By Patti Casey / For The Herald
As soon as kindergartener Andy walked into the General Music room in late October, I knew we were going to be in for a ride.
He dropped his teacher’s hand at the door and immediately went off on an exploratory mission to find every instrument that could be tapped on, (including those that had not been put out for the lesson), a stray pencil and a wall to draw on, and stacked band chairs to climb onto and under.
My repeated requests to come take hands and join us in a circle were met with silence, and although not a defiant glare, he did sit himself firmly in the center of the room and remove his shoes and socks. I assumed I had a kindergartener who was still learning student-like behaviors, even at the two-month mark.
Andy — I’ve changed his name — was not new to this school, but I was; hired for a limited eight-week engagement as the substitute teacher of record in general music for a school that was too large for a single specialist to cover. My classes had had a rotating door of subs since the start of the year, not all of whom were musically trained.
As a sub, I had no background information on any of my students, no stack of Individual Educational Plans (IEPs) to read as a guide to abilities and behaviors, and no other music teacher to consult with who’d had Andy’s class at the start of the year. I am a long-experienced teacher and have a wealth of materials and techniques in my bag of tricks, but most importantly, I have my hard-won National Board Certification training as a resource.
There is general agreement that the most impactful assurance of student learning is the teacher in the room.
National Board-Certified Teachers are inculcated with the necessity and techniques needed to see each and every child and address their needs, and the state of Washington responded to this level of professionalism by legislating a stipend for those who achieve this very rigorous gold-standard certification.
My concerns about Andy only grew over time, so I located the Learning Support teacher and requested Andy’s IEP synopsis, asked his classroom teacher for a meeting, and arranged to have a box of “alternative learning” activities available if the 30-minute music lesson was just too long for this child. I began to document to the building administrators, the classroom teacher, and the district special education consultant my continuing behavior and safety concerns for Andy, and his lack of engagement in learning. Substitute teachers who work on a daily basis by definition do not normally go into this level of depth regarding a single student, but I was to be there for two months and, more crucially, my national board training demanded that response from me.
And in fact, every child in the state of Washington deserves a board-certified-caliber teacher in their corner! We are one of the top states in the nation in this statistic, with more than 12,400 such teachers, many in high-poverty schools. Teachers have made a considerable investment to earn National Board Cerfification status, both financially and in the full year of rigorous writing and self-reflection of teaching practice necessary to achieve this certification. We are needed now more than ever; many students are still in a covid learning lag, while others have more intense societal and family situations that make learning a challenge, more so than in previous years.
It is the paramount duty of the state to fully fund education. The Legislature has difficult budgetary decisions to make but should fulfill their promise to the state’s NBCT corps to honor their hard work and sacrifice by continuing the stipend for this achievement as part of that full funding.
Andy, and all his classmates state-wide, deserve nothing less.
Patti Casey is a music educator and nationally certified teacher and worked for the Edmonds School District.
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