. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . P A R O L E . C A L L

It’s Monday and the week begins. While walking around the class I notice Shawna is lying face down on the floor to the right of her chair. I run to her and shake her shoulders lightly. “Are you okay?” I implore. She turns her head and says, “Yes, I was just looking for a nut that rolled underneath my desk.”

Then Manny comes in saying he has sad news. His sister’s boyfriend stabbed her six times and killed her seven-year-old son. She survived with minor wounds and the other seven children escaped unharmed. This horror story may be unimaginable to us but for my parolee population, it is part of everyday life. I encouraged Manny to find others he could talk to in the community.

Before the day was over Joe told us how he worked at a local dairy farm during the day while still in prison. He explained in detail how he inseminated the cows and delivered calves. He told us how dairies operate around the clock. His favorite part of the job was taking care of the calves, setting up their formula and watching them grow.

My students give me so much to think about. I often think — what do I teach them? I aspire to teach the value of an open mind and heart. I  hope I teach them that education is a way out of poverty, drugs and violence.

I’m not sure why I keep posting pictures of cake when this blog is supposed to be about parolees. I returned to work today after a glorious 7 days off.

Today at the rehab was what we call ‘donations day.’  That means all kinds of weird near or out of date food items donated from markets and agencies show up in the community kitchen. Once a truckload of soda was dropped off and everyone got a couple liters. It was like your Italian uncle hijacked a truck and gave it to the criminals. Today saw a flurry of Christmas cookies from local markets. One student handed me a dozen cupcakes topped with green and red sprinkles. I started to hand them out till I saw the discard date of some time last September. “Here, you guys decide,”  I said handing them the goods. Kitchen workers, parolees who work volunteering in the kitchen, are the first to spot donations. They are always so sweet, bringing me first choice of out of date yogurt and stale animal crackers. As a rule I never eat donations and I try to bring my lunch. There is free fruit and water available around the clock. I should try to honor this in my 2010 diet.

Blog is an anagram for glob. That’s how I am feeling about this process. Who is my audience? Internet savvy parolees looking around for social services who stumble upon my site because they are trying to find out how to obtain cheap calling cards? I read some other globs for inspiration. Many post someone they admire, a sort of you are nobody till you know this somebody column. I’m not sure but I think you might be interested in knowing about an obscure teacher, Piper Prezant, who helped thousands of parolees re-enter society. Piper is the author of this glob. Piper once handwrote a gossip rag about celebrities and distributed it on her block; it mainly featured Liza Minelli. She was 12 and there were no subsequent editions.

It always takes longer than you think to set up your class for a substitute teacher. I substitute taught for years and i would always tell the students I am not a substitute like saccharin is a sugar substitute, I am an alternative like honey. This reminds me of a substitute teacher that came to my elementary school class. Instead of teaching us math he told us all about the honey bee hives he kept and passed around samples of honeycomb dripping with honey for us to taste. We were riveted to his words and I never forgot how interesting that day was. When a teacher returns to find out her students loved the sub it’s bittersweet. One must teach the curriculum but a sub can do pretty much whatever they want.

Like most teachers, I don’t actually teach as much as I would like to. In fact the better part of my day is spent on paperwork, filling out student intake forms and setting up tests. My students receive their adult basic education via a computer so I facilitate their learning, tutor and troubleshoot. At any given moment, a student will nod off, seem to be hypnotized, or sit on a problem without asking for help — remember my students are also recovering drug addicts — so it’s my job to get them to notice something new everyday, to spark their imaginations and steer them toward the online encyclopaedia for research and discovery. “Raise your hand if you were born in the 20th century,” I ask. One of my students insists he was born in the 19th century, that’s how he remembers being taught. I take the time to explain historical periods, that we are in the 21st century is a new concept to a few of my students. I throw in that if you go by the Hebrew Calendar we are in the 58th century, in the year 5770. But the earth itself is is around 4.54 billion years old. Then it’s back to adding and subtracting fractions.

The day before I left for a four-day weekend, I gave my students a Christmas party, a sugar fest. My current school site is in a rehab facility where parolees are mandated to live, sent by their parole agents or the courts. The average person stays for six months. For my annual party,  I brought in candy canes and sodas and our amazing in-house chef made a hundred cookies and enough homemade strudel to feed a rehab. So the questions today came in whispers and whimpers. “Can I have candy, got anything sweet?” “You got any sodas?”  I guess I gave the addicts a taste and now they are hiding in the shadows begging for more, pleading in small and pathetic ways to get them a fix of what that fat red-suited man makes good on for a short time every December. Meanwhile many students need to see the County dentist and I feel bad drinking a cola on my break. My students survive on a steady diet of rolled Bugler cigarettes, instant coffee and their new drug of choice, refined white sugar.

The first day I started my new job I already saw police action. I entered the small school site in the strip mall close to the parole office. No one had told me the building itself was alarmed and when I opened the door a loud beeping noise began. I ran to the back to see what was going on. Meanwhile several police cars surrounded the front door. I had to explain I was the new teacher and someone from parole came down to silence the alarm. Welcome to teaching adults out on parole. I had to win over support from the parole agents, to get them to refer their caseloads to my school. It was a good start, I’m here–sound the alarm. That was close to ten years ago.