A True Failing Teacher

            Teachers are very diverse people. They gather in various schools from all walks of life in order to educate the masses. Different types of teachers are found teaching at every level, from kindergarten to college. Therefore, one cannot give a perfect description of a “good teacher” due to the many different types of teachers as well as their unique situations. Likewise, a “bad teacher” is rather difficult to describe as well. What I can describe, however, are the basic parameters for a failing or “bad” teacher.                                                                                                                                                                                        Failing teachers tend to either look too professional or completely unprofessional. One possibility is that he/she could be wearing a suit. While this might look nice on paper, it denotes a lack of personality, or even humanity in its wearer. On the other side of the coin however, he/she could dress in very casual clothes (such as an undershirt and shorts). This would tell a student that he/she not only does not care about how he appears to others, but it could also tell people that he does not care about teaching.                                                                                                                                                                    A failing teacher's teaching method can be summarized in four words: look in your book. Instead of going over a lesson in-depth like most teachers would, this type of teacher would simply direct his/her students to read certain pages or chapters out of a textbook, go to his or her desk, pull out a newspaper/cell phone and read/text until near the end of class. Then, at the end of class, without explanation, he/she would hand out a seemingly random amount of homework depending how the teacher is feeling that day. With a failing teacher, instead of an answer, questions will probably get a student an annoyed look. Basically, failing teachers do not bother actually trying to teach their students.    Failing teachers can either ignore faculty completely, or they can start up an incredibly long conversation with any teacher that they can find. They are either completely concerned with themselves, or they are more likely to start a chat session with someone than make lesson plans or grade papers. In fact, the chatty teachers would do nothing but chat during their planning time. These kinds of teachers are not concerned with teacher work sessions either. Instead, they see these critical days as either a long social hour, or a time to catch up on the news.                                                                        These teachers don't even bother to study to stay ahead in teaching. Even an average teacher knows that he/she needs to hit the books and keep hitting them continuously in order to be able to teach effectively (or in some cases, even keep their jobs). Failing teachers do not care about this. They figure that since they made it through some big-name university with a Master's Degree in education that  they are in the clear (in terms of job security) until they die. Unfortunately, the tenure system makes this true. However, that should not mean that teachers can do whatever they please. The real uncaring ones wait to be granted tenure like all of New York waits for the ball to be dropped at Times' Square on New Year's Eve.                                                                                                                                                          Instead of actually teaching students (God forbid that they do that), failing teachers either mock their students, or use them to have frivolous little favors done for them. I can't tell you how many times that I've seen a teacher make fun of a student, not just to lighten the mood, but just for the sake of being nasty. I know this could happen for a good teacher who's had a rough day, but the failing ones do it just for kicks. These teachers also have “pets” (perhaps you've heard of them) that will do anything to stay on a teacher's good side. Trust me, they might just wash the teacher's car just to be on good terms with him or her. These teachers may even pile work on the aides responsible for helping them.                         Some would say that failing teachers are those that are unfortunate enough to have failing students. I do not believe that this is the case. I believe that the true definition of a teacher who is failing are those who do not look, act, or communicate like they want to be in school. In other words, they just do not care. How teachers like this cannot be held accountable, I'll never know.