Why Should Anybody Care?

“Why do you care?” It wasn’t a particularly hostile question. It reflected a bit of puzzlement, a touch of boredom, perhaps an ounce of honest curiosity. He looked straight at me – there was perhaps a touch of contempt on his face. “Why do you care?”
I had passed out the assignment, explained that it was due at the end of the hour. This young man pushed the pages aside, left his book shut and took out his cell phone. That’s a major no-no in this school. I looked at the defiance on his face and decided that as a substitute I didn’t need to fight a losing war for possession.
I just said, “I didn’t see that phone; I don’t want to see it,” and I began to walk toward him. He looked at me and decided he didn’t want the battle either. He flipped it shut and closed his hand over it. I accepted a half victory and looked away.
He casually stood up and began walking around the room. “Sit down!” I said. He looked at me, then he turned and walked back to his seat, slipping the phone in his pocket. He just sat at his desk, looking bored. He was a coiled disruption just waiting to spring.
I called his name. “Would you please open your book and start your work?”
That’s when he looked back at me and asked the question. Why did I care? Why should he care? I’m sure the regular teacher (I know her) had warned him about flunking and all the possible academic consequences of doing no work. This leaves kids like him unfazed.
Middle class school, middle class expectations—which are slipping lower and lower. I don’t know what parents of these kids think they are going to do for a living. I don’t have an idea what the kids themselves think they’re going to do to pay their cell phone bills. If he didn’t care, why in the world should I or any other teacher care?
When I handed out the assignment, I saw another kid pick up the assignment and heard him say, not quite so sotto voce—the art of the whisper is almost completely lost in the modern classroom, “I ain’t gonna do this.” There were murmurs of assent all around him.
At the end of each hour that day, I found untouched and unused copies of the assignment lying on top of desks. During the hour they might sit there with the book open and the paper next to them, but at the end many had done nothing. I looked at several during the hour and asked them to start. Some said “Okay”, others gave an excuse why they hadn’t begun yet, a few ignored me.
Of course, in every class, there are as many as ten or so who sit quietly by themselves and work quietly all hour. They have completed assignments to hand in. But they are increasingly—whatever district I’m in—becoming an ever smaller minority.
I often feel guilty as a “sub” when I hear how loud the room is. Kids talk about sex, drugs, alcohol and rap music. They even plead to have the music turned on—“Our teacher always lets us”—and she or he probably does. I hear enough music from other rooms. When it’s on they just yell over top of it so I mostly leave it off. That’s less loud.
I also hear enough loud talking from other rooms when the door is left open. (Kids often ask to shut the door so their noise won’t be heard in the hall.) So I suspect that it isn’t just me. This is confirmed when one of the good students comes to me and asks to work in the hall. Mrs. Jones, I am informed, always lets me. “It’s too noisy in here.”
Occasionally another teacher is in the room to “team teach” with me or the regular teacher. Yesterday, the team teacher said to me, “I’ve never heard this room so quiet.” So I’m doing something half right.
But the question remains. Why do I care? Why should the regular teachers care (I hear them talk among themselves about thirty, forty, fifty percent failing)? If the kids don’t care, their folks don’t care, why should anybody care?
These are tomorrow’s voters, workers, leaders. That’s why we should care – and we’d better start soon. It’s a competitive and increasingly hostile world out there. They certainly aren’t going to care.