Woman with All the Answers

               It is 7:00 AM and fresh sunlight begins to rise through two long, narrow, bare windows on the end of an elephant grey room in Danville Area High School. Dark blue carpet tiles with a green, red, and grey striped pattern cover the heavily trafficked floors. Two double-doored tall cabinets stand between the narrow windows with a small opening in between them, wide enough for a person to stand. The words "Heart of Darkness" hang above a wall in bright happy colors and to the far right of the cabinets sits a plain desk. Tan and metal it sits there, heavy and unmovable. It is covered with a large white paper calendar, two towers of paperback books, colorful staplers, a hole puncher, a bulky grey HP laptop and even more books! Hardbacks, paperbacks, thick, thin, red, blue, purple all lining the edge of the desk and behind the desk sits a woman. Pale, with little makeup and short dark brown curly hair she sits behind her desk reading papers. In her lite blue buttoned up blouse, plain khaki pants and thick soled dark brown leather shoes she happily hums a tune all the while waiting for the 7:40 bell to bring the room alive.

 



Figure 1 (see notes)

Deborah Parker never planned to become a high school English teacher. In fact she became a high school English teacher in spite of her own teachers she had at Shikellamy High School. "I kinda felt like it was an injustice that I had gone through my high school English experience without having to try. We never read The Crucible, The Great Gatsby, Macbeth, Huckleberry Finn and many other important works." Early in her higher education she attended Mansfield University and received a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy, but she did not stop there. Determined to rights the wrongs of her previous teachers she decided to return back to school for her second Bachelor of Arts degree, this time in English Literature, and then also received her Masters in Education Curriculum and Instruction, both from Bloomsburg University. Now as the leader of her own classroom, Ms. Parker makes sure that all of her students are exposed to such important works of literature including her favorites to teach, A Streetcar Named Desire and Heart of Darkness (see Figure 1).

 

Students in t-shirts and a variety of bottoms stream through the large, heavy door to their mismatched yellow, orange, and blue hard uncomfortable chairs lining a horseshoe of grey speckled tables, rimmed in black. The initial chatting soon fades as Ms. Parker takes her place center stage and explains the day’s goal; learning how to write an essay for the SAT. Up front she waves her arms, flourishing her thick white pen, tapping the smart board in order to change the slides of her Prezi. With their arms propping up their heads students stare at the smart board as if in a tired trance. In order to help students better understand what the CollegeBoard expects, she swiftly walks around the room passing out various SAT examples as chattering amongst the students resumes about how ridiculous the SAT is. Taking her position at the right tip of the horseshoe, she sits on the edge of the hard blue chair, her legs completely straight out forming an acute angle with the floor. Students giggle at the spelling and grammar mistakes found in an example that received a score of one.
             “There’s some pretty significant sadness in there. There’s no real point of view. Let’s take a look at a two or maybe we will skip to three just because we can.” She sits in her chair reading the example in her left hand aloud, while waving around her right hand. “I’m going to give them a pass because they only had twenty-five minutes,” adds  Hannah Cooper, a senior female student, after reading the poor example. “It’s not a bad idea. It’s just executed poorly,” explains Ms. Parker.
              Finally the class reaches the last essay, the best according to the CollegeBoard with a score of six. Students instantly burst out in outrage after hearing the example, talking over each other. “This is so cliché!” exclaims Jacob Sheridan, an outgoing senior football player.
               Others talk about how random the grading seems to be. “I get why this received the score that it did but I don’t see why I got the score that I did!” complains Tristan Beiter, the soon-to-be class valedictorian and English fanatic. “Hold on! Hold on! Hold on!” pleads Ms. Parker trying to regain their attention.
             “I would say the word choice is pretty strong. Like AP, the readers are supposed to reward you for what you do well,” declared Ms. Parker as she tried to make sense of the CollegeBoard grading procedure. The bell sounds and students quickly gather up their belongings, push in their chairs, and resume their usual senior rambling about colleges, boyfriends, and Homecoming as Ms. Parker moves about the room preparing to put on the show all over again.

 



Figure 2: Students use Resource time to get a head
start on their homework.

           A normal day for Deborah Parker includes much more than just seeing students. She arrives at the high school to start her day at 7:00 AM each day, forty minutes before the beginning of classes. Some days she has various meetings but for the most part this is her time to catch up on work from the previous day which may include grading tests, reading papers, collaborating with coworkers, or reading college application essays that students have given her. Students start filing into her classroom looking like zombies around 7:30 and relax a little before class. Often Ms. Parker will talk and joke around with the kids until the 7:40 bell rings and she takes her role as leader of the class. By constantly changing her voice tone and volume, cracking mini jokes, telling stories, and conversing with students she makes sure that all eyes are on her. “You have to entertain the children or else they won’t pay attention to you.” Not only does she have to constantly change her style to keep students in the same class attentive, she also has to change her style when it comes to the level of English she is teaching. “AP is seminar style so it’s almost all discussion based. Everyone has to bring something to the party in order for that class to work.”
             After teaching three periods of AP English with seniors, Ms. Parker has her first class of 11 Honors students. She then uses fifth period to help monitor the school's gifted program, which she is in charge of. After enjoying a lunch with coworkers she heads back to her room and is greeted by senior boys enjoying their sixth period study hall. Following sixth period she teaches two sections of 11 Honors during seventh and eighth period. She finally ends her school day with ninth period called Resource (Figure 2).

            The last period of the day  is used by students for study hall purposes and during it Ms. Parker is completely immersed in her students. Whether she is simply talking to them, helping them find what to write for an essay, or trying to console them over an extremely tough English project, she is there to help any student that walks through her door (Figure 3). “I like Ms. Parker because she gets students, because she understands that you’re going to try. She also understands that there is a limit as to what you can do. She just gets us.” At 3:05 the bell rings and students rush out of school, eager to start their different sports and activities, but from October through June the day is not quite over for Ms. Parker. Four days out of the week she heads to the school library in order to take on another role, Forensics coach. There she helps the students prepare all their different materials needed to attend a meet such as speeches, and information to be used in debates. Not only does she donate her time after school, but she also donates long Saturdays and even whole weekends to being the forensics coach as the team heads to their various meets. At around 5:00, after a hard day’s work, Ms. Parker is finally ready to go home. “It’s kinda brutal. It really is. You burn out,” reveals Ms. Parker.

Figure 3: Ms. Parker helps Aurora Freedman with her college
application essay.

            Sometimes the best way to get to know a person is through the words of the people they interact with. In the case of Ms. Parker her coworkers had nothing but praise for her. "Ms. Parker is the woman with all the answers and if she doesn't know something she will find the answer. Everyone likes to teach with her. She's incredibly enthusiastic about teaching English and understanding how students learn.," said English Department head and fellow teacher Mrs. Helbig. Not only does she have a positive image with coworkers, she also is a favorite in the eyes of her students. Johanna Burke, a senior student who loves English, has nothing but kind words for Ms. Parker; "Ms. Parker is extremely positive about what we're learning in the classroom and is willing to share her excitement." Ahlena Davies, a shy senior at Danville, even went as far to say, "If she wasn't the one teaching AP, I wouldn't have taken AP." Through her work at Danville Area High School, Ms. Parker has positively affected all those around her and continues to do so today.

 


 "A Streetcar Named Desire (New Directions Paperbook) (Paperback)." Tower.com. Web. 22 Sept. 2014.