Aharon Levi and Meira Levi
We are back again, discussing general studies in our
schools, but this time we are jumping into the deep end. Before we start, a
little background information: I am in my second year of teaching, and my
father has been teaching in yeshivos for more than 20 years. Sometimes, I come
home at the end of my day and talk shop with my father, and as it turns out,
many of the questions and issues he has dealt with (and continues to deal with)
are the very same ones I come home with.
Meira: I have one word for you: behavior.
Aharon: I was dreading this topic. We all know there is a
problem. There have been articles, books, panel discussions, administrative
meetings, and more on this topic. We all have a sense of what is going on and
what the issues are, but can we really affect any changes? Before we jump in,
perhaps we can define the precise issue that we are dealing with: Why has it
become “normal” behavior to misbehave in general studies classes? While veteran
teachers have established themselves, new teachers, non-Jewish teachers, and
non-frum teachers can be subjected to behavior that borders on cruel. Why is it
acceptable that if a teacher is “bad,” it is okay to misbehave, to talk, to
cause problems – even parents seem to take this attitude. And what are we, the
teachers or the parents (who care), supposed to do about it?
Meira: Last year was my first year teaching, and I was
assigned two very different classes. As a new teacher, I listened to all the
advice, took notes, and came prepared. In one of my classes everything went
well; all the preparation paid off. I had a lesson plan, and I had a
disciplinary plan. My teaching was on point, and my classroom management was
excellent. Then came my other class. The girls simply would not cooperate. I
asked for help from the administration, I took steps to deal with misbehaving
students, I called parents, I created incentives – but their only mission was
to destroy the educational process whenever and however they could.
Aharon: Sometimes no amount of classroom management techniques
will help. Often, a particular class (regardless of the teacher) gets a
reputation: everyone knows that ninth grade science is a joke. Sometimes it’s
the teacher, and the kids will say, “You have so-in-so? That class is simple;
he doesn’t care what you do in class.” Even worse, it’s the entire school: “They
don’t care about general studies at all at that yeshiva.”
Meira: That’s how I felt. It didn’t feel like it was anything
I was doing or not doing; rather, it seemed more structural or systemic.
Aharon: It’s cultural.
Meira: Yes, the culture of the school and the culture of the
classroom define the parameters of student behavior. I also find that a
particular clique or cohort can define the cultural attitudes in a particular
class, much as celebrities define popular styles in the general culture of
society. In my “good” class, the culture was one of achievement; the
expectations were that students would sit in the chairs, take notes, ask
questions by raising their hands, study for the tests, etc. Of course, there
were misbehaving students, but their behavior was limited to the context of the
classroom. I had students passing notes, chewing gum, calling out, etc., each
of which I was prepared for and was able to deal with. In the other class,
though, the culture was one of not caring. The class was deemed extra or
unnecessary, and so the students talked endlessly, did not sit in their seats,
and did not pay attention.
Aharon: One piece of advice I give new teachers is to create an
atmosphere of excellence. By establishing a culture of achievement in the
classroom, many of the disciplinary challenges disappear. In the 1990s, New
York City police commissioner William Bratton used a similar approach to
fighting crime; the methods he used were based on a theory called “broken windows theory,” introduced by
social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling. The theory is based on
the observation that “if a window in a building is broken and is left un-repaired,
all the rest of the windows will soon be broken. This is as true in nice
neighborhoods as in rundown ones. Window breaking does not necessarily occur on
a large scale because some areas are inhabited by determined window breakers
whereas others are populated by window lovers; rather, one un-repaired broken
window is a signal that no one cares, and so breaking more windows costs
nothing.”
Their approach to crime fighting was to remove graffiti
and more strictly enforce laws against subway fare evasion, public drinking,
and public urination. The idea was to change the overall feeling of the city.
As a result, not only did rates of petty crime fall, but rates of serious crime
also fell dramatically, not just in the immediate aftermath of their efforts
but also for the following decade. Culture can be hard to change, both for the
bad and for the good.
Meira: Shimon Waronker used that exact strategy as principal
to turn around the Jordan L. Mott School (Junior High School 22) in New York. The school had been listed as one of the
12 most violent in New York, with abysmal attendance and graduation rates and
substandard scores in math and English. There were active gangs, fights that
led to hospitalizations, and drug and alcohol use on campus. Waronker brought in social workers, guidance counselors, and
psychologists and expelled and suspended many students. One-on-one tutoring and
smaller classes were instituted, and field trips and library time became the
norm. He built new science labs and made sure each classroom had books and
laptops.
Aharon: Those ideas were not new. Others had already increased
school resources with little improvement. In fact, Waronker joined JHS-22 in
November of 2004 as its seventh principal in two years. Officials in New York
had thrown a lot of money at the problem and sent in expert after expert, to no
avail. Where the others had failed, though, Waronker succeeded. By the time he
left, in 2008, the school was no longer on the city’s most dangerous list.
Attendance was above 90 percent for the first time in years, and the school was
on a trajectory toward success.
Meira: Waronker understood that it was not just about making
school safe or about adding books and computers. It was about changing
attitudes.
Aharon: He created an atmosphere of self-respect and personal
responsibility among students that led to their desire to achieve. He
introduced a school uniform, painted over graffiti, replaced broken bulletin
boards, met personally with students and parents, and even had students
apologize during their breaks to other students for their misdeeds during
class.
Meira: So, we have a cultural problem in our schools. We
simply do not care enough about general studies to establish the proper framework
that effectively communicates to our children that what we are doing matters. I
am very happy to have a job, and I believe that I do it well, but a girl right
out of seminary is not exactly the most qualified to teach.
Aharon: Likewise. I have been teaching for over two decades,
but I do not have a teaching degree. I do not have any formal training besides
the professional development that the schools attempt every now and then. And
while we both might be good at our jobs there are many teachers who are not.
Meira: I think the schools make an effort to mentor new
teachers and make sure they are given the support they need to try to be
successful; nevertheless, the students seem to be hearing something different.
It is the comparison between kodesh (Jewish)
and chol (secular) subjects that
creates the damaging messages.
Aharon: Absolutely. It is not just that general studies are
less important than Torah subjects. It is the message that Torah subjects are
the only ones that matter. I am not suggesting that Torah subjects are not, but
it is inevitable that students will internalize this to mean that general
studies classes are merely a waste of time. This problem is exacerbated in
yeshivos where the primacy of Torah is often stressed repeatedly to the
exclusion of all else.
Meira: Teachers, parents, and administrators need to better
communicate the idea that Torah is important without relegating general studies
to the trash bin. It is not enough to ask the teachers to employ better
classroom management techniques; we must address it as a community, as a
school, and as parents.
Aharon: I once suggested to a principal of a yeshiva that if he
wanted to change the atmosphere of general studies, he should ask the rebbeim
to walk the corridors of the school during the afternoon for the first few
weeks of class. That simple act of letting the students see that they care, of
letting the students know that someone they care about is watching them and
taking note of what is going on in general studies would go a long way. The
principal responded that the rebbeim would never agree to it.
Aharon and Meira:
This issue is tied into so many others that it seems impossible to untangle. It
is tied into the caliber of our teachers, the feeling that general studies is unimportant,
the struggles of parents to guide their children toward proper behavior after a
very long day, and the already high price tag of tuition, among many other
factors. But if we truly want to address the situation (and that is a big if)
it will take more than professional development, more than classroom management
techniques, more than mussar shmoozen.
We will need to shift our underlying beliefs about what is and is not
acceptable during class and be willing to act on those beliefs in a more comprehensive
manner.
