Someone asked me recently to share my Teach For America experience with her friend. I ended up writing QUITE A LOT. I thought maybe it was worth saving. On my original blog -- Gretchen Adventures (aka my single girl blog) -- I chronicled my TFA experience as well (which shows newest posts first).
I'm not sure what you're looking for but here's my experience. I'll
preface with saying that I wasn't the usual recruit; most are fresh out
of undergrad, I was 26 and had been working as an event planner at UO
for years after finishing a MA in English from OSU. And as I was
applying, I was in a major car accident.
I'd always been interested in teaching,
and almost pursued a MAT after my BA but was unsure so I pursued a MA so
I could get teaching experience at the college level. After a few years
of working a stressful and hectic job, and mentoring (which I found very rewarding) I decided I wanted to find my
true career and Teach For America had all the aspects I was looking for
-- a path into teaching where I'd gain experience while earning money, a
chance to move to a new part of country and experience new culture, an
ambitious program centered on student success, and a way to make a
difference on a larger scale.
I was accepted in 2008 to teach in
the Rio Grande Valley, Texas, which was one of my top choices. TFA only
recruits and trains and sets up interviews (which recruits basically
have to accept if offered the job); I was originally hired to teach 7th
grade writing at a middle school in the west part of the RGV, which is
very rural. There's actually a strong TFA group of maybe 15 teachers who
all live on the same street and have a pretty tight knit community. I
was very excited about this since my MA focus was Rhetoric &
Composition.
The first week in TFA is an orientation to the area. I
moved my stuff into a storage unit and spent a week living in dorms at a
college in Edinburgh while attending some Welcome to TFA seminars. They
educate you about the program and your responsibilities, basically that
you work for the school district, pursue your emergency teaching
credentials the first year, and maintain data/goals of your students'
progress for TFA. TFA provides an adviser who is supposed to be a
specialist in your subject area and oversees your progress. After that
week, it's the month-long teacher training (or bootcamp), which is
regional, so we went to Houston where we studied with 2008 TFA recruits
for a few other regions (Hawaii, Houston, St Louis...). And there, we
lived in dorms and split the day teaching summer school in our
subject/grade level and taking courses on everything from grading to
discipline. There too we had an adviser and met with our adviser group
daily as well.
The bootcamp, in my experience, was awful. It's
completely overwhelming. I caught a bus at 6:30am (the earliest one
because our school was the farthest out) to the middle school campus
where I taught and we had our classes. The day was busy every moment and
when we returned to dorms around 5pm each night, there was really only
time to eat dinner and start on our homework. It's a 4-wk teaching
course for which we had to practice our overall goal and course
planning, and create daily lesson plans in a very specific TFA format.
What I generally found was that we had these very time consuming
homework assignments, often that we didn't know how to do, then a day
after we turned them in, we'd receive a whole day of lessons on how to
do that thing. TFA preaches not to set students up to fail but not
teaching them something before testing, yet that's exactly what it felt
like they did. My friend and I also were scolded for working on lesson
plans together, despite the fact that we were both teaching 6th grade
writing across the hall from each other during the same period; we
thought that it would be helpful to compare how each classroom received
the lesson, and honestly there was so much to do, it also helped to
split the work. PLUS isn't the whole goal of teaching really about
collaboration?! Teachers borrow from each other, and lesson plans, ALL
THE TIME. But I guess their point was they wanted to be sure we could
independently handle it; I still disagree.
The other tough part
was the underlying culture of TFA. It is all truly very ambitious,
successful, competitive, driven recruits, most fresh out of
undergraduate education who, frankly, aren't phased by staying up all
night to finish an assignment. One friend who had researched TFA very
thoroughly before he joined said that he'd read the common denominator
in recruits is that they are people with a proven track record of not
quitting, despite what they were up against. I found there was a lot of
judgment, a lot of one-up'ing and competition. And it's very
frowned-upon to say anything very critical of the program. There's a
real Pollyanna attitude and those I saw struggle (including myself)
didn't get a lot of true support. And it was completely the norm to only
sleep 3-5 hrs a night. I was so stressed, I was generally nauseous and
barely ate.
Another
difficult part of TFA is that TFA basically lies out a continuum that
goes something like: teacher effort --> teacher action --> student
inspiration --> student effort --> student success. And TFA
DRILLS that relentlessly into recruits. Maybe it's meant to feel
empowering, like as a teacher, my effort is the direct cause of my
students succeeding. But taken in reverse, it means that my students
failing is a direct result of my failure as a teacher. Which I heard
over and over and over again from recruits. "Your students aren't
motivated to do their homework? It's because you haven't tried hard
enough as their teacher to inspire them." It was one of the most
frustrating and counter-productive messages.
After the institute,
you return to your region and for a week, TFA puts you in dorms so you
can find housing. In my case though, while we were at institute, my
position was cut at the middle school so I had no job. The RGV region
serves cities that span a 2-hr drive west to east, with McAllen as the
major and central city. And because we weren't allowed to pursue our own
interviews, I had to wait for TFA to find interviews for me. So while
others found apartments, got settled, and even traveled or visited home
during a few wks we had off, I sat in coffeeshops and slept on floors
waiting for interviews while living off my savings. I hadn't qualified
for much of a transitional loan or grant because I had been working and
did have money in savings. It was really depressing and discouraging. We
also had a hurricane, which was interesting. Then we were supposed to
be working on our year-long classroom goals and objectives and term
plans. But because I didn't have a placement, and didn't know if I'd be
teaching 6th grade or 12th grade, I really struggled to make a plan that
felt coherent.
About 2wks before school started, I finally felt
the need to be somewhat settled and gambled that if I got an apartment
in McAllen with one of the last available female TFA teachers who hadn't
yet found housing, I'd at least be central. So I signed a year contract
and the next day, TFA got me an interview at a 9th-grade-only campus in
San Benito, which was an hour east; they offered me the job and I
basically had to accept it. My English dept there was 5 teachers- 1 was a
1st-yr local, 2 of us were 1st-yr TFA, and the other 2 were 2nd-yr TFA,
one of which was my mentor teacher. She was basically no help because
every time I asked for help, she'd reply that she really hadn't been a
very good teacher her first year. Our dept head was an administrator who
had never taught English and hadn't actually taught in the classroom in
about 30yrs.
The 9th-grade-only campus had 900 students and a
mile down the road was the 10-12gr campus, where the graduating class
was only 300. In 2008, for the students who failed 9th English (or more
9th classes), instead of passing them to the other campus with their
classmates and just bussing them back to the 9th campus to retake 9th
English, which they'd done in previous years, they decided to retain
those kids at the 9th campus with the incoming 9th graders; the flunkees
would take both 9th and 10th English at the 9th campus so that in 11th,
they could be caught back up with their original class. The kids found
out only a few wks before school and very upset. I was the only English
teacher teaching both 9th and 10th grade English at the school, and they
never would give me the contact information of the 10th grade English
teachers at the other campus so I could get some lesson plans and make
sure those students would keep up with their peers. They were the lowest
priority. Whenever I asked my dept head for advice because I had no
lesson plans for 10th grade, she just advised building lesson plans
around the 9th grade state test (which was one of the major standardized
tests in Tx, and because of No Child Left Behind was a huge priority
for school funding). So basically her advice was to focus my instruction
on teaching 10th grade students how to succeed on the 9th grade
standardized test that had actually nothing to do with whether or not
they pass 9th grade. Not fostering an appreciation for literature, or
making sure they even can read at grade level, but teaching to the test.
To students some of whom were 17 yrs old, still in 9th grade, and were
in gangs or were teen parents.
We had only a classroom set of 9th
grade textbooks, which we had to use in class because I had 4 or 5
classes of 9th graders and only 40 books, and the school library only
had single class sets of novels. So if I'd wanted to teach a novel, I'd
have to had rotated which class was reading the novel so they could
check them out, which I barely was able to put together one year or
semester plan for one class, let alone 4-5 plus my two 10th-grd classes.
I also struggled with discipline in the classroom, particularly
the 10th graders who had been at that campus the prior year, so if they
didn't know I was a 1st yr teacher, they knew I was at least new to the
school. A lot of the students were in and out of in school suspension,
or were happy when they got sent to this bootcamp school in town, in
which they did have to go on morning drills/runs but otherwise were
mainly unsupervised to work on computers and not do the classwork that
their regular teachers would have to put together and send to them. In
my class of about 20 students, usually 10 would talk at the same time.
Literally the only day I was able to get through an entire lesson plan
was the day I asked the vice principal to sit in my classroom because I
couldn't control the kids. And I was a middle-class
blonde-haired/blue-eyed gringa who only understood basic Spanish and
definitely not border-Spanish so they took advantage of that. And my TFA
adviser had taught 6th graders so when I asked his advice, he said
stickers and incentives worked really well when he'd taught; no joke,
1/4 of my students would get high in the bathroom just before class-
what incentive exactly am I supposed to offer them? I was shocked by how
little my 9th-10th graders knew. I was shocked by how little resources
there were. I was shocked by the lack of support or much concern I felt
from my mentors/administrators. And I was shocked by the lack of resources. I was shocked by how inept and powerless I felt. I shouldn't have been because TFA does try to warn/scare you initially.
I never felt
like I had time to get ahead of just preparing for the next day. In
hindsight, I think I would have really benefited from doing a MAT
program and having a mentor teacher really guide me through the process.
And I say that having been a GTA teaching Writing 121 at Oregon State
and having almost no oversight and my only requirement being that I
teach 3 essays; I designed my whole course, selected readings, etc, on
my own there, but really struggled to do it in TFA. The TFA lesson plan
that we were required to complete every day was also very time
consuming, linking everything to an objective that was linked to state
goals and having an instruction/demonstration/practice/test
comprehension format in every lesson (which, my classes were 50 minutes
long, so it was very challenging), plus copies of every handout and all
of it organized in a binder so that at any one moment, someone could
come in to observe and know exactly what you were doing nearly by the
minute. Plus I had inclusion special education students who needed
modified materials that I had to submit to the inclusion teachers for a
whole week ahead so they would know what I was doing and could better
help those students in my classroom. Plus if any students were in
trouble and sent to either in school suspension or the bootcamp, I had
only a few days to prepare anywhere from 1-4 wks of lessons for that
student to complete. And given that I was hired 2wks before school, and
one full week of in-service, I never got ahead and was generally always
being slightly scolded for being late with my assignments.
And on a
personal note, the one hour commute each morning and night was a huge
time suck; and a week into the school year, my roommate decided she
hated our apartment complex and wanted to break our lease (which was
going to cost around $1500) or to have me live with a male TFA teacher
who I wasn't comfortable with so she could move out. Basically I was at
the point that I cried most of the drive to school, started crying in
between almost all my classes, and cried most of the evening in
frustration and anxiety and loneliness and disappointment. I've never
been so miserable. I would say I was slightly suicidal, as were my two
closest TFA friends ironically- one of whom relapsed and was drinking
during the schoolday after a few years of sobriety (and eventually was
allowed to transfer to Minneapolis where she is from and where there was
an AA program) and the other whom quit after her 1st year and returned
home to Ohio to work in social work.
Also I'm not entirely sure
how much my car accident, and I think undiagnosed brain trauma, was a
factor at that time, though I really didn't feel like myself until about
2yrs after that. Additionally, I ended a 4y long dating relationship
(which fine, it should've ended sooner, but it was an adjustment) to
join TFA and though I'd lived in other states during summers, had never
lived outside of Oregon. So granted I'm sure some of my experience was
personality and life experience related.
I also think, and this
was my observation based on my experience there, that the culture of the
RGV is a very tight-knit, family-oriented hispanic culture. It's not
that parents don't want their children to succeed. Of course they do.
It's not even that the kids don't want to succeed; they're 14 yo and
interested in Tx Friday night lights football games and maybe think of
college as a possibility. But ultimately I heard a lot of "I want to go
away to college then move back here to be with my family." And there is
not a majority of educated individuals there who have the knowledge to
even know how to guide their children in applying to college, or for
loans, etc. It seemed that a lot of the kids saw their future as
graduating high school then working in the family business, or in the
fields (or, I heard from some, drug running). College for many was such a
pipe dream and seemed so unattainable, and they barely even knew anyone
who'd been to college who could give them guidance. It was just an
eye-opener for me and I felt a bit helpless.
So this will sound
like I lasted awhile. In truth, it was just over a month. And then I
knew I just couldn't keep it going. TFA recommended therapy, but that
would've been 1/wk at best and I'd have had to take time out of the
classroom to do so. It just seemed like it would've been too little
almost too late for me. When I went to talk with TFA, they kept me in a
conference room for nearly 5hrs talking to me about what 3 small goals I
could make so that Monday morning, my life would be totally different,
like maybe I could spend all day Sunday just filing my students'
homework because I hadn't had time to do that. And they used EVERY trick
in the book to convince me to stay. Threats about paying back my
transitional loan (which was about $3000) in 60 days. Letting down my
students. Letting down the other teachers. Letting myself down.
Regretting it forever. Not sticking it out when I'd stuck out everything
else. They even told me that the regional director had made a list of
the top recruits to keep an eye on (out of 100 of us or so), and I was
at the top of the list of those who they were concerned about failing.
Thanks, helpful. In the end, I decided that I needed to leave, so I gave
my notice at the school but had to keep teaching until they found my
replacement.
Luckily, my position was the result of a veteran
teacher who'd wanted to take an extra year of maternity leave. They
begged her to take my position and she agreed. She had taught my
10th-grade students before, had their respect as a local at least. And
when I showed her around the classroom and explained the systems I'd put
in place, how things were running that year, she actually said to me
"wow, this is not how things were when I left. Things are a disaster. No
wonder you want to leave. This is totally disfunctional. I don't blame
you for quitting." So I left, was ostracized by almost all of my TFA
friends (because it's basically like going awol in the middle of the
war), and moved back to Oregon. I usually don't mention my experience
when I meet other former TFA teachers because I find the social
interaction is really a bit challenged; I'm on TFA's blacklist and
theirs too. But honestly, nearly every day, I'm overwhelmed with
gratitude that I'm not in Texas any longer. I ended up many thousands of
dollars in debt; and I returned to my event planning job at UO but
working remotely from my hometown because I had to move home to my
parents' house. But it led me to where I am today.
If I knew when I
was joining what I knew now, okay yes I still would've done it, because
now I am happily married and have a beautiful son and perhaps would not
have been on that path if not for that TFA experience. Plus now I know
how low life can be. And that I have absolutely no interest in classroom
teaching. I also think I'm not extroverted enough to feel comfortable
leading a classroom, which I should've known about myself sooner but you
try and learn. I don't think TFA is a bad program but I have serious
concerns about some of their practices. I think their heart is in the
right place, though I do question if it isn't a bit of a disservice to
send inexperienced young adults (albeit ambitious) to teach the most
underserved, challenged and needy populations of students.
Sorry
for the long report but obviously I did learn a bit from my experience. I
would never discourage anyone from joining but would encourage to
really do so with open eyes. TFA does try to scare recruits with some
challenging stories, but not of those who end up quitting. TFA keeps
track of EVERYTHING recruits do. They have data on everything. But they
never shared with us the divorce-from-TFA rate. Just kinda interesting. I actually have wondered/suspected that if I had been able to stay in my original placement in the west valley, I might have lasted because I'd have had more of the peer support I needed. But I'll never know. And ya know, thankfully so :)
