Mon 5 Feb 2007 @07:07
No, I didn’t lose a finger. I still have all ten and one in particular for the system most days….
So the other morning one of the administrative deans comes in during my second period class with a couple other guys in workclothes. They’re talking about the brackets that hold the TVs in the corner of the classrooms. One of the workers turns the bracket to the side and points. “See,” he says to the dean, “there should be another hole right here. Look at how loose this is.” And he shakes the TV.
“We can’t get even get our people to sweep the floors every day,” replies the dean. We’re not going to get them to go around and drill holes in all the brackets any time soon….” He signs the work order and leaves.
Now, all this is going on during my class. The students were working on their own but still, this is a distraction. A few minutes later they have my TV on a handtruck and start wheeling it toward the door. As an aside, one of them asks me, “So what’s wrong with your TV, sir?”
“I didn’t report a problem with my TV.”
“What?”
“I didn’t report a problem with my TV. I think Mr. O across the hall in 215 did. This is 216.”
He looks at the work order. “This says 216.” And they leave. With my TV.
I call the office. Please have the dean return to my room. He gets back a few minutes later. I explain that when they came in talking about a problem with brackets I didn’t realize they were there because they thought there was a problem with my TV. He confirms that it was indeed Mr. O that has a problem with his TV. “I could be playing golf instead of doing this,” he says….
But he gets on the phone and not long after the guys bring back my TV. But now they are reinstalling it during my third period class while I am trying to explain about the Architect’s Scale and how to read the fractions on it. [If you think high school students should already be able to read a scale divided into 16ths of an inch, I would not argue. However, I can also tell you that there is a large void between what we may think a high school student should be able to do and what they are usually capable of when they enter my classes....]
I don’t know if it was related to a bracket, but I did find out the next day that one of my colleagues was hit in the head by a falling TV earlier in the week. And I understand why that would be a more interesting topic of conversation. But if they had verified the information on the workorder before they interrupted my class and started removing my TV… well, I’d have one less story to blog so I guess it wasn’t all for nothing….
February 5th, 2007 at 21:15
Once upon a time, in the same system but at a different school, a worker came in to make some repairs on the roof directly above my classroom. He had to access the region through a very old trapdoor in my ceiling, which he did, and after he came back down into my classroom he refused to close the trapdoor, showing me the work order. “Didn’t say I had to close it,” he responded implacably, even after an assistant principal called the physical plant and demanded it be closed. (And it wasn’t just a simple matter of climbing a ladder and swinging it shut; it was a technical issue since that same worker had damaged the trapdoor on his ascent.) To sum up, another work order was issued for the Shutting of the Trap Door, to be commenced three days hence, but unfortunately an unseasonable storm swept through the region the following night, flooding the classroom and destroying two computers.
I’m just puzzled why you didn’t go all Jedi all over the idiot ganking your TV, or at least sic some freshmen on him.
Just sharing.
February 5th, 2007 at 21:43
Isn’t that how it usually is — people doing things or reacting to things because they’re misinformed? Frustrating I know. I deal with it daily as well.
I can’t believe they interrupted your classes though to handle this. I’m sure getting/keeping the attention from the students was a nice endeavor. ha!