Fifth Week of April

Monday
This morning, on my way to work, I saw a coyote crossing Glisan Street. How crazy… an actual coyote. (I haven't seen a coyote since I moved to Portland from eastern Washington farm country.) It came from the woods next to the Wood Village Lowes and cautiously slunk across the road into the woods surrounding the ON Semiconductor complex (formerly LSI). The driver in the lane next to me and I both had to slow down while it walked right in front of us.

Coming so soon after my morning raccoon encounter last week, this made me think about the development of areas that were formerly quite wild. Gresham grew out of farm land and berry fields, and Fairview was developed on top of a massive bramble patch. I’m not really sure what Troutdale was, but Wood Village seems like a funny little after-thought. We’re so close to untamed forests and mountains and all of the wildlife that goes with those. I wonder if there will come a time when nature will take back the land, and the wild animals that we’ve pushed out will come back into the neighborhoods. A raccoon seems harmless enough, but a coyote? And does anyone else remember the cougar in Troutdale during the spring of 2006?


Tuesday
My action team was supposed to present at the staff meeting this morning. Imagine our anxiety when the Superintendent walked in with the Director of Curriculum and Instruction! They sat at a table and expected us to proceed with our presentation as normal. It was a bit intimidating. Fortunately, once we heard what they were there for, no one remembered anything my action team had to say.

When we were finished, the superintendent got up and started talking to us about our fabulous state test scores and how much good work we’ve done and how they need to replicate that in the other schools in the district too. As my colleagues listened, they apparently began to be very frightened that the district was going to transfer a bunch of teachers from our school into the other schools. (I heard this later.) They aren’t. Instead, they’re taking our principal and moving him to the district office to be the Director of School Improvement.

They brought our new principal with them, too. He is a TOSA this year at the district office, but he used to be one of our own 6th grade teachers. He is known and loved by the staff at our school. He seemed a bit nervous about the announcement, though, because he was lurking in the foyer of the library, not actually coming into the room. We were relieved to know that our principal would not be replaced by some wacko from who-knows-where, and even more relieved to know that we’re getting a good guy who is extremely even-keeled.

There was some minor outrage at the surprise of it all, of course. His teacher friends from the 6th grade team were shocked that he hadn’t told anyone, but he explained that he’d only known since the previous afternoon. The day before, he’d had lunch with us (and sat by me, talking with me about his new vice principal job at Parkrose Middle School for next year). When he left our lunch party, he said he was going over to Parkrose to sign his contract. Apparently, OUR district called him back to the office while he was driving over there. When he arrived, they offered him the head principal position at our school – and were very glad he hadn’t signed his contract yet with Parkrose. He felt awful about Parkrose, but they were nice about it, and this is a job he just couldn’t turn down.

As we proceeded through the rest of our school day after this very dramatic morning staff meeting, it seemed – for once – that the typical middle school drama for that day involved the teachers more than the students!


Wednesday
Holy cow. They arrested an 8th grader at Mr. Chandler’s school for vandalizing his neighbors’ property and for cutting down trees along Highway 26. They’re calling the kid the “Chainsaw Chicken.” I guess they’re assuming that there is something cowardly about his sneaking around at night. I wouldn’t call it cowardly… if someone is going to sneak around chopping down trees and causing dangerous traffic accidents, taking advantage of the cover of darkness seems like a wise choice (if you can use the word “wise” for someone like that). I never thought I'd say this, but maybe they should have given him some video games or something so he would stay inside...


Thursday
This afternoon, I attended the “community” forum put on by the school board for staff and community members to meet the two candidates for superintendent. I’m not sure they can really call it a community forum, since it was held at 4 p.m. while much of the community was still at work. The room was full of teachers, with a scattering of administrators and students. The candidate was interesting (in a lame sort of way). Every time someone asked her how she would handle a particular challenge facing our district, she answered by talking about things that are important… but she never actually said what she was going to do. “How will you try to increase student achievement?” “When you’re trying to increase student achievement, curriculum is really important.” (Yes… but what are you going to DO with it? Examine it? Replace it? Support it?) It was obnoxious, and it makes her sound like a poor communicator. I hope they don’t pick her.


Friday
I got new iPod games today! One of them is terribly addicting. It’s called “Flight Control,” and it involves tracing a path for airplanes to land on the runways safely (without hitting each other). It's way harder than it sounds. I also got a game called “Fruit Ninja” in which you use a sword to slice fruit. I like to play “Fruit Ninja” on mute and add my own sword-slicing sound effects. I have to be careful, though. I’ve already gotten some pretty weird looks from the people around me.