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Still Rushing Around

Still trying to get everything done before the week of meetings start. Studiously avoiding the school building and taking another peak at my class roster. Yesterday students could pick up their schedules and make changes before the year starts. About a third of them do it, and the counselors start working on evening out sections. I'm sure that my 5th period class now has more than 7 students. Or I could not have a 5th period class any more. It's all up in the air now. But I won't take a peak until next week. Why ruin the surprise.

I'm still worried about the AP classes. I ran into a student a week ago who told me "everyone wanted to drop the class, but were afraid to tell you"... Is this true? Am I an AP bully? Have I driven the entire program into the ground by demanding too much? The first thing I had to learn after moving here was that very few people expected any sort of rigor from students and that those who had that were usually looked down upon. If they don't lighten up, they're driven out of the school. Before me, the APE summer assignments were optional and pretty much a waste of time. No students actually did them, even the motivated. No other AP classes have a summer assignment, (although, how would AP Calculus have a summer assignment). It seems like the longer I teach, the less sure of my teaching I become.
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