35 Letters

On Friday, for my three twenty-five-minute eighth grade writing classes, I selected and printed out four entries from my old blog: the first one I ever wrote (December 2003), one from December 2007, and two from this past year.

“Writing isn’t always a form of torture that you put yourself through just because your teacher is forcing you to do it for a grade,” I told my classes. “I write for fun, and I’ve been doing it since the 8th grade. I’ve kept a blog about my life since December 2003, and I’ve written over one thousand entries since. It’s how I developed my love for writing.”

I introduced the four selected entries and passed out copies to them. Some were really adamant about getting certain ones, such as Christmas Carol. One of my students, Leandra, surprised me by grabbing the longest one, “God Loves You,” and separating herself from the rest of the students to lie on the floor and read it.

My students all liked the activity. Ironically on that last day class, my classes were all on their almost best behavior, as if to say, “Look, we’re nice! Please come back next year!”

A lot of students have asked me if I’m coming back to teach next summer. Seventh graders are hoping to get me as a teacher next year. Nigel wants me to come back so I can let him teach a day or two of breakdancing in dance class. A student from my Block C, to my surprise, plans on coming back next year for the ninth grade freshmen program and hopes that I’ll be teaching ninth grade.

It upsets them and me that I don’t have an answer yet.

On Saturday, Breakthrough had its celebration night for all students and their family. There were student work expos, student performances, speeches, songs, teacher performances, and a slideshow. It was all very powerful.

I had to put myself out there one more time, so in my speech to introduce my dance class’s performance, I delivered some very unfortunate news...



(For the record, I censored “shit” for “SHIP,” but I guess some students didn’t think so, as you can hear by the laughs.)

(Back to being off the record, I actually thought up of the idea of a fakeout early at the beginning of summer last year, but I never implemented it because it probably wouldn’t have been too appropriate for my co-dance teacher at the time’s African Jazz piece. Last night, I felt really satisfied to see the fakeout happen; it was a burning secret plan that I kept in the back of my head and told NO ONE about.)

After the fakeout, the actual dance started. (Unfortunately, teachers are not supposed to put pictures or videos of the students online or anywhere public due to liability issues. Child molesters or something, I guess.)

After the final performance from the teachers, which I almost cried doing, kids received their summerbooks and t-shirts. The night before, I had written letters to twenty-eight of my students to give to them at celebration night. I had originally planned for more, but I had to cut down to just my three blocks of writing, my crew, and my dancers. I handed out the letters to my students and I also made sure to write longer letters in the summer books of the students who I didn’t have time to write separate letters for.

Overall, in the last two days, I wrote about thirty-five substantial letters to the students. They weren’t just generic shit like, “You were a pleasure to know. Good luck this year in school. Brian.” I seriously wrote down everything (positive) that I thought about them, among a few other things, including some sappy and emotional stuff:

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You probably thought that I got pissed off at you a lot in class, and I did. But you know that I know that you are a sweet and hardworking girl. The effort you put in this class is amazing.
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I don’t teach you because you’re a seventh grader, but I know you’re an amazing student in class. Overall you’re so well rounded. I am so proud of you for going up on Celebration Night to give both a speech and to perform in the dance set.
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You’ve had my writing class for two summers now, and it’s been a pleasure to see how much you’ve grown. I still remember last summer when you were shouting things like ‘HIGH QUALITY’ in your squeaky voice, and now, look at you, with your deep gruff voice and aiming to get accepted into Bellarmine College Prep.
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You were an all-star student, but I still need to apologize. I know I failed you a few times this summer.
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Imma tell you ‘bout a man named Mendoza, Matty
Straight from the bay where we all git hyphy.
You wouldn’t think he be Mexican.
You be thinking he trippin.
Especially with his million near deaths,
You’d wonder how this boy still be kickin’.
Nonetheless Mista Mendoza is the best,
The best rockin’ most chill guy ever.
And you can all bet...
His friend Brian won’t ever forget ya.
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There are still three days of Breakthrough left, but the students won’t be there. It’s just wrap-up and evaluation crap. Tomorrow, it’s going to be heartbreaking to walk into my empty classroom, rearrange the empty chairs, erase the shout-outs and messages on my whiteboard, and hear nothing but silence ring through the halls.