Trust

 Morale amongst my fellow teachers is as low as I can recall. Some of this is because we have never come to terms with the real trauma Covid inflected on us. Teachers were "frontline" workers, but we weren't really treated as such. In fact, for many public school teachers, they were actively attacked for trying to look out for their and their student's health. It wasn't that bad here, but there was a strong sense of "We aren't going to be remote, no matter what you want or care for in your own personal health." Last January in particular was a decision made to simply white knuckle our way through it.

However, at least in our school, a lot of faculty anger comes from a farrago of bullshit decrees and mandates that come from school administration. Hours of "professional development" that could have been condensed into a few bullet points. Oversight of aspects of our teaching that never existed before. Regulations and requirements that we never had before.

All of this creates an atmosphere that the school's trustees and administration does not trust us to be professionals. 

Weird example: I was told I had to get fingerprinted for a background check. I've worked here for 23 years. Were they worried that I was not me? If they want to run a background check every three years, OK. We work with kids, so I guess I get it. But they need my fingerprints for this? I was fingerprinted when I started here. When I got them done, the Campus Safety officer who did them informed me that I was grandfathered into the new state rules, but that the Board wanted it done anyway. Sure, I lost a half hour, but in the end, that's just a half hour. It was the sense that I was somehow I needed extra scrutiny despite decades of service to the school.

Similarly, that same day, we got an email about outside work and how that can't interfere with or leverage your relationship to the school. I've read AP exams before, and they wanted a record of that. I guess? No one really knows. Apparently someone, somewhere was violating this rule. Perhaps intentionally, but more likely not. What I do know is that a sizable number of faculty members were asked to catalog any work they did that wasn't specifically school related. Again, we don't trust you.

Why does this matter? Because the school only functions when the faculty are trusted to do their jobs. What's more, the school only functions because the faculty are relied on to exhibit a sense of voluntary zeal for work outside that which is mentioned in our hire letter (we don't even have a contract). "Can someone chaperone a dance at another school?" "Can someone run a workshop on MLK Day?" "Can someone host international students over break?" One of our wrestlers was hurt last night and was in the ER until midnight. My assistant coach stayed with the wrestler until another faculty member - who was assigned as "emergency driver" came to relieve him - four hours later.

As I alit on this observation, it also occurred to me that this is true of America and the world as a whole right now. There is a terrible lack of trust in each other.

Trump voters don't trust me, because they think I'm secretly out to make America a Gay Socialist Woke Hellhole. I don't trust Trump voters, because...<waves hands at everything>. The breakdown in institutions is less about the institutions themselves than about our trust in each other. A sizable number of Americans no longer trust basic medicine.

I don't really have any observation beyond that at this point, but it strikes me as fundamental to our current problems.