Editor’s Note: this is the full original text of the column printed in the State Hornet.

I began working as a substitute teacher in Sacramento area schools in 1998. When I asked fifth graders to evaluate me, one answered succinctly, “he sucked,” which I saved with another’s “best teacher ever.” When I parted with second graders after trying with difficulty to be an adequate teacher for the first two weeks of the year, their heartfelt appreciation melted me. Struggle and redemption happen in classrooms every day.

Our public schools too often miss or suppress such connections and revelations. We have resorted to scripted, seat-bound instruction, segmented one thing from another and lost the magic of learning and play. Yet I deeply value the challenging, enlivening callings, richness and messiness of public education.

Students make you sigh, grumble, scream (or want to), feel speechless and sad, shake with disbelief and laughter, and marvel at their patience, good humor, intelligence and ingenuity. I have discovered new balance and resilience by trying, failing, recovering, trusting, and learning with them.

Over months in an after-school program, kindergarteners at Jedediah Smith Elementary wrapped me in their frustrations and tenderness. Jed Smith is a hardscrabble place tucked between housing projects and freeways, near one of the most advantaged elementary schools in Sacramento.

The schizophrenia of DaVinci Elementary reflects larger contradictions: a relatively healthy and integrated elementary school but a troubled middle school, caused by an exodus of the most motivated and brightest to touted Sutter Middle School in east Sacramento, leaving behind a vacuum filled by kids from turbulent lives in south Sacramento. Segregation, sanctioned and reinforced by the school system (we should pay attention to the impacts of those small magnet high schools that are gaining popularity), is all too alive and well in our community.

Learning the Ropes, Finding Challenges

I learned which assignments to avoid and choose when possible. I’ve had students throw things at me, threaten, taunt, fight, and walk out of the classroom with utter disregard for consequence or adult authority. I’ve witnessed fifth graders mocking me (and the principal) with middle fingers, at the “Success Academy” no less!

Some classrooms are very orderly and well prepared, others chaotic and sobering. I’ve encountered highly motivated, resourceful teachers and staff and endured those who are disorganized and generally unhelpful. I’ve subbed for many teachers that have helped make my work a pleasure and others I felt like reporting for child neglect.

I took on an extended assignment with a class that had been badly neglected by a veteran teacher who was going on medical leave, someone the site adminstrators had been unwilling or unable to deal with, thereby cheating the students. When I asked them what they wanted to change, their first word was “freedom.” We began to make changes and turn things around, but there was little show of interest or support from those in charge and the rug was soon pulled from under this intrepid change agent when I spoke up. It’s little wonder that so many teachers give up hope and leave the profession, given the environment in which they work daily. Just the other day, a teacher with a very rough class I endured thanked me for understanding her trials and why she was preparing to exit the classroom.

Many students come from seriously dysfunctional homes and neighborhoods. Teachers are grateful every day for adults who demonstrate a real dedication to their children and the schools but that gratitude is too often outweighed by frustration with those who are disinterested, dismissive and disruptive. Such adults tell children this enterprise of engaged learning is beyond them, a bother or worse, or simply does not matter. What a lesson and legacy for a lifetime.

I taught at Sacramento High School before St. Hope Corporation assumed control and returned in the fall to see how things had changed. There I found things in disarray with poor student behavior and morale, expressed concerns about conditions and how things were handled, and no longer sub for St. Hope. While I appreciate efforts to strengthen distressed schools, all who claim public resources and affect the larger community should be held accountable based on actions and results rather than promises or self-promotion as is too often the case.

Early this school year, I was assaulted by a high school student. The student was arrested by an on-campus Sacramento police officer, but I became a victim twice due to the way in which the situation was mishandled by the Sacramento City Unified School District.

This underscores the uncomfortable truth that we are meeting some rough and scary lives and the challenges of bureacratic incompetence and resistance that stymie needed change.

Toward New Realism, Movement for Change

In general, our public schools are not very inviting places, minimally supported and cared for. Low expectations are reflected in the physical environment that students and teachers experience every day. We can and should do much better.

Those in the system need to speak up and act more strongly, sharing power and responsibility in new kinds of partnerships. In the larger community, we (including those who have largely forsaken this system or taken it for granted) must make a greater investment ?” and not just in money – toward fundamental change.

We need to break the costly cycle of self-interest, stagnation, hype and disappointment that entangles our schools, find ways of building new realism and movement. Until we do, our society should expect to pay the high price for low achievers and unfulfilled promises.

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Ira Saletan can be reached at [email protected].