Only two out of four accounts are logged into Zoom at the start of class. A warden walks up to the camera and greets me. “Hello, Mr. Goldman!” she says. “It takes about 15 minutes to get everyone in here. Be patient with us, but we’re so excited to have you as a teacher. You’re going to love these kids!”
Having recently graduated from Chapman University with my master’s degree, I was looking for a job and had agreed to take over teaching juvenile hall students as a long-term sub.
Before I started, the former teacher wrote me several warnings. Students would test me to see what they could get away with. They would push to end class early since it was just before lunch. Technology would be a barrier; kids came from several facilities, each having a single computer that students would share. The internet connection would be poor and microphones shoddy. Students’ writing proficiency ranged from college-level to barely literate.
I had no idea how to prepare for this challenge, so I imagined topics that might be important to them. I settled on an article that dealt with challenging unwanted labels. I figured these kids had all worn words that may have influenced the people they became. I built the class around the way language shapes reality.
I was interested in teaching incarcerated people because of my dad. Today, he coaches youth soccer. He volunteers for the Special Olympics and used to play Santa for inner city kids every Christmas. He’ll have a beer at parties, but I’ve never seen him drunk. He’s come a long way since being a heroin addict charged with armed robbery and attempted homicide.
I begin class by having them write about who they are, how they feel about school, and to share their hopes and dreams. Three screens are filled with serious students, sitting too far from the camera for me to see them clearly. Their heads bend down, and they seem focused. Students in the fourth screen sit up front. They keep switching seats. They make goofy faces at the camera. They shout out to friends in the other rooms. A warden asks if there’s any way to limit their view so they can only see me, but there isn’t.
Only eight students of 35 turned in what they wrote, but their words made me realize the first warden had been correct: I love these kids.
One writes of his newfound passion for classic literature. Outside, he cared only for money, women and drugs. Now, he has fallen for Shakespeare through “Macbeth.” He wants help writing stories with stronger hooks than heroin. Another hopes to leave juvenile hall and become a voice for the oppressed. He enjoys writing and hopes to develop a vocabulary like the politicians he sees on TV. And yet another is proud of completing his high school diploma, which never would have happened outside of juvenile hall. He’s currently taking courses for college credit and plans to pursue a four-year degree when he gets out.
Their hopes come into friction with the obstacles that pushed them away from school, out to the streets. Educators had called them stupid. Parents had neglected them. They had no support system when they struggled with schoolwork. Not a single person encouraged them to go to college. Speaking English as a second language had subjected many to brutal discrimination.
I write each student a one-page response, mostly words of encouragement. I tell them they are fine writers, and that I’m sorry anyone made them feel stupid. I mention that being multilingual is a superpower. I promise to help with college applications if they want me to. The next session, a student approaches the screen. “Hey, Goldman, I’m gonna get you that homework from the other day. You gonna write me a response, too?”
My inbox soon fills with completed assignments.
I tell them that I’ll be teaching class the same way I teach college students. They cheer and pump their fists. After one particularly dense lecture, I notice there’s only a few minutes remaining. Remembering what I’d been told about this being the period before lunch, I end class early. Instead of being relieved, they boo and wag their fingers.
Every day, I brag to anyone who will listen about how brilliant these kids are. They are not the disruptive slackers I was led to believe they would be. They are excited to learn and cherish every moment I spend working with them.
Then, three weeks into teaching, I learn that I failed my background investigation. I can only imagine it’s due to a marijuana-related misdemeanor from 2005. The temporary authorization I had been given to work at the juvenile hall is revoked and I’m immediately cut off from the students without getting to say goodbye.
I’ll miss their animated gestures over topics they enjoy. I worry I’ll become another in a long list of people who have abandoned them. Most of all, I’m angry at what this teaches. If I can be punished for mistakes from nearly two decades ago, what hope do these kids have when their incarceration ends?
I often wonder if we, as Americans, even believe in rehabilitation. America has more incarcerated people per capita than any other country. Are we capable of moving beyond the prison-as-punishment model? My own father proves that change is possible.
I still wonder about them. Most of the kids in juvenile hall had been left with a void that the streets came to fill. When given the opportunity and support to learn during their incarceration, they possessed a hunger for knowledge that I’ve rarely encountered as a teacher.
I had gone into juvenile hall to take a job, but now I realize those kids taught me more about our innate desire to learn than any lesson I could offer.
