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Kylee gave herself a shake and began clearing away dishes. “Ron, Principal Kidd and I, we’re just friends.”
“Best friends?”
“We used to be.” She turned on the faucet to wash away the excess jelly from a plate.
“Maybe now that you’re older, you could be more?”
Oh. Oh no. Oh no, no, no.
Was that what the mischievous look was all about? Was Molly trying to play matchmaker between her mom and the principal? Kylee had to nip that in the bud.
But by the time she’d turned around Molly was gone. She’d have a talking-to with her daughter soon enough because dating, much less marriage, was the last thing that was on her mind.
Chapter Six
Ron hated faculty meetings. He’d hated them when he was a teacher. He hated them even more as an administrator. Even now, when he was in charge of running the meeting, he wanted to be anywhere but in the school conference room.
He was constantly buried in paperwork, on the phone with concerned parents, getting an earful from teachers and their needs, facing issues with the school building itself, and then there were the kids. He’d rather be actively participating in any of those other activities than being trapped in an endless meeting.
Thankfully, the meeting was coming to a close. The teachers were all itching to get on the road before the rush hour hit. But when Mrs. Steen rose, a collective sigh rang around the room.
“We need to begin preparing for the state standardized tests,” said Mrs. Steen.
Jaws tensed, strained temples were rubbed, and tired eyes were rolled. For once Ron wasn’t the bad guy in the room. There was a perception that when a teacher left the classroom to join the Main Office they were going to the dark side. As if now he was on the wrong side of the force. But they were all on the same side with the same goals; to be a force for good for the children of their community.
Aside from the common ground of wanting their students to succeed, most teachers had little appreciation for standardized testing. The current state and national testing systems were more of a comparison made amongst schools than an assessment of student achievement and areas for improvement. So, in essence, the teachers were being tested.
“We all know the Board of Education wants data-driven results when it comes to testing,” Mrs. Steen continued.
“But that shouldn’t mean they can control what we do in our classroom,” said Mr. Collins, another veteran of the school system that had been around when Ron was a student in these halls himself. “We take up so much time preparing for these standardized tests we don’t have any time to actually teach.”
Ron agreed. In the span of two decades, education had changed so drastically. He’d taken a couple of standardized tests in his formative years. But they’d all been to collect data to help teachers teach better. None of them had determined how much funding his school would receive or give Barton a grade that prospective parents would weigh in deciding where they wanted their future students to attend. Certainly, none had determined the job security of his teachers or the entire school.
Nowadays principals were caught between the Board of Education who wanted data-driven results, the teachers who wanted control of their classrooms, and parents who wanted to see their kids succeed. But it was the new policy, and Ron had to push the policy.
“We need to have everyone handing in lesson plans every week to make sure all the children are getting an adequate education,” said Mrs. Steen.
“The requirement is not for weekly lesson plans,” Ron spoke up. “You can turn them in unit by unit.”
“But we need to be sure to evaluate.”
“There is no requirement to evaluate everyone’s lesson and make them similar,” said Ron. “Where you have a strength, Mr. Collins might have a weakness.”
“Weaknesses shouldn’t be tolerated when it comes to the future of our community,” she said.
“Forgive me,” said Ron. “Weakness is the wrong word. We all have our own strengths. If we use those strengths to teach the lesson, the children will get what they need.”
There was a rally of head nods and grunts of agreement. Ron had worked hard to earn the trust of the people gathered around. He’d worked with most of them for the last decade either being one of their students, helping in their classes as a teaching assistant during college, or being a colleague.
He may have been young, but he’d proven himself in the halls, conferences, and of course the endless meetings. They knew he understood where they were coming from and would have their interest at heart.
“We still have to evaluate the new test prep company,” said Mrs. Steen.
“We already have a prep company,” said Mr. Collins. “We’ve been with Here 2 Learn for the last five years.”
“And for the last two years, we’ve had problems with the company providing us outdated material, lessons that didn’t meet the competencies and late delivery of results.”
Half of the room nodded in agreement at Mrs. Steen’s assessment of the test prep company. The other half crossed their arms and fidgeted with the pens and papers in their hands, clearly uncomfortable with change.
