Art class

Yesterday was Angela's first day back at work and since it was a non-student day, I went with her. We loaded up the car with the few boxes she had narrowed her stash to, and her laptop/projector cart and away we went. And of course, immediately, she found out she was required to attend the staff meeting at 8am. Had she been invited or informed of this before? No. So off she went. And there I was, car full of stuff. So I went in search of her new room.

It wasn't hard to find, it was directly across the hall from her old room. Once I got inside I stopped. It was overflowing with stuff. And it was dark and musty. And to top it all off, every visible surface was covered in rat poop. Not mice poop but big, gross rat terds.

But you know what? It didn't matter. It was Angela's new classroom. It was where she'd do her thing, teach her kids and spend a good potion of every school day for the foreseeable future. So I got to work. I found the head janitor and asked for all the trash bags he had and that he call the exterminator. (Mouse traps and ant traps are against LAUSD policy, go figure, rat poop and ants are apparently not.) I turned up the AC, opened all the blinds (she has a beautiful view of the skyline and palm trees) and went to work.

The art teacher before Angela retired in June. She didn't tell anyone she was going, just the principal on the last day I guess, and walked out. She left everything behind. Can you imagine doing this at your place of work? At a house you are vacating? It's insane but is apparently protocol for most teachers. Because every time Ang has moved into a new classroom we've had to clean it out. (Lucky for me I had only one classroom in my tenure as a seventh grade teacher and the teacher before me in there was Angela!)

But this teacher had been around for a hundred years or so and was a hoarder. No, she didn't just keep a few old papers and mementos. She could qualify for an Oprah exclusive. Stacks of paper and posterboard five foot high, never been used. Gallons of rubber cement. Eleven staplers, most not in working order. About forty rolls of masking tape. Hundreds of pencils. Boxes of brand new colored pencils, crayons, pastels. More sticky notes and paper clips and razor blades and compasses than Staples has in stock. And that was just some of the good stuff.

We filled up two boxes and a bag and set on down the hall like Santa Claus. We shared the wealth and then took the rest to the school office's supply closet. It was ridiculous. But then there was the cupboard of fabric that was home to some of the lovely rats. Angela bravely pulled on gloves and went to work in there. And remember -- this was all for sub pay. Several teachers stopped to gawk throughout the day and some even cautioned her not to do too much as she might have to move classrooms and she wasn't being treated fairly. To that we continually reminded people that rat poop is gross and unhealthy. Who wants to work in a place like that for even a day? Who wants to see kids sit amidst that?

So we kept cleaning. I doused everything in 409 and we filled the hallway with trash. And more trash. And more. That teacher had never thrown out a used eraser or greeting card. But amidst the trash we found something cool: art supplies. We found almost everything on Ang's list, including hundreds of pipe cleaners in every color for the mobiles. Felt and construction paper for the collages. Trays for the water colors. Charcoal for the sketches. It was fantastic. The sad part is that past art students didn't get to use any of the supplies (from what I could tell - they mostly did word searches. I tossed thousands of copies of word searches, literally). The exciting part is Ang's students are gonna use them all up!

When we left last night after nine hours the room looked good. We'd moved tables around, collected chairs (her biggest class has 48 students!), laid out supplies for this week, and things weren't sparkling but they were certainly better. And today, as she left for her sixth first day of seventh grade, she said she was excited not nervous. And I think that's gotta count for something!