On Trying to Teach

This is from an email I sent to a teacher I worked with this past quarter:

Being able to communicate with you after class gave me a glimpse into the life of a university teacher and all the insecurities, stress and magic of it. To you, the class was a bunch of light bulbs in need of electricity, and you were constantly worried about whether or not you were providing enough voltage. To me, they were the students I wanted to escape from, the reason why my mother invested in an SAT tutor and a college counselor and the reason why I spent so much time applying to so many schools- so I wouldn't be stuck here, where everything felt just the same as it did in high school, where you could get away with writing all the short stories in your English class about growing up gay and the teacher would give you an A for effort (and because he was afraid of offending you and being labeled un-PC), where success was measured in how often you showed up to class and whether or not you paid attention, not in your ideas or analysis or criticism or intellectualism.

But, I suppose, I'm starting to further understand how to make the system work for me- must be in leadership roles (check) must communicate with professors (check) must not be snooty (B- for effort?).

There were a few moments that changed me. First came when I had to lead a short discussion section. I got up in front of the class and I had to say something about the film festival book, and how the festival circuit actually exploited good films, did nothing to further the art form, and was essentially a name-game networking event that scared indie filmmakers and delighted journalists ("so many brushes with stardom and rivalries and politics!"). I got up and, looking into the eyes of my fellow students, couldn't fathom a word that wouldn't make me sound like an intellectual snob. My entire prep, all of my thoughts, somehow revolved around what made this book a good piece of journalism, why it was news, what worked about his use of language.

I had to think of something to say that related to the curriculum (and fast! all the staring!) that didn't further alienate me from them. I believe I said something about how this book, unlike the last critique we had read (which sounded more like an angry blogger rant), was more of an accessible critique, perhaps because the journalist knew that his purpose was to educate the populace about an exceedingly complicated arena of art and commerce through whimsy and non-judgmental observation, and not to indoctrinate the reader with slatherings of opinions (something academic writers tend to do all the time).

None of which is relevant to your course! This anecdote I had revolved around writing, and there are so many writers who think about writing all the time but I guess what I realized was, like, who cared? I was a teacher at this moment, not the kid sitting in the back of English class. I had responsibilities. It was scary and I realized what a juggling act teaching must be, finding this way for your brain, with it's myriad of thoughts (some productive, some self-defeating) to work in harmony with the brains of everyone around you. To pace yourself so the thoughts will sink in everywhere. To look at the class but not in their eyes (never the eyes!) and try to gracefully tie just about everything to your syllabus (how do you do this?)

There were other moments. Lots of other moments. There was the moment I filmed the commercial, where I really felt like I was actually lending some sort of creative clearance to the endeavor, like I could leverage my loopy sense of creative entitlement toward the greater good ( and then it got deleted...) There was the moment I started atanarjuat and had to fast forward through parts of it and not come off like I was unsympathetic toward silence and absence in nonwhite narratives. There was the time I said the words "this hurt our aesthetics" or whatever. There was the weird look people gave me for being associated with the Stranger, that made me feel like they were practically expecting my whole routine to be very off the cuff, whereas yours was polished and refined. I got to revel in their juvenilia (is that a word? it should be a word), and be occasionally juvenile around them, but you got their professional ready-to-work smiles and "sure thing" glances. I'm not sure who should be jealous of whom.

All of which to say is...teaching is hard. I have no idea how you do it. You are some kind of wonder woman balancing all of these conflicting things (does fun make people learn? how do you create fun? what if they're having too much fun?) I mean, I honestly feel like I learned more than two credits worth of information, even though I probably only deserve two credits since I didn't really do a whole lot. For a whole quarter, I got to occupy the brain of a college professor, and was privy to all of her off-the-cuff thoughts and emotional reactions. For a journalist, that's called a gold mine. For a student, it's practically unheard-of. So, a genuine thanks. It was a fascinating, frustrating, endlessly insightful ride, and not something I will soon forget.