Abstract:

In her job on a project that brings technology into a community, Laura Reasoner Jones learns that there are expected hierarchies of communication. "Each person has something to contribute. No one is more equal than anyone else," she says.

Jones, L.R. (2004). I don't have any 'people.' Teacher Leaders Network diaries. Retrieved from the Teacher Leaders Network 11 Apr 2008. Link: http://www.teacherleaders.org/old_site/diaries04_05/LJ43_04_05.html

Full Text:

I Don't Have Any "People"

"All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others."
George Orwell, Animal Farm

Recently, as I go to more and more meetings and meet more and more people in the upper levels of the school system, I have noticed that my new position puts me in a different place on the educational food chain.

I am definitely lower.

When I was teaching, and I won awards or presented at conferences on encouraging girls in math and science, I talked with certain people on an equal basis, or at least what I felt was equal. I had something to say that they came to hear, or they were there to honor me; we had friendly conversations that usually picked up where the previous award ceremony or conference had left off. Or we made contact to work on the issues at hand. It worked well.

Now that has all changed. It would be really humorous to watch, if it didn't privately enrage me at times. Now I have been politely and directly told that 'equals' talk to 'equals.' This doesn't happen in my office, thank goodness, but it is clear that when I am outside this office, I am not ever to directly contact people with titles; I am to go through their administrative help. It is "Have your people contact my people." Except—I don't have any "people."

Now you could say, "Who does she think she is, wanting to talk to high-ranking people about 'unimportant' things?" I guess I think I am still the same person I was six months ago, when I wanted to talk to the same high-ranking people and was able to.

Thrones speak to thrones. I could never live in Great Britain.

I guess this feeling of frustration is a Midwestern thing. Or maybe it comes from years of working in special education. But in my eyes, every person's life has value.  

This conundrum became more apparent to me before school let out as I stood in the back of the crowded old gym at the elementary school where I am housed. The students and parents of this school were honored by a visit from Paul Rusesabagina, the man who sheltered and saved more than 1200 Africans in Rwanda during the genocide in 1994. It's the story told in the movie Hotel Rwanda. He stood quietly in a large circle of seated children and talked about Rwanda and answered questions in his lilting South African accent.

The children had been well-prepared, spending two weeks learning about heroes and writing about their own personal heroes and histories. They asked him questions like "Were you scared?" and "Why do you think this happened?" And Mr. Rusesabagina said, "I was too busy to be scared; I was just doing my job" and "We never learn from history—it just repeats itself." And then at the end, with parents and teachers wiping tears away in the back of the gym, the choir sang "Let There Be Peace on Earth." It was a profound experience. This man's dedication to the value of single lives saved over 1200 of those lives. He is a man to emulate.

I am not drawing parallels between petty bureaucratic politics and genocide in Africa. But attitudes of superiority only create islands of frustration and unhappiness. And attitudes of equality foster teamwork and contentment.

I will never forget our former superintendent, a man whom I perceived as valuing each person equally. Once, at an after-school award meeting for NBCTs, I waited in the hallway for a friend as the superintendent walked in with another teacher. As they walked together down the long hallway toward the cafeteria where the meeting was to be held, the former superintendent asked the teacher where she worked, and she told him, talking animatedly about her assignment and her school.

As she spoke, he nodded to me and smiled, recognizing that we had met and talked several times in the weeks leading up to this meeting. As he passed me with the other teacher, I heard her say to him, the highest-ranking official in the 12th largest school system in the country, "And where do you teach?"

I can't help but smile at the memory of the other teacher's face when the superintendent politely gave her his name and his title. But he showed so clearly that he was a person, not an office, and he made her feel important, not embarrassed, saying that he was so pleased to be here to honor the new NBCTs. His humanness was remarkable.

Just as Mr. Rusesabagina felt that it was his job to shelter his countrymen and women, it is the job of each person in every school system to do the best she or he can for the children we teach. We are all trying to make a contribution and this effort should be recognized and valued. I don't like being made to feel inferior and I am too old to accept it without resenting it. It's a problem that eats at me a little every time I pick up the phone, and I have to work on it.

Meanwhile, I am thinking about getting some "people."

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