Phones are out, balled up papers are flying, and the constant chatter is like the background music to a classroom. We all are familiar with these sounds— a substitute teacher is in.

“It’s like a jungle, like that scene from ‘Mean Girls,’” senior Paul Spaulding said. He walks into what he calls his “crazy, discombobulated” Algebra 3-4 class hoping to get through the period without any confusion on a problem. Spaulding knows as a senior he needs this class to graduate. He knows that when he walks into the classroom, he won’t have the support he needs to help him pass the class.

Antoineaha Sims, junior, knows this too. “He (math teacher) came in for two weeks, and since then we’ve had so many subs,” Sims said, describing the teacher. She would finally get used to her new substitute and then three days pass and a new face would greet them. Sims knew that there was no possible way to pass the class without a permanent teacher. “I talked to my counselor to take me out,” Sims said. “I was really sad and crying.” Fifteen class periods, 400 students and no teachers to teach them.

At the beginning of the year three out of the 10 math teachers and an English teacher required a long-term substitute teacher to cover their classes. Weeks later, one of the math teachers came back. The other three teachers haven’t come back and there has been no permanent teacher for the fifteen class periods.

Andrew Walter, math department chair, stepped in and did what he could for the math classes. From lesson plans to after-school tutoring, he is trying to make it fair for the students. He is also in charge of grading the students for the time that the substitutes are in. “(I’m) trying to grade the students, but (I’m) not even in the room,” Walter said. Ninety percent of the students in Algebra 1-2 that have substitute teachers have a failing grade. That class also had about 22 substitute teachers this year.

“Unless you have a substitute that is knowledgeable in the subject, you lose that day of instruction,” Kathy Sady, math teacher, said. Administration says there is nothing that they can do because they have to wait for the teacher to
retire until the district office can actually hire a new teacher.

The Algebra 1-2 teacher, Barbara Rizzonelli and now the placement of a new teacher is being processed. The condition of the Algebra 3-4 teacher Tuan Ton is still uncertain.

As the semester is coming to an end, an idea of a solution will take place after break. The Algebra 3-4 class will be dismantled and students will be placed in other available seats in an Algebra 3-4 class on campus. The Algebra 1-2 and English classes will get a permanent new teacher on campus.