Mayhem and Messes

One fun fact about the Washington Unified School District is that they have weird ideas about where saving money and being smart intersect. Two years ago, I opened a brand new campus (Stonegate) with many of my Evergreen teacher friends. They were still building the cafeteria, office, playing field, and fences until about November, but the campus is beautiful and everything is new and the people are great, so it was worth it.
I hate moving!! After that gig, I ducked out of opening another new campus the next year by taking Stonegate and a little, quiet school called Westmore Oaks. That plan only worked for one year. The district built a brand new, state-of-the-art high school and attempted to relocate the entire school midyear over Christmas break. Lucky them. The old 1950s high school was decrepit, outdated, and crowded. Part of it is condemned and the other part is ugly.
Here comes the moment of real brilliance: they slapped some paint on the old high school, and moved our little elementary plus the neighborhood 6-8 graders in. We didn't get on campus until the week before school, and the poor kindergarten teachers couldn't even set foot in their classrooms until after 2 pm on the day before school started. You can't fake kindergarten- it's not like you can give them worksheets until the materials turn up. Yikes.

I finally was assigned an office off the library. It has a window, and it's not the smallest space I've worked in, so for an SLP that's pretty good. But it was COMPLETELY EMPTY. No furniture, no boxes, no nothing. When I asked where I could get a desk, the custodian escorted me to the condemned middle section of the campus. 8 classrooms were completely full, floor to ceiling, with abandoned high-school sized desks, chairs, bookshelves, and rubbish. I was basically told "If you can find it, you can have it." Great. Eventually I scavenged out a set of shelves, a bookcase, and a file cabinet. The table is so big, the kindergarteners can slide under it while sitting in their chairs. I made a desk out of my two small filing cabinets and a board that Diana cut for me. On the 8th day of school, I got a phone. I'm still waiting to get my hands on a computer. The boxes were discovered in the art room, minus a bin that I borrowed from a friend. Also missing was the box marked "open first," which has the file cabinet key and all the desk stuff. Of course. The unpacking task was almost too overwhelming, but my friend Julie saved the day by whipping it into shape in an hour.

I was proud of myself for getting the room together and the schedule up and running by the second week of school. My kids weren't as impressed. One third grader came in and yelped, "Hey! This is the smallest teacher room ever! It's smaller than my bathroom!" Well, yes. Maybe next move, I'll set my sights high and ask for a remodeled lavatory. On second thought, some school things simply can't be remodeled enough. I'd better be content with my window instead.