Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

Cold As Ice: Update #3, The Posse

This series began with its first post February 4. Updates quickly followed: #1 on February 6; #2 on February 9. Now we are ready for Update , the deputizing of college campus police to enforce immigration law.

How fitting that when we think of undocumented immigrants coming across the southern border, we think of the American West with its images of deserts, sand, river gorges, buttes, cowboys, cattle, shallow rivers, watering holes, cottonwood trees, and bluebonnets. I suppose I should mention tumbleweed as well, an illegal alien from Russia, that invaded in the latter half of the nineteenth century, but well, tumbleweed is Russian so that illicit crossing of our nation’s borders is probably okay with the Trump administration.

Part of that nostalgic view of the West is the traveling judge holding court in the local saloon to deal out justice according to his idea of the law. Attorneys not being around, frontier justice was presented as a rough sort of justice enforced by a local sheriff and the men he chose to deputize.

Completing the picture was the outlaw, sometimes a loner but often part of a gang. The sheriff gathered a posse when outlaws were in the area to ride out and bring them in for whatever justice the sheriff had in mind. Printed posters proclaimed in loud, large letters: WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE.

While it is debatable as to whether that remembrance is more 1950s Hollywood than the historical reality, what is not debatable is that vision underlies the deputization of local police and other law enforcement agencies to act as ICE agents under deputizing agreements.

From a TV show.

Florida (state motto: where every bad idea is born) leads the way. The governor, senate president, and house speaker had squabbled over what to do when the governor called a special session to ramp up immigration law enforcement. In the end, during a succeeding special session, they enacted a law to force local law enforcement to assist with ICE and immigration enforcement by screening individuals for their status when they are detained or pulled over for a traffic stop.

This effort has now reached Florida’s college campuses. Florida Atlantic University, University of South Florida, and the flagship campus University of Florida are seeking to enter into deputy agreements with federal authorities. Other universities are joining them, including Jacksonville’s University of North Florida.

Joshua Glanzer, spokesperson for FAU, said this, “We are simply following guidance from the Governor’s Feb. 19 directive to state law enforcement agencies, of which FAUPD and other state university police departments are included.”

Under a 287(g) task force model, such as the agreement being pursued by the University of Florida, participating officers would have the authority to interrogate “any alien or person believed to be an alien” about their right to remain in the country, as well as the power to make arrests without a warrant in some cases.

https://www.news4jax.com/news/florida/2025/04/14/florida-universities-to-deputize-campus-police-for-immigration-enforcement/

Students have a different viewpoint from their universities. This new ability is making them feel unsafe and unable to participate in normal campus activities or access other campus resources students need like counseling or health care.

ICE says racial profiling is forbidden under its guidelines for local law enforcement, but let’s tell the truth. Racial profiling is a characteristic of the new administration’s policies overseen by Stephen Miller, Deputy Chief of Staff.

One worries that she could be pulled over on the flimsiest of excuses because a campus officer may decide that she doesn’t look like she belongs here, i.e., in the U.S and will be detained. What will happen then? (As if we don’t know.)

She cannot be the only one.

But the officers are being deputized and their posse is riding to root out undocumented immigrant students. This is the new reality descending upon Florida’s college campuses.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 11

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Investigate. Figure out things for yourself. Spend more time with long articles. Subsidize investigative journalism by subscribing to print media. Realize that some of what is on the internet is there to harm you. Learn about sites that investigate propaganda campaigns (some of which come from abroad.) Take responsibility for what you communicate to others.

Back in 2011, Florida enacted a law requiring teacher evaluations to be based on test score data and eliminating ‘tenure’ in favor of annual contracts that could be non-renewed for any reason or no reason at all.

Few teachers paid attention until 2014 when the law took effect. At that time, teachers in my building were upset, mad, and demanding to know when it happened. I replied, “Three years ago. I tried to tell you.”

I know the risk of uttering any criticism of teachers, but sometimes we are our own worst enemies. Investigate. Figure things out for yourself. Get active. Understand what’s going on. Raise your voice. Monitor the legislative sessions in your state and what laws are proposed. Your livelihood depends on it. Stop voting for people who want to take away every protection you have. Stop voting for people whose end goal is to demolish the career you have chosen. Stop voting for people who see you as Public Enemy No. 1.

Think about your professional development. You are your own expert. Keep learning; keep striving to be a better teacher, whether it is gaining new content knowledge or perfecting your craft as a teacher.

Subscribe to a few professional journals. Read the magazines your union sends you. It’s not all business or organizing; unions sponsor research into best teaching practices. I have found many good ideas in the publications of NEA and AFT.

Read books. Don’t rely solely on your district for your professional growth. Much of what they do is to enable them to reach district goals, which center on school grades, not what you need to be a better educator.

Be careful of what you find on social media/the internet. There are good ideas and materials on sites like TeachersPayTeachers, but some of it is plagiarized and some of it is schlock. Don’t be lazy; write your own lesson plans even if they are only in your head. Many district lesson plan templates exist to document compliance with legal obligations or district requirements. Don’t be afraid to force the template to record your plan as you intend to teach the lesson.

Responsibility for what we teach is inherent in our professional standing. Justifying bad practice by pointing to the district curriculum is bad practice. The next generation is depending upon their teachers. Let’s not fail them.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 10

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Believe in truth. To abandon facts is to abandon freedom. If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis upon which to do so. If nothing is true, then all is spectacle. The biggest wallet pays for the most blinding lights.

Knowledge is gained from a search for truth. While educators cannot hand off a philosophical truth to students, they guide them on their way as they help them to learn about and understand the world they are living in.

As Snyder aptly points out, we cannot abandon facts. Water boils at 212 degrees … at sea level anyway. At higher altitudes, water boils at lower temperatures. As educators, our job is to help students learn not only basic facts, but understand the nuance that can surround them.

Good ol’ science working out how to know water’s boiling point with all the variables involved.

Facts combined with nuance in their application becomes truth. Truth without underlying facts is useless and most often is a form of falsehood/propaganda. Pilate famously asked Jesus, “What is truth?”

Educators help children find it. With the truth, democracy and freedom are preserved for another generation. That is why education is under an onslaught to destroy it or remake it, especially America’s universities. Those who would replace our democracy with an autocracy want to suppress all criticism.

Why is it that the most heated conflicts over schoolhouse curriculum is social studies? Why are certain truths regarding the treatment of Black people, indigenous people, and others being removed in favor of a one-sided story glorifying white superiority? Why can’t we tell the full story of America, the good, the bad, and the ugly?

Because power does not want to be criticized and because power uses fear to suppress ideas that compete with its ideology.

We, as educators, need to equip students with the skills they need to question and critique what Kellyanne Conway notoriously dubbed ‘alternate facts.’ We need to equip students with the skills they need to articulate truth with the facts that underly it.

Otherwise, all is spectacle. Sports, Friday Night Lights, concerts, and plays are an important part of school, but if there is nothing else like literature, mathematics, and science plus history and civics, then they become only spectacle. Together, the electives form an essential part of the curriculum; alone, nothing but spectacle.

Ancient Rome was comprised of a few oligarchs (the senate), an emperor (actually, a military dictatorship with hereditary succession,) and the masses of workers and slaves. There was a reason Rome provided the masses with bread and circuses. The empire lasted longer than the original monarchy or the republic. The emperor had the biggest wallet and arranged for the most blinding lights. Those lights kept the masses from revolting.

As educators, our duty is to help our students turn down the lights and see the stars that twinkle in the sky and will continue to shine regardless of what we do to our society. That is a truth that will outlast us.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 9

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Be kind to our language. Avoid pronouncing the phrases everyone does. Think up your own way of speaking, even if only to convey that thing you think everyone is saying. Make an effort to separate yourself from the internet. Read books.

Take that, Science of Reading*! Read books.

Up yours, Achieve 3000**! Read books.

Forget your shortcuts, Cliff Notes and the online/digital knock-offs! Read books.

As for you, Sal Khan*** … read books.

Read books.

Several years ago, my district decided to change the ELA curriculum. They bought a boatload of paperback novels for teachers to use. Because of budget restrictions, they only bought enough for each teacher to have a classroom set.

The students did not read the novels in full. They read excerpts and then tried to answer questions as the Common Core had taken hold and reading a full book for the enriching experience was something schools no longer had time for. The district specialists who designed the program couldn’t understand why children would want to read a whole book.

BUT THEY DID. The selected books must have been interesting because the ELA teachers reported in team meetings that the kids were begging to take the books home so they could read the entire story.

Nope, nope, nopity, nope. The teachers couldn’t let them borrow the book, not even overnight. Maybe it was some of the language. One teacher reported that her students loved the F-bombs in the text only to be told she was supposed to direct the students to read around those parts.

Out of touch doesn’t begin to describe it. That’s why the best instructional coaches tried to teach summer school–they wanted to keep the actual classroom experience real. The district of course had other ideas. They did not look at summer school as an educational experience for teacher and student; they thought it was a reward for teachers to give up their summer break to earn a few paltry dollars. The district showed their true colors when they cut fully funded positions because the enrollment did not meet projections.

Back to the point. Read books in their entirety. Let students read a full book; require it. Immerse them in the text, the story, and their imagination.

If you don’t, stop griping about falling performance. Do the right thing. Read books. Let the students read books and you will get back to the rest of the lesson that everyone of us, including students, needs to develop our own voice.

That means reading, but not scrolling down the social media feed.

That means reading, but not posting the funny meme that five thousand people have already shared.

That means to read books and then, in your excitement, share quotes or takeaways.

Read books.

*Science of Reading is a movement to teach elementary school children using phonics as the primary and sole method. For background information, read Nancy Bailey or Tom Ultican.

**Achieve 3000 is an online test-prep program for middle and high school students in which they read excerpts and answer questions.

***Sal Khan created Khan Academy, an online edutech program and product. He might have had the best of intentions when he started it but has since fallen into a reformster mode, particularly in steering the program toward participation in College Board exams and the use of AI.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 8

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Stand out. Someone has to. It’s easy to follow along. It can feel strange to do or say something different. But without that unease, there is no freedom. Remember Rosa Parks. The moment you set an example, the spell of the status quo is broken, and others will follow.

Speak up for students. Someone has to. It’s easy to pretend they are data points and these days, it can feel strange to do or say something different. Do it anyway. Break the spell. Let others follow even as you know many will not. But why should that stop you?

Every teacher who has worked in a public school setting has sat through dreary meetings that endlessly chew over student test results (code word: data,) that promote the trick-of-the-month (code phrase: admin spent school money to go to a conference and has to justify the expense,) or that require teachers to do nothing more than keep their mouths shut as district personnel tell them what to do (code phrase: I hate kids. Never going back to the classroom.)

Speak up for the students. Keep it professional; don’t give in to the impulse to make it personal or get upset. Stay focused on what counts–>student learning and growth, true learning and growth, and dismiss the flawed proxy of test results.

As said in a previous post in this series, this doesn’t mean being combative or going postal. It means speaking up when it’s needed.

Many years ago, I sat in a shared-governance meeting and one of the topics was student tardiness to class. Lots of brainstorming took place along punitive lines. What do we do to students when they are late to class so they will be on time?

I wasn’t a member of the committee and sat silently until the debate reached a lull. Moreover, this was my first year at this school. My goal that year was to keep my head down and build relationships in the building. But I raised my hand. “Am I allowed to speak?”

The chair, a fellow teacher and building rep for the union, said yes.

“Let’s look at gym class. My building has planning that period. The P.E. teachers send the students into the lockers early enough to shower and change and then wait for the bell to signal the next class. Except we have turned off the bells.

“They don’t know when to go to class. There’s no clock in the waiting area. Some of them come into the building only to be yelled at that it’s not time yet and go back to the P.E. area. They comply.

“Waiting around, they do what kids do: play, gather in groups, talk, laugh, and horse around. They are not keeping track of time and again, there is no clock for them to look at.”

“Then, someone yells at them to go to class. They are late. Teachers grumble and threaten referrals for being tardy. But how are the students supposed to know that?”

It’s not easy for me to speak up and confront people. I’m not psychologically built that way. It’s a lot easier to write and post 🙂 But somebody had to say something.

My last principal took note how my nervousness showed through in the sound of my voice. But in his view, that gave me authenticity, what I was willing to suffer in order to speak an unpopular view. It gave me more authority, not less, as an educator speaking out for students.

When somebody has to say something, stand out. Be that person. You may not have an appreciative administrator, but do it anyway. Set the example, break the spell, and see those who will follow.

P.S.: After that meeting, many people came to me to express their appreciation for what I said regarding the tardy students. The most common comment was, “Awesome.” Others do follow.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 7

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Be reflective if you must be armed. If you carry a weapon in public service, may God bless you and keep you. But know that evils of the past involved policemen and soldiers finding themselves, one day, doing irregular things. Be ready to say no.

I don’t know when School Resource Officers showed up in high schools, then middle schools. I do remember when my district’s SROs were given elementary schools to which they would pay random, unannounced visits. That was in the aftermath of Parkland, which took place in February 2018.

The role of the SRO is to enforce the law. In reality, the SRO has a wider role within the school. The best ones use their presence to be visible among the students and cultivate positive relationships. They work with the principal even though they have their own chain of command to answer to. They add another layer of safety when they are doing the job right.

SROs play a detrimental role when they do things like introduce themselves to the faculty by an email announcing that everyone is breaking the law in the way they make a left-hand turn into the parking lot with a citation of a non-existent city ordinance. Also, if they approach their job by sitting in their office all day.

As the law enforcement contact on property, they play a crucial role in determining when to arrest students and assessing threats.

However, because they possess a weapon of lethal force, they must be aware of when its use is necessary, how they would recognize those circumstances, and think ahead about how they would react. We assume that is a part of the rigorous training they undergo.

But what happens when they have to interact with other agencies? With the current administration authorizing ICE agents to go into schools, SROs have to be ready to say no and refuse cooperation if the agents are acting unlawfully.

A few short years ago, state legislatures were enacting laws to allow teachers to carry guns. For any teacher in one of those states who now carries, ponder the words of Timothy Snyder. Why are you armed? When would you draw your weapon? Under what circumstances would you fire your weapon and at whom?

Could you ever find yourself doing “irregular things?” Are you ready to say no?

Search deeply for the answers. There is no human deceit as great as that of self-deceit.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 6

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Be wary of paramilitaries. When the men with the guns who have always claimed to be against the system start wearing uniforms and marching with torches and pictures of a leader, the end is nigh. When the pro-leader paramilitary and the official police and military intermingle, the end has come.

We need to rewrite those first sentences to make an analogy for educators. After all, no extralegal authorities are strolling our schools’ hallways–at least, not yet.

Be wary of astroturfed community groups. When the people with a political agenda who have always claimed to be against public schools start wearing the same t-shirts and showing up at school board meetings marching in lockstep, the end is nigh. When they take seats on the school board and hire like-minded superintendents, the end has come.

Oh, Duval! You are low-hanging fruit for this post. But I have bigger fish to fry. Lest you think that’s a mixed metaphor, feast your eyes on this.

Yum?

Moms for Liberty, anyone? Other groups who use the public comment portion of a school board meeting to tag team a reading of passages from a book they consider obscene? But they are not satisfied with performative politics on the outside.

They are running for office. Most places, a few individuals may win, but they don’t grab control of the school board. In some places (Duval, cough, cough) they find success.

When federal and state authorities conspire together to castrate their respective Departments of Education, the end has come. Linda McMahon is such a disappointment. Given her background in the pro wrestling biz, we know the outcome is scripted but at least there should be a good show.

Kitty litter boxes for furries, slandering teachers as groomers and pedophiles, and faking outrage over the issue du jour, they are riding their high horses into positions of power.

We are left to ask, “Has the end come?”

You know the answer.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 5

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Remember professional ethics. When political leaders set a negative example, professional commitments to just practice become more important. It is hard to subvert a rule-of-law state without lawyers, or to hold show trials without judges. Authoritarians need obedient public servants, and concentration camp directors seek businessmen interested in cheap labor.

What are ethics? According to dictionary.com, ethics are “the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group, culture, etc.” Also, “a system of moral principles.”

Most states have ethical codes for teachers. You can find Florida’s here. It’s subdivided into three categories regarding obligations to students, the public, and the profession.

Florida’s code of educator ethics is based upon the model code developed by the NEA (National Education Association.) It’s based upon an educator’s obligations to students and the profession.

Among the ethical obligations are not to restrain the freedom to learn even that experienced through independent action, to ensure equal opportunity for all, allow access to varying points of view, and not to suppress or distort subject matter so as not to impede a student’s progress in learning.

Living through these dystopian times, aren’t we seeing the subversion of quality education as these ethical obligations are plowed under much as a Deere harvester machine mows, threshes, and leaves the residue behind for a plow to turn under the ground?

Public schools, despite all the attempts to end them, have stubbornly held on. Much of that has come as educators have resisted the reforms that have worked to park students in front of computers for the entire school day (independent action NOT,) resegregate schoolhouses through the use of charter schools and targeted marketing (equal opportunity NOT,) script curriculums and assign test preparation that steer students to the one allowed answer (varying points of view NOT,) and remove books from school libraries, suppress Black history courses, and eliminate anything other than Lost Cause-inspired views of history (suppress or distort subject matter YES.)

“When political leaders set a negative example, professional commitments to just practice become more important.” Educators following the ethical code must maintain their ethical commitments and follow through as necessary.

No one is saying this is easy, but no one is saying that it means being combative or self-righteous as an educator goes about her daily work. Every educator has to determine how to navigate the path they are on. Authoritarians come in many guises and they work on many levels in a district’s bureaucracy. The first thing an educator can do is learn how to recognize them.

Then, resist. Don’t be an obedient public servant. What form and action that takes depends upon an educator and their circumstances. But don’t become complicit and a tool of the forces decimating public education. The ethical commitment to students and the profession demand it.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 4

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Take responsibility for the face of the world. The symbols of today enable the reality of tomorrow. Notice the swastikas and other symbols of hate. Do not look away, and do not get used to them. Remove them yourself and set an example for others to do so. (Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny, Chapter 4.)

The symbols of hate are around you because our students are as divided as we are. Do not look away.

I’m not going to define for you symbols of hate. You know what they are. But I will share a few memories from my teaching career that show division.

Black Lives Matter did not begin with the killing of George Floyd. The movement came into being after the killing of Trayvon Martin and the subsequent acquittal of George Zimmerman. Sometime afterward, the clapback began with Blue Lives Matter (police.)

This played out in one of my classes. One boy felt strongly about supporting the police, wore blue silicon bracelets, and other items that made his feelings clear. Other students took exception and muttered in the back of the classroom about how they were offended. It became one more problem for classroom management and keeping the peace.

We were supposed to be the safe school, the one where a large LGBTQ+ community existed and teens could find their people. Yet, there were students on the other side of that culture war. I was always on the lookout for brewing trouble.

Teenagers have a talent whereby they can say things to their peers just loud enough to be heard by their target, but not the teacher. They can act in passive-aggressive ways to stay out of trouble. There was an incident in another classroom where a LGBTQ student was getting more and more upset. The alert teacher realized she was being bullied by the student next to her and moved to intervene.

I have had a student complain about bits of pencil being thrown at him. The offenders were careful to do it in a way that I would not see. Being alerted, I then caught them at it.

The symbols of hate that show up in school are not always tangible. We, as educators, have to be on the alert and not look away. We cannot dismiss divisiveness in our classrooms as not belonging in our subject area, for example, math or science. We have to address it.

Sometimes, that means taking a student aside for a quiet conversation about what they are doing and that it won’t be tolerated. Sometimes, that means a conference to facilitate communication and provide a means for students to understand one another. Sometimes, that means consulting with the school counselors to get a bigger picture. If there’s one adult in the building who has knowledge about the undercurrents, it’s the counselor.

It can mean setting the tone for the classroom and making it a place of mutual respect. At the beginning of every school year, I worked to establish my mathematics classroom as a place where it was okay to make mistakes, even encouraging students to make mistakes because that is how humans learn: experimentation, failure, and reflection on better or different ways to approach a problem.

Students would put solutions to problems on the whiteboard. I never said right or wrong. I asked the class to give feedback. “Do we agree on this solution? Or does someone have an alternative to propose?” The best classes happened when students disagreed on the solution and through the back-and-forth came up with the correct answer.

Hate is best met with openness and discussion with others. This is the approach of restorative justice, a process that some unfamiliar adults condemn, because they do not understand it and what it can and cannot do. That makes it ripe for culture war issues.

The culture wars, a neat little euphemism we’ve used for decades to we can avoid the reality of the division and hatred inherent in the phrase, attitudes, and actions of those who engage.

“Take responsibility for the face of the world.” What we do today sets the stage for what people do tomorrow. If we are to put aside the divisiveness and hate, which is not to say that we cannot disagree on matters of little and great importance, we know what we need to do: tone down the rhetoric, stop trolling on social media, and talk reasonably with others, not hyperbolically.

School is a good place to start.

Posted on by grumpyoldteacher

On Tyranny: Lessons for Educators 3

Reflections on the short yet deep book of Timothy Snyder.

Beware one-party states. The parties that remade states and suppressed rivals were not omnipotent from the start. They exploited a historic moment to make political life impossible for their opponents. So support the multi-party system and defend the rules of democratic elections. Vote in local and state elections while you can. Consider running for office. (Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny, Chapter 3)

I suppose I could write this post in one word: FLORIDA.

Florida, a state now suffering under super-majority Republican rule, which means the Democrats still in office cannot use the few privileges of a minority party to stop bad laws.

Combine that with a governor who pushed the power and reach of his office to unprecedented levels, who cowed the super-majority into supporting his policies and ambitions, and you have a state beyond the control of the people because the radical Republicans have hopelessly gerrymandered the state into an enduring network of fiefdoms. This despite the fact that Florida has Fair Districts Amendments in its constitution. See here for an explanation of how the amendments work and the shenanigans that followed.

I am disappointed in the impotence, ineffectiveness, and incompetence in the current Democratic leadership to form an effective opposition to Republican steamrolling both nationally and statewide. I have been ready to switch my registration back to NPA, but then I thought, if I live in a one-party state, maybe I should grit my teeth and register Republican because the real choice to be made is in the primary.

But I cannot stomach that thought or take that action. In the afterlife, I don’t want to have to explain why I got into bed with devils.

What has been the effect of this one-party state, one with the most extreme of radical educational reformers destroyers?

  • Unlimited vouchers most of which now go to people who already were paying for the children to attend private or parochial schools.
  • Book-banning in which the school library is restricted to only those books that contain the correct thinking.
  • Abstinence-only sex education for adolescents, which has been shown to impair health and increase unwanted pregnancy.
  • A testing regime that goes on and on even when it has lost its purpose.
  • The casting aside of elected officials on the flimsiest of excuses, a phenomenon that cannot have escaped the notice of elected school board members.
  • A state school board made up of sycophants and toadies, whose only purpose is to serve coffee and donuts and receive marching orders written on napkins.
  • A take-over of universities, all for the purpose of purging academic freedom that goes back 1000 years to the first centers of education and for pillaging the finances and rewarding presidents, whose only qualification consists in shouting, “Hear, here,” to the governor.
  • A state mired in mediocre or worse academic achievement in its schools no matter how loudly it blasts the success of the Florida model.

Beware one-party states, America. Don’t be Florida.