If you've been around the schools any length of time, you have met them. The Divas. They are the teachers that administrators love because they shine light back at the admins. In other words, they are flashy, showy, and yet almost totally lacking in substance. Everything a Diva teacher does is important, and everything everyone else does is much less so, at least in the Diva's mind. There are several characteristics of typical divas:
- They are generally given the best classes either because they whine for them or convince the principal that they need the best kids in order to do their wonderful projects.
- They do wonderful projects. The projects look wonderful, at any rate. Some Divas put on plays that could make a successful off-Broadway run. Some decorate their rooms more lavishly than a Turkish whorehouse (not that I've ever seen one, of course).
- Most have the kind of handwriting that tips off their anal retentive upbringing.
- They will never share anything, even a piece of chalk, because they will need it for whatever it is they are doing, and God forbid they get caught with less than 78 pieces of chalk. Not that I am bitter.
- And worst of all, most of them rarely teach anything. They just make it look like they do. A Diva will spend four months on the third grade musical version of Death of a Salesman, complete with car crash finale and chorus line. Other teachers wonder how they get their kids to do such wonderful stuff.
It's pretty easy, really. They give up math and reading. Science and SS? Tush! They didn't teach those meaningless subjects anyway, darling.
I'm annoyed about this because my child has had a Diva teacher all year who has decided to move up with the class. That means another year in which I will have to teach the skills the Diva jettisons in favor of making stained glass letters for her bulletin board. I have no more room in my attic for scale replica Taj Mahals made of fusilli.
I've had it. I don't have any choice but to take my own child out of public school, which sucks more than I can tell you. But I think the fat lady has sung.
