When things don't add up

My 8th grade math teacher was an incomprehensibly bad teacher.  I say this as someone who has the utmost respect for teachers and knows how hard most of them work to inspire and educate young people.  I say this also as someone who knows though that they aren't all like that.  My 8th grade math teacher was not like that.

It was rumored among the students that he was a notorious pothead and was most often stoned. Even looking back now from an adult perspective I think we were right.

He managed to never once correct a single paper or test.  We, the students, corrected each other's homework and tests.  His only task in the whole process was to decide whether we would hand our paper to the person behind us or in front of us.  Once corrected we would call out the scores to him (an exercise in humiliation for math students like myself) and then either put away or toss the graded paper.  He never once looked at our work or even seemed to care whether we were giving him accurate information (which not everyone was).

When my parents discovered that I was flunking the 2nd quarter of math, my mother promptly went to meet with my math teacher and the school counselor.  He casually admitted that he had no idea why I was struggling because he had never seen me work a single problem all year.

The first morning I went into school early, under the pretense of getting extra help from him, he looked at me over his cup of coffee and said, "You don't want to be here, do you?"  Stunned into a compliant silence I stared at him unsure of what to say.  It was clear that he didn't want me there, that was very, very clear.  Taking my silence as agreement he smiled and waved his hand and said, "Go on.  You don't need to be here."  And so I left.  My Mom hired me a tutor.

The bizarre saving grace of the whole year was that this teacher had another unique practice of letting all of his students choose their grade for the 4th quarter.  He would simply go around the room and have everyone state out loud what grade they felt they had earned.  There were always a couple of honorable students who opted for a "B", but for the most part every single kid gave themselves an "A."  So did I.  

I passed 8th grade math with a low "C."

So today, I am thankful for Big J's 8th grade math teacher.  

He is the polar opposite of my own 8th grade math teacher which is reason enough to be very, very thankful.  He is engaging and interested in his students.  He encourages and patiently answers all questions.  He allows the students to re-take any test that they do not do well on for the shocking reason that he "would rather they learn the material than just accept a bad grade and move on."  He knows his subject, he enjoys teaching, and he is doggedly determined to get these kids to learn the fundamentals of mathematics.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Mr. W.  You are a champ.