Computer class

I teach ninth grade computer class, in addition to second grade. I have been blogging for almost a year now about the school and my students, and I think I've mentioned ninth grade computers once. Maybe twice. That's because, beyond telling me that I'm teaching ninth grade computers and giving me two hours a week to teach it, the school administrators have basically done nothing to help me and have given me nothing to work with. The main problem is that we have no computers at our school. Well, at first we had no computers. For the first half of the year, the principals told me that I could use the class as a study hall, because I clearly couldn't teach it without computers and without a curriculum.

Then, one of the two school principals had a "curriculum" sent in from Tegucigalpa. This curriculum was about 75 pages, in Spanish, of computer lingo. He told me that the Tegucigalpa administrators wanted the students to have grades on their report cards for computer class, and that I should just do what I could with the material. After looking at it, I decided that I would try to see if I could take the random computer parts that were in boxes in the library to try to make some functioning computers. I was able to find enough parts to piece together two computers. Now, I know nothing about computers, but I knew that the computers I had to work with were really, really bad. They basically are able to turn on and run Microsoft Word and Powerpoint. But it was better than teaching the students computer jargon in Spanish.

So, I have been teaching computers by putting three students to a computer and making the groups rotate to finish projects. Today, I went into the library, where the computers are, only to find that the school administrators had taken them all apart to find a part they needed for their own office computer.

This led me to I go into the office and tell the principal that I was beyond frustrated. They pressured me to teach this class but gave me nothing to help me do it. They clearly don't care if the students learn anything about computers, they only care if there's a grade on the report cards so that the parents don't ask about it.

I have many frustrations about my job. I know that leaving the children at the end of the year will be one of the hardest things I've ever faced, but I also know that, in terms of the actual school, I won't be sad to leave it behind. The example of how the administration treated my computer class this year (with complete disregard in terms of the class, and yet concern about the image presented to the parents) is one example that speaks to a much larger picture of the some of the problems in the school. Until the administrators (whether in Gracias or Tegucigalpa) get their priorities straight, they will not have any luck in either retaining American teachers or truly achieving the higher level of education that they desire.