think about that time I spent in Germany with a German family who didn’t speak English and all I had was the school girl version of their language. Communication was difficult to say the least. Our topics were reduced to the mundane because I simply didn’t have the capacity to wax lyrical with them about astronomy or American politics. Our conversations were cheapened to “yummy Nordhessische Ahle Wurscht, thanks.”

If you can’t express yourself to any great degree, you’re left with the risk of assumed understanding. “I know what you mean.” Do you? How can you know what I'm experiencing/thinking? Because even I don’t know because I simply don’t have the language to even articulate it to myself.

Education , gig economies and cotton mills in Bedfordshire

Did you know that the current education system was established over 260 years ago in order to feed the rise of the need for workers to drive the Industrial Revolution? It was aimed at producing compliant, reasonably educated people to work on the floor of factories and in administrative roles to drive the growth of said industry. These workers were required to be indoctrinated in the historical and hegemonic mores of the ruling classes to enforce their feudal worldview and keep them quietly acquiescent. Sanitised historical facts were touted to engender patriotism and a subservient agreement to the traditional roles, a subtle pride encouraged in the ideology of class and your valuable place in the New World. Soldiers for the New Frontier. It’s still happening in modern industry where long hours are expected in reward for being part of the shining system of Capitalism driven by your very own Company, a vital leader in the Business World and making lots of MONEY.

This gave rise to the lower class “Ruling Bosses” who whipped their little empires within the factory/ company into line with an iron fist. This false alliance with the powers that be might be fruitful by the granting of small accolades such as ‘employee of the month’ due to an increase in production. Profit was seen and is still seen, as the Holy Grail, even if at the price of cutting costs by increasing hours and accountability to the common workers.

And of course with the great technological progress machine in full throttle, just as Sarah Connor predicted, the machines eventually took over and the working class lost jobs by the droves. And thereby the dream of class mobility ended. No one much was going up except the profits of the owners of industry.

But the education system has not changed.

Despite there being few, if any manufacturing jobs anywhere but in third world countries, as those same magnates derived even greater profits by moving offshore to a cheaper labour force and the added bonus of massive tax avoidance.

Despite technological advances driving a workplace morphing into a behemoth in the service industries.

Despite being modelled on a system of long ago permanent jobs in the same firm for life. An employment situation that rarely exists in the new gig economy.

Despite the fact that the workplace is saturated with degreed youngsters with no place to go.

The refugee population used to be the one where you’d find a heart surgeon driving a cab because it’s the only job he could get because his qualifications were not recognised in his adoptive country. Now it’s the case of a degree is worthless if everyone’s got one, making the employment marketplace so highly competitive, it serves no one but employers. University graduates are left with aspirations to manage a McDonald’s.

A couple of colleagues and I were discussing what to do with the kids that don’t want to be here. Year after year we encounter those kids that have no interest at all in academic studies. And year after year we drag out the old tainted argument of what could you possibly do without an education?

Those kids who know what they want to do or at least have been lucky enough to discover something they enjoy know what path they wish to follow. They can make plans, explore options around which subjects to take to underpin their future direction. Within the demographic of my school at least, the kids are not without hope of getting a job.

But many have no idea what they want to do and have no interest in exploring the subjects they are required to take. Their literacy and often numeracy are low and they can barely write an essay; the format for much assessment. This is not the teacher’s fault; there is often a deeply ingrained and wilful refusal to learn. Many of these kids give up and will not engage. They don’t see the point. They are so far behind their peers that they settle into the role of class clown and agent provocateur during classes. They chronically engage in school avoidance, obviously condoned by parents who sign off on absences. Many fall into mental health issues with anxiety and depression prevalent in their mid teens.

We see this. We work with it. And it’s getting worse.

We’re all trapped in an outdated system and it’s crushing us; teachers who have to consistently deal with behaviour issues of bored and frustrated kids and those bored and frustrated kids themselves.

In the Netherlands, after 8 years of primary education, students are offered 3 choices for secondary education; vocational (4 years), general (5 years) and university preparatory (6 years). How eminently sensible of the Dutch. Trying to cram a car mechanic, park ranger, construction worker, landscaper, hairdresser, sports coach or beautician into an academic stream is preposterous. Everybody gets the shits.

In Finland “Ninety-three percent of Finns graduate from academic or vocational high schools.” Finland leads the world in educational achievements for students; valuing more than those positions that are favoured by the business world. It makes for a happier, healthier country.

In Australia, one in four high school students drop out of school.  

The system is broken. It is run by non-educators, bean counters, who know nothing about the fine art of education and view it as a number crunching exercise where piling on more requirements by way of curriculum and teacher improvement is the answer to a complex problem. Teaching is the most micro-managed profession in the world. By non-educators.

“Finland’s schools are publicly funded. The people in the government agencies running them, from national officials to local authorities, are educators, not business people, military leaders or career politicians. Every school has the same national goals and draws from the same pool of university-trained educators. The result is that a Finnish child has a good shot at getting the same quality education no matter whether he or she lives in a rural village or a university town. The differences between weakest and strongest students are the smallest in the world, according to the most recent survey by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).”

As Chris Hedges (Human Reform Politics) says, “We’ve bought the idea that education is about training and ‘success’, defined monetarily, rather than learning to think critically and challenge. We should not forget that the true purpose of education is to make minds, not careers.”

This is what it’s about. Teaching kids to be thinking citizens in a world that values them, not their use in the business world. We need all sorts of workers in this world and undervaluing those jobs and people who keep the world running, quietly, yet efficiently, does all of our society great harm.

Why oh why, can’t we adopt the same system here?! Kids act out because they’re unhappy. They’re unhappy because they are not being directed to where they need to be. It is not a matter of intelligence- they are many of them, just ask Gardner. And if you are a Naturalist or a Kinesthetic, the hallowed halls of Academia are not for you, yet the world needs you; builder, actor, farmer, conservationist…

Why are we so hell bent on maintaining an outmoded, outdated system of education that does little to arm kids for life in the real world instead of a cotton mill in Bedfordshire in 1832?

White Lies

In Counterpunch last week, was an article about the roots of white supremacy in the US. It could, I believe, apply almost equally here in Australia. It concerns a refrain I’ve heard before; “the white male is being vilified” as though under dire threat of extinction. Or the threat of Australia being taken over by ‘others’ as though there aren’t fifth generation Muslims or Asians here, only good old convict or Anglo stock. Why is it that funding minorities or seeking more equality for some groups is seen as a loss, as though the ‘fair’ pot is only so big and because white privilege is so entrenched in the (particularly male) psyche, it’s a threat to their right or way of life? It’s scarcity thinking- like the hoarding of toilet paper. And it’s fuelling male fury.

Perhaps the abomination in Atlanta this week comes under this umbrella when a poor white guy ‘had a really bad day’ and murdered 8 people. One article I read by Moira Donegan showed great insight which shed light on one of the causes of white male supremacy; that machismo is all about power and superiority- over ‘weaker’ men, women, ‘lesser races’… Attractive women caused Aaron Long to feel horny and as he couldn’t control it, it was their fault so they were disempowering him so they had to be punished. This is how cartels and gangs behave and think. He has no self control so his failure is externalised. His reputation is tarnished and punishment has to be meted out to maintain his ego.

Eight people died.

But as always, I digress. The article by Walden Bello is fascinating, tracing racist thinking back to John Locke’s economic and social philosophy that took such an ardent hold on the frontier consciousness and has, for every generation since, kept a stranglehold on our subconscious. And that’s when the trouble started…

You know how I know? Because I'm ashamed to say, that this very morning I awoke with a start, realising (from a dream perhaps) that I have always secretly assumed that men who have female children aren’t as ‘potent’ or virile as men who have male babies. That their testosterone is somehow deficient. Where. The. Fuck. Did. That. Come. From?

It’s been a quiet little seed at the back of my mind. A judgement pulled out when advised of the makeup of a man’s children’s gender. I'm ashamed. I admit it. You know I'm an ardent feminist or humanist…God, the hypocrisy. Perhaps I too would have beheaded Anne Boleyn because she couldn’t produce a male heir. But after reading Bello’s article, it suddenly hit home how wickedly subversive the unconscious is, peppering our deepest held biases with subliminal messages of long dead generations past.

Locke’s thinking, while enlightening and wondrous in many ways, was based on the assumption that individualism was freedom and that the capitalist dream was based on the sanctity of property ownership and was tied to the notion of taking the land for your own and ‘working it’.

“This attachment to individual ownership of small property is deeply embedded in the collective cultural psyche of America…”

It’s what the Great American Dream is based on, despite it being utter tosh for the past couple of generations. It applies equally to Australians. Not only must you grab this land (read suburban house and garden) and work religiously each weekend on its maintenance and upkeep, you also have to ensure that your neighbours do the same as part of the unspoken social contract. Because someone’s sloppy upkeep, (unmown lawns, rubbish, car bodies, discarded furniture…) is not only an eyesore which taints your morning constitutional with Brutus, but can bring down the house prices of the surrounding neighbourhood. It is fiercely contested in vicious verbal battles on the nature strip and in the small claims courts. We are at heart, Hartz’s “petit bourgeois settler” who still carries the peasant’s meagre desire to own a piece of land and fear the loss of that over any aspirations to accumulate more.

But the reality in today’s economy is that many will never own their own piece of settler’s paradise, doomed to forever renting or house sharing. Or horror, living with mum and dad til they kick the bucket and you can take over the last vestige of the generation who could buy their own homes and become land owning gentry yourself.

But something I didn’t know about Locke was his attitude to the Indigenous which flowered from the afore mentioned theory at the heart of Capitalist philosophy, tied as it is to the sanctity of land ownership by working the land:

“Locke saw the Native Americans as creatures who could not be considered property owners since they merely inhabited the land and forests but did not cultivate the soil... To Locke, in fact, the Native American could be equated with “one of those wild savage beasts with whom men can have no society nor security” and who “therefore may be destroyed as a lion or a tiger.” Locke thus provided a most potent ethical justification for racial genocide.”

So racism clearly embedded in the settler’s psyche (see the alliteration there? Tricky huh) becomes the norm as it so often does because, well everyone thinks this way. It’s the accepted wisdom by rule of numbers. Much like the Aussie version of Terra Nullius. And right here, people began to band by way of race instead of the afore practiced European class system.

But there’s something sensible in banding with your ‘class’. There is a shared experience that others can’t understand, hence the sistrenhood and brotherhood of the homeless for example. There’s less judgement and more understanding. It’s how the French Revolution happened- when enough women had lost enough babies to starvation, their shared grief galvanized a rush on the Bastille in fury at Louis’ blatant disregard to their suffering. As with most monarchs before him he was hell bent on enjoying the Divine Right of Rule but forgot all about the accompanying Divine Duty to his subjects. Rights + Responsiblities. Hand in hand. Matching pair. Quid Pro Quo. There is power in numbers to match the power of the ruling class- particularly in a Democracy when pissed off voters= political party beware. Seventy million people voted for Trump because they’re pissed off with the US political system. They were sadly misguided if they thought that a child of the ruling class would for two seconds consider their needs and act accordingly. But there you have it. Race versus class.

The poor whites will actually band with white rulers rather than risk the liberal left because they’re seen to be ousting them from their seat of paltry power and giving it to the Black people. Funny isn’t it. The ruling class are still running a feudal system but the peasants can’t see it. They’ll defend their little bit of tenement misery against the ‘invasion’ of Blacks even while the smiling white leaders cut their funding even more, forcing their kids out of decent education, leaving their parents outside the ER without private health insurance because somehow they have some perceived white privilege to lose.

It’s the Great White Lie and it’s fecking tragic.

Me Myself and I

What caught my eye this week (well actually last week but I didn’t post this til now) - apart from the horrors on the hill- was that many Americans are moving to Florida. You would think it was much the same reason that many Australians move to Queensland or to the coast- the warmer weather and more relaxed lifestyle, but no. Their main reason is to avoid paying taxes.

What?

When has this become such a thing? Why do we constantly hear about multi billion dollar industries moving offshore to avoid paying taxes? What’s that about? I know they’re run for profit, but really? Where is the ethical imperative of community in any of this?

Why are ‘rich people’ above an obligation to others?

Do people think that taxes go to the politicians? Do they believe that there’s some scam happening? Well let’s be honest, there probably is. But taxes are to support education, health, and infrastructure such as roads, garbage collection and disposal and til pretty recently, water and electricity (in some states). This has been a bit of a disaster apparently. I stumbled across this paper from 2002 by Melita Grant of Aid/Watch. The result of privatising water in Sydney was a disgraceful mismanagement.

“In 1998 when Sydney’s drinking water was contaminated with Giardia and Cryptosporidium, it was found that the management of the privately operated water treatment plant were aware of the outbreak days before the public were alerted.” And “What emerged……was a picture of a managing director unable to stand up to his chairman’s pressure and a chair more concerned about Sydney Water’s corporate performance than Sydney water drinkers.”

Profits.

That’s all they’re interested in. Even in the face of children getting ill.

US citizens would rather avoid paying ‘excessive’ taxes than support those worse off than themselves. And don’t think Aussies don’t do it too. Because they do. Everyone’s in to diddle the tax man.

But that’s what taxes are for. To pay for free education and healthcare so that just because you’re poor, doesn’t mean that you miss out on a decent education or good healthcare. I mean we all know what happens in the US- people without health insurance are turned away from hospitals and all too often die of illnesses that could have been treated.

How can you allow that to happen to your fellow sistren and brethren? You might not know them, but what does it say about your society? About you?

I remember a tv interview I saw last year. The reporter was asking the ‘man in the street’ what he thought of sacrificing the few to save the many- herd immunity type thing. He said it was sad, but he thought it was a good idea. The reporter then asked who should be chosen. He stumbled at that- like most of us- figuring that someone ‘in charge’ will look after us and make those awful decisions and we can carry on ordering online Bonds underwear and sipping lattes at our favourite café.

Then from around the corner, the reporting team, brought a group of people. The reporter asked should these people be ‘sacrificed’ for the greater good. He turned and was stunned. It was his own family.

We all think like that. Until we’re confronted with the reality of our rational decisions- it’s usually at others’ expense. And it’s those unseen others that is the issue. Those not considered ‘ours’. Just watch Walking Dead. Despite the gore, it’s actually a considered study of human behaviour and rationalisation. Rick Grimes is a doll… no I meant to say… the character is considered a ‘good man’  by his adopted family. He protects them to the death and ensures their health and safety at all times; no matter what it takes. He’s done some heinous things- murder most horrid- in the name of protecting his flock. And others that do the same are considered ‘bad’. Despite Americans’ obsession with the stark idea of the world consisting of ‘good guys v bad guys’, it’s a fascinating look at how humans justify their behaviour ‘for the greater good’. How ethics become blurred when the stakes are high. The vagaries of human motivation…Grimes’ clan struggle through this dilemma, each character a voice of conscience in turn. Asking those big questions- asking “is this who we really are?”

Is it okay to be part of a system that ensures psychopathic behaviour is rewarded? Ruthlessness in business is considered a desirable trait for corporate leadership- if you’re a shareholder. We all remember the cigarette industry’s blatant lying regarding the correlation between lung cancer and their product, Dieselgate and Samsung phones bursting into flames. And let’s not forget the guys who duped my 90 year old dad into spending $10,000 dollars of his life long savings on a new roof he didn’t need through frightening him about impending roof collapses. Or even the junkie down the road who regularly came to the door and told da he’d mowed his lawn and could he receive payment please. At least he said please. And at least he’s a junkie- he has a very urgent and personal motivation- I get that.

It is indeed the Age of Distraction.

We have stopped thinking.

We have stopped questioning anything, let alone spending a nanosecond on the big questions.

I find it in all my classes. Those kids who ‘don’t care about that’.

Until it’s too late.

We’re collecting money for Caritas at the moment during Lent. Of course you know the only kid who’s been putting in more money than anyone else- most don’t bother- it’s the kid who knows what it is to be hungry. The kid who’s seen horrors and know what trauma there is happening to other kids around the world every day. At this moment. He’s from Sudan.

Are we really all about Me, Myself and I or Mine?

Male toxicity

Yesterday’s Guardian featured an article about the culture of teenage boys and their treatment of girls. Specifically, this article’s investigation uncovered some 3000 testimonies of sexual assault among school age girls. One expert blamed pornography.

“According to an ABC investigation into the use of porn in Australia, the estimation is that more than 90% of boys and 60% of girls have seen online porn, and that 88% of the most popular porn includes physical aggression.”

Monkey see, monkey do. It’s little wonder if boys then begin to act out what they see on a regular basis, adults performing sex acts of violence against women ‘who love it’ or worse don’t. Children are unable to combat the strategy of titillation or discern between reality and fantasy.

A couple of years ago I took my year 9 class to see a talk by Brent Saunders, an ex policeman who runs a consulting firm that aims to eradicate bullying and sexual harassment. It was both an inspirational and terrifying talk. I learnt a lot about sexual assault myself.

When I was eight, I was sexually assaulted by two boys aged 10 and 15 (brothers) who were obviously in the throes of experimenting with their sexuality (at least the older brother was). I was held fast and molested to the satisfaction of my captors and released. In shock and confusion I told my parents, but as they were the children of family friends, it was all very embarrassing and was hushed up. I muddled along as best I could, alone in the experience that ‘didn’t happen’.

I have been under the naïve idea that misogyny had stopped with the advent of the 70’s. Apparently I was wrong.

Much of Saunders’ talk was based around what sexual assault actually is. He admitted that it was shocking to discover that most girls don’t know what it is and that many are stunned to discover that they weren’t just bullied, but that they had in fact been raped. It’s illegal. It’s a crime.

It is a theft of your human dignity and human right to the private sanctum of your own body and in addition, it annihilates your right to feel safe.

Rape is the penetration of the vagina by anything; penis, fingers or any other object against the will of the girl. If a girl is intoxicated, she is deemed by the law, to be incapable of giving consent. Many boys apparently also force young girls to commit acts of oral sex. Sometimes this is witnessed by other boys who do nothing to stop the act. They sit in the bystander role which is also against the law.

So we come to the prevalence of male toxicity; something I really had hoped had been drummed out of boys long ago. But it seems it’s still alive and well.

You only have to look at the leaders of our country and the allegations of rape in the bastion of our democracy- Parliament House. The ego driven environment of an all male culture is still prevalent today- look at the Church and its leaders’ failure to recognise the effects of rape, even on children, and complaints of a toxic male environment in the political sphere escaping from the Hill for decades.

Why does it seem that Australia is no further evolved than the male’s attachment to the Amygdala? This basic and primitive organ controls our response to fear and it seems, according to the article, that boys (and by media accounts, men) are still controlled by what other men think about their masculinity. Add to this the fact that one woman a week is killed in Australia in domestic violence cases and you begin to wonder what the hell is happening to our boys and men.

What is it about Australian male culture (some of it only of course) that is still so confused about who they are as men or what it means to be a man? Is it a lack of positive role modelling? Are boys so easily swayed by what others think of them, that they really can’t take a stand for themselves, because really, I find it impossible to think that more than a few boys have no empathy towards girls and merely see them as objects for their sexual gratification. Surely most boys have some sort of empathic response to their fellow humans.

In many Latin cultures, machismo is seen as the ideal of the male identity. Machismo is exaggerated male pride and results in a demand for subservience from anyone seen as inferior; women and ‘weaker’ men. As such some parts of Latin cultures often have a preponderance for violence towards the inferior species. As a result, femicide in Mexico alone is 10. A. Day.

When people talk about bringing unwanted aspects of culture to a new country, I get cross because it seems to be barely concealed racism. But when it comes to patriarchy and the idea that women are lesser, then I agree. But sadly, I don’t think we can blame any other culture. Because it’s already here.

I see it in the school yard with boys rough housing and smashing each other with glee. I see it in the leers of the young men as they watch and laugh at young female teachers and it terrifies me. I see one young man who wants to be alone, wander off and sit by himself and the mob gathers. One by one or in pairs they approach and taunt him mercilessly. What is that? Why do I have to intervene and drive them away?

I know boys and girls both enter single sex segregation during the teenage years in a bid to reinforce their identity but gender identity is a social construct. So what the hell are we constructing? Where are boys getting the message that machismo is all that matters? Not from me and not from the teachers at school so where does it come from? We all challenge bullying and biased behaviour of any kind. Perhaps at home it’s seen as funny or endearing or ‘boys will be boys’… But if boys are raping our girls and laughing about it, sharing images on social media to reinforce the ‘laugh’, something is seriously wrong my friends.

Have a watch of a TED talk by Joe Ehrmann- Be a Man. He says it all so well.

Men are beautiful. As an admirer of the hard and hairy compared to my soft and squishy, I love how they can be fiercely protective of those they love. As children my boys were so loving and affectionate. Now as men they are caring and thoughtful. Sometimes they are soft and squishy and it does not in any way detract from their masculinity. Why can’t all men be like that? Why can’t we all realise that we are human and we run the gamut on the vast spectrum of gender. It’s just a social construction and we need to re-evaluate what we are modelling and engendering in our male children- because as grown arse men, they can grow up to be horrifically dangerous if we don’t cut them some slack and allow them to be just human- in all its fantastic diverse and creative ways.

saving that one kid

This year I have at least 4-8 students with special needs in each class. The numbers have drastically risen over the last few years. We have what we call personal plans in place that the Inclusive Education department make available to teachers. These plans have various information such as diagnosis/es and recommendations for aiding the student in learning such as extra time to complete tasks, visual tools to accompany teaching, repeated instructions, chunking information etc.

But it takes time to get to know kids. By the time we have assessment due in weeks 6-8, and have a chance to actually evaluate the level of the student, much time has passed. With the pressure of curriculum requirements, teachers have little time to ‘waste’ other than on ensuring that the outcomes are met and necessary scaffolding information and skill sets taught to ensure students have a fair chance of accessing the curriculum and passing.

In every class, there are also students who are not diagnosed and therefore have no personal plan in place. Somehow we’re getting students in these higher years, that can’t even read (we had 2 last year in year 10). Our wonderful IE department as well as the ‘junior’ teachers are doing all they can but uncooperative parents who don’t wish to admit their child has learning difficulties are impeding not just our efforts, but the very future of their own children. These kids then of course act out. They hold beliefs that they’re stupid because they can’t keep up with the other students in their cohort. In turn they have no option but to either stay away from school (avoiders- aided by parental consent) or behavioural problem children who play the class clown and try to disrupt the learning of others. They see no value in education because ejucashun ain’t doin’ them no good.

These students take up valuable class time. They disrupt the rhythm of lesson teaching, distract other students and often press every button available to infuriate the teacher. Of course we have an arsenal of disciplinary tactics but have to run the gamut with each child before hitting on the right procedure for this particular kid. And we’re only human. Sometimes our compassion and professionalism is in short supply- sometimes we don’t get enough sleep, have personal problems, feel overwhelmed… and don’t reach the bar to which we aspire in all five lessons of every day.

While it’s the most rewarding of jobs, it’s also one of the most taxing. After the advent of Covid and home schooling, the world is finally beginning to see that educator is one of the most stressful jobs. It’s fast paced, unpredictable, highly variable (from a year 7 to 12 class, maths to Humanities lesson…) and requires something in the region of 1000 decisions a day to be made. And don’t forget we do it not for the money, but because we care. Like most undervalued vocations, people will always be attracted to the profession because it draws people who have high compassion and drive to help. These attributes are also stressors because we are driven to go above and beyond. And children’s lives MATTER.

Add into the mix that every year, there’s a couple of kids that we all know are in dire danger of not just falling through the cracks, but failing in life altogether. Those kids with highly challenging home lives and physical and mental disabilities or difficulties. Together with the onset of hormones, it becomes the perfect storm – a plunge into extreme behaviours and negative thinking.

All teachers want to ‘save’ this kid. We all do our best. You see these emotionally charged movies where some brave teacher goes out of their way to ‘save’ this troubled kid and moments of enlightenment hit the kid as the teacher imparts great wisdom that finally hits home and they walk off into the sunset with the kids future looking rosy and the teacher satisfied by a life saved… cue fade out.

They’re great movies no doubt, some based on true stories and really, that’s fantastic. But do you realise the reality of this endeavour? The long hours required of spending time with this kid, building trust and mutual respect, the dedication to consistency… The reality is that teachers are so time challenged that we have little time to spend on this one kid. We are teaching up to six classes with 25 or so kids in each. We have administrative obligations (ad nauseum), programs to formulate, evaluations to do, marking, reading, our own study and refining- it’s a highly cerebral job- and it’s not just that one kid in our class, but sometimes 8 that need our special attention. Not that all 8 are at risk but they do add to our workload and reservoir of concern.

It’s a fine balance too- we have obligations to our profession and protocols to adhere to. We are constantly under scrutiny (particularly if you’re a male) and are discouraged in spending ‘alone’ time with a student. Of course that’s right, but when else do you have time to talk to the troubled teenager, other than during out of class time? We have these talks in glassed rooms with the door open for all to see. We sometimes have to bring a witness into the room for our own protection. We become spur of the moment counsellors when a student admits thoughts of suicide or depression. Of course we hand it on to appropriate authorities, but in that moment of personal revelation, you hold the power to reinforce or reverse their thoughts by your fumbled words of solace and encouragement to see the world differently than they’re currently entertaining.

At the extreme, we hear whispered words of ‘we locked the cat in a cage for a few days because he was naughty’ and ‘I stood on the chicken’s neck and it stopped moving’. We smell cigarette smoke on children’s clothing (not their smoking) and know they’re being tirelessly ridiculed by classmates because they stink. We feed the kids who come to school with a hastily grabbed brown paper bag of chips for lunch, having had no breakfast either. We watch in horror as mum smacked out of her head drives her children home and mandatory reporting seems to have done nothing to help out these kids. And we quietly wait for our own school shooting from the kids we tried to help but the system and parents failed.

And when everything manages to come together, we miraculously do find time enough to ‘save’ that kid and let them know it’s not them, that they’re loved and lovable and when we all work together, something wonderful happens and the kid finds some sort of niche in the world. We all breathe a sigh of relief and remember all the lousy hours in class and at home, doing battle with that kid, worrying about that kid, networking for that kid, counselling that kid, hours spent talking to mum/dad about that kid. And they have finally made it through. Cue tears.

It does indeed take a village to raise a child.

And sometimes that one teacher to start the ball rolling.