A few weeks ago, I was informed I was not going to be part of a subject I always teach at school. I was taken aback first, because the client we had been working with, was beyond excited to see the strategies the students had come up with. As far as I knew, the students seemed really happy with the projects they had developed. The only thing I wasn't certain about was the same issue I had been encountering: the pairing of teachers for this college subject.
My suspicion first arose because I wasn't included in a mid-term meeting where all of the teachers discuss the progress of the strategic projects which made me uneasy but was actually, too busy with the projects to read much into it.
It turns out in this meeting, I was accused by other teachers of "not sharing" the research I dug up beforehand for every single client, foundation or project we had, and teachers conveyed they were left out of what seemed to them as a unilateral approach in teaching. That fact already there might have hinted the director of the department as of why I hadn't come to her with the same issue, that is: the lack of them sharing content with me, and that is simply and sadly, because in some cases, there wasn't any.
What they didn't know, was that for a year and a half, I had been analyzing closely these relationships and that I had facts that led me to believe why the esablished dynamic does not work out and why I had been so resistant to it. In this dynamic what is supposed to happen is that teachers allegedly share their knowledge to each other and deliver it together to the students as a team. Sounds idyllic right?
Yet what if the some of these teachers don't do their part? Come to class with... Nothing? Then in some acts of trying to deliver this message "together" you share for a few times what you think must be done in class but after a few classes, become tired of the other part not delivering anything at all? Why is it these teachers can't come up with anything you wonder... Some of them even resist your approach and expect for you to fail and instead they receive diplomas and recognition by the end of the year, and then and there, they speak of the vision for the projects or write of processes they don't certainly have a full idea (because in some cases, they were busy making presentations for personal projects while there were students and artisans working in a room), yet smile and wave to the cameras in symposiums, contests or design biennals?
For 3 years I was baffled by coordinators that had to be pushed to deliver what was promised to communities of artisans, that had to be constantly reminded that they needed to give grades to their students as they promised and while these students came to me for answers which I provided amidst high demand personal engagements, I had to witness how they ignored their students as they posted beautiful pictures of their vacations on their social media outlets.
I was outraged for three years, but the only thing that held me prisioner to that subject was the passion I engaged these projects with, I really loved the road trips to a Mexico I am always surprised with, of shaking dry, robust and skilled hands with artisans that move every natural resource to create colors, patterns and objects that speak of themselves in such poetry that sometimes it's hard to convey to an urban design student. Of meeting up with clients that don't believe can be shocked by what students can come up with, yet I could hear them gasping after some presentations or remember myself crying after some foundations were grateful for the small attempts of making a community slightly better.
Now I know, there are dark situations in academia, that there are things you are not supposed to write about because once you are deemed as a problematic teacher by a few adult bullies, that etiquette may (or may not) follow you around. Yet, I will always be uncomfortable to some people, because along these years, people that were first of all friends, quickly became enemies as they felt betrayed because I acted ethically towards what wasn't right in some occasions and clearly was in others, an abuse of power (it seemed their teaching agenda was disturbing their personal commitments). The fact I wasn't invited to express my opinions openly in this meeting, only conveyed other teachers the same message, which made them act upon it by doing nothing and left me experiencing the same frustration and lack of understanding regarding the absence of input towards the student's learning.
I don't regret a thing, and as painful as this learning was, I would do it all over again yet I would disengage of these college subjects faster, knowing some things don't change no matter if that lack of attention or respect falls on the students that await not opinions but informed creativity, that expect the best of you if you are supposed to ask the same from them and finally, I am so so grateful, because this process has made me a better teacher. I was not the same person I was four years ago. I know now, I have convictions and that I'm also willing to pay a price for them. I know now, there are always other options but that sometimes we tell each other stories to prevent us from moving away from "safety". But even better, that no matter how dark these zones of academia might be, I don't feel banned but spared from and that makes all the difference towards a curious spirit like mine. As Cerati sings: "Being able to say goodbye, means growing up."
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