The System Is Serving Lunch
What I Learned At Professional Development Day
At least we got lunch.
The speaker our school’s regional parent company hired talked about Emotional Poverty, a term she coined, also the title of the book she wrote and self-published. Apparently she used to talk about financial poverty, but since she makes $20,000-$30,000 for each speaking engagement, well, at least she’s not a hypocrite.
In a time of pandemic isolation and systemic racism, gaping holes in the social fabric that have exposed things that educators need to talk about, a rich white lady with a book series and a catch phrase was a terrible choice.
Like a campaigning politician, she shared folksy anecdotes about stuff that happened to her, and, like Dr. Oz, pop science facts about how the human brain handles emotion.
While she spoke, I thought about how I’d rather be home, reading a book, or on a walk with my dog.
She had us trace our hands, the elementary school art class method of drawing a Thanksgiving turkey, on a page in her $30.00 book, left blank specifically for that purpose. It seemed like a cheap trick, and I forget what the point of it was. All I remember is I drew my thumb at an angle and it looked strange.
After a while I got bored, then, restless. Pretending I had to go to the bathroom, I walked out into the banquet facility’s ornate foyer and looked out the window at the cars in the parking lot.
I was getting paid for this. We all were. Does that make us complicit? Am I even allowed to complain?
By mid-afternoon, she wrapped it up. Our applause was perfunctory, tinged with relief. A day misspent in so many ways, and for the life of me, I could not see my place or the place of the students I serve anywhere in it.
My takeaway was cynicism and a cookie I thought was chocolate chip but turned out to be oatmeal raisin. I was disappointed but ate it anyway, which is precisely how the system continues to operate.