Teacher's 'Help Currency'

A school is like its own little society, separate and autonomous. Like a country.

We have our own laws and day-to-day structure of activities. But no currency… no formal one anyway. Teachers do have their own informal barter system of favors.

It took me awhile to catch on to the system. I found myself adapting and using the process before I was even aware of my actions. This week though, with all the craziness before Spring Break, the system has been in overdrive and I thought I’d think out/write down the details.

I tried to think of a clever name for the currency and failed pretty intensely.
My ideas were:
- Teacher Barter System (TBS)- no. That’s a TV station that is basically the Tyler Perry network.
- Teacher Trade Currency (TTC)- no. I feel like that sounds like an STD. “Aw man, I got TTC, gotta get that stupid shot in my butt.”
- Teacher Favor Exchange- no. Too oddly sexual.

Forget it. The system doesn’t need a catchy name. Moving on.

Education is a team sport. True, it’s just you in the classroom but the whole process of successfully putting knowledge into kid’s heads takes a village. Teachers are always in communication with each other and requesting/giving help. Different items of ‘help currency’ carry different levels of weight.

Lower Level

- Borrowing Stuff.
Sometimes teachers endeavor to have their students do an activity for which they require extra “stuff.” Maybe every student needs their own pair of scissors or a red pen. These items can be collected from other teachers as a small favor. Most teams/departments (ex: Social Studies, Math, Fine Arts) are in a constant state of fluidity with stuff drifting from class to class.

- Acts of Convenience.
There are a million little tasks for teachers to complete every day. Acts of Convenience are when another teacher is going to doing something anyway and you ask them to go ahead and do your task too. Examples: checking your box in the teacher’s lounge, picking up completed copies from the copy aide or dropping off a book at the library. These little favors are the bread and butter of the barter system; the most utilized.

- They Were With Me.
Sometimes you need to keep a student for a few minutes after class. This can be because of any number of reasons: discussing a grade, re-explaining an assignment, or working through some discipline. Either way, the result is the student missing the beginning of their next class. Teachers take attendance promptly at the start of each class; it’s a good way to get kids settled and quiet. So no doubt your student you kept back a few minutes has now been marked absent. No big deal; you write the student a pass, send an e-mail to the teacher, or make a quick phone call: “They were with me.” Fine. Every teacher understands. But now they have to re-open attendance, change the Absent to Present and re-post roll. Sounds simple, but it takes almost a minute and in that time you can lose the focus of a class, plus add in the distraction of the kid coming in late- stopping whatever was going on. If you do this multiple times to a particular teacher… you’re going to owe them for the hassle.

Medium Level

- Can You Keep an Eye on Them?
I heard somewhere that flight attendants and teachers have the highest incidents of bladder infections. It’s because we never have time to pee. There are 4 minutes between passing periods. Once you factor in getting the previous class out the door (collecting papers, giving homework, finalizing disciple issues), getting ready for the next class (organizing papers to be handed out, setting up notes/bellwork, cleaning the board) and add in our responsibility to monitor the hallways during the passing period for student mischief… those 4 minutes fly by with not a spare second to dash all the way down the hall to get some bladder relief. So we rely on other teachers in our hallway. A quick watch glance, make eye contact with your teacher across the hall, and then the question: “Can you keep an eye on them for a minute?” And then you hustle to the bathroom in your glorious bonus minute. Now you owe your neighboring public servant the same favor. And it’s also impolite to ask them to “keep an eye” again until they have asked you for that favor. You have to take turns.

- Available Aides.
At my school, 8th graders can sign up to be a Student Aide during one of their elective periods. Most of the time aides are decently helpful. They can grade worksheets, cut stuff out, in general help with the busy work that sucks the life out of teachers. Aide labor is popular currency. At least once a day a mass e-mail goes out that only contains a subject line: “Anyone have aides I can borrow during __insert class period__??”. You get credit for helping if you send your aide. Sometimes teachers try to cultivate favor by sending out this mass e-mail, “I have a free aide during __insert class period__ who wants them?” And then three minutes later my inbox chimes as it receives the follow-up “Aide Taken!” e-mail.

Highest Level

- Cutting in the Laminate Line.
We have a singular laminate machine that takes any paper and seals it between sheets of plastic to make it slightly more durable against the hands of middle schoolers. With only one laminate machine, when a teacher lets you cut in line to laminate your 50 pieces of paper you need for tomorrow, it’s a favor to remember.

- Helping Un-jam the Copy Machine.
The copy machine is completely vital to teaching, almost embarrassingly so. It’s a complex piece of large machinery that can copy, hole punch, staple, make packets, make things double-sided, one-sided… it makes the education world spin ‘round. The result of these intricate processes is the copy machine innards are a twisted series of labyrinths beyond the average human's understanding. And paper can get stuck literally anywhere inside that thing. I once saw a copy machine jammed in 13 places. Any teacher willing to take time out of their day to sit at the machine and stick their hands into the hot inky depths to yank out scraps of your kid’s worksheets, you owe big time.

- FIGHT.
I’ve been on all sides of this super fun situation. When a teacher has a fight break out in their room, they become suddenly very dependent on other teachers. There are several different ways teachers can help:
-Calling or running to get an assistant principal or the in-school police officer.
-Physically helping to pull apart (and keep apart) the fighters.
-Watching/controlling the rest of the class while the fighters are escorted out.
Fights are great bonding experiences for teachers. Everyone has a good fight story and you always want to be a productive character in their tale, not the useless person who didn’t help. Always step in and help in a fight situation if you can, because odds are you’re going to need your own additional referees at some point in your teaching career.

The core of the barter system is the fact that teachers have an uncanny ability to “keep score.” I mean keeping score in the nicest way possible. I’ll explain.

Teachers have fabulous memories. We have at least 120+ students just in our own classes and we can remember their first and last names, handwriting and voices. Add in multiple assignments, learning goals, lesson plans, assignment modifications, grades and homework- teachers’ brains are always operating at max “remember this” capacity. Our talented memories are what allow us to keep score.

The system functions best as teachers keep track of who owes them a favor, or who they are unquestionably obligated to help next time they’re asked. It’s not at all that teachers won’t assist someone they don’t owe a favor- I’ve definitely picked up on the mentality of the staff that “we’re all in this together” and we do what we can for each other. When I say teachers “keep score,” I don’t mean with points or that someone is winning by helping more. It just goes down like this:

‘Hmmm… this particular teacher picked up my copies for me yesterday. I’ll stop by their room and ask if they need me to grab anything from the lounge, since I’m on my way already.’

‘This teacher let me borrow two dozen mini whiteboards last week, so I’m cool with them asking to borrow my entire stock of glue sticks.’

'I'll sit here and cut out 50 laminated vocabulary words with you during my conference period and not resent it because you helped me cut out my whole new unit's bulletin board two days ago.'

That’s how the system flows. The swapping of favors keeps people feeling like things are fair and I think keeps one’s overall mood pleasant. It’s okay that you need something from me… because eventually I’m going to need something too. If no one ever wanted to help each other, the whole atmosphere and productivity of the school would suffer.

The system is in overdrive because it’s almost Spring Break and teachers are going a little bit crazy. Grades are due Friday, so there are tons of students being kept after class to talk about their scores. The “They Were With Me” e-mails are flying around as a result, along with lots of “I Need an Aide!” e-mails as the different teacher sponsors of school organizations scramble with bureaucratic overload to get things done before the break.

I kind of like the craziness… its like the whole staff is holding each other up as we strive to make it to Spring Break in one piece.