Gone.

Friday was by far the worst day I have ever had as a teacher. The cliff notes version goes like this...started out the day by putting out a fire in the boys' bathroom across from my room.

Then I found out that there is a good possibility that I could be switched to 6th grade special education because of licensing issues for the other teacher. Now I know that i have not made any progress academically or socially or behaviorally or anything, but...I am beyond attached. I see so much hope and potential in these students of mine and I don't know how I plan to reach them or teach them, but I'm not done with them yet. I need more time.

Later in the day, I was told that it was one of my babies who started the fire and I just melted into a puddle. Education is literally the only way out for these kiddos and if that is taken from them, their future equals jail or alcohol or drugs. They need to stay in school so they can have a chance of choosing the lives they want that could actually benefit society instead of always being told what life will be for them. But they need to first choose goodness. (long story short, his name was cleared and I get to keep him!)

But the real drama occurred during 4th period when (long story short) the officer discovered that one of my other boys brought a mini bb gun to school and hid it under my table!!! No one got hurt. The gun was wrapped up by the officer and taken away. But still...a gun! On Friday it looked like my boy would just be suspended but today I was told that he would definitely not be coming back. My heart broke. Yes he messed up. Yes he should be punished. But he, of all people, neeeeeeds to stay in school.

My heart breaks for T because he has had such a hard and unfair life for a 13 year old boy. I think that he is at the place now where so much ash and dust has been piled upon him that all he knows how to do now is to pile on more dirt. It's not his fault that the initial dust was thrown on him, but he needs to learn to start wiping it off instead of adding more on. My hope and prayer for this year was that I would get to be one of the people who wipes a bit of the dust off and shines some lit through. But now he is gone. And my time with him is up. It feels like I had one of my own children taken from me before he was 18 and ready to move on. He's not ready. I needed more time.

So now my job is to pray. I pray that this would be the time in his life where God presses down the clay and begins to form it again. To form it into something with less chips and cracks and dust. I pray that this would be a time when God's bigness overpowers the small box of "possibilities". I pray that there was some lesson that I taught him over these last 10 weeks that actually sunk in and that will have a positive influence on his life. I pray that she knows he is loved. I pray that he will learn to choose goodness.

Please pray for the rest of my kiddos. And for our school. Pray for healing and light through dust. (and please pray that my job is not switched...)

Thank you,
Em