Test Question

By TAD BARTIMUS

Attitude makes a difference, teachers told themselves throughout their too-short summer. A great attitude at the start of a new school year could make up for a lot of the discouragement and unease of those sad, shaky days following last spring's shooting spree at Columbine High School.

Through June, July and August, thousands of teachers put in a lot of mental overtime convincing themselves they had to return to the classroom in order to make a difference. Already fed up with disruptive students who don't want to learn, crumbling facilities, weak administrators, uninformed politicians and shrinking budgets, some decided it wasn't worth I so they quit or retired.

Teachers charged with creating and protecting a physically and emotionally safe learning environment had their homework cut out for them.

Returnees -- my husband among them -- knew they'd have to overcome the psychic damage wreaked by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold when they killed 12 students and a teacher and wounded 23 others before committing suicide in Littleton, Colo. It would also fall to teachers to mitigate the fallout of fear from eight other recent incidents of school violence. Teachers charged with creating and protecting a physically and emotionally safe learning environment had their homework cut out for them.

Nonetheless, my husband was filled with anticipation on the first day of classes as he packed extra peanut butter sandwiches for kids likely to show up without lunch or money to buy it. His hair was trimmed and he wore ironed slacks and a new shirt "to set a good example." He'd spent days painting bookshelves, hanging bright posters and decorating bulletin boards. He was ready.

Then he turned on the morning news. Two teen-age boys in Palatka, Florida, had been arrested for allegedly conspiring to commit second-degree murder at their high school. A teacher who'd questioned them about a drawing one of them had made showing a student with a bloody knife, a shotgun and an assault weapon had alerted the principal after the boys reportedly told him they had a plan to do a better job of killing than Harris and Klebold. The principal notified police; authorities said one boy was taken into custody while watching a video of someone getting their throat cut.

My husband listened in disbelief as the father of one of the arrested boys hinted to an interviewer that there might be repercussions against the teacher for sounding the alarm.

"He's got to be kidding! So now I have to worry about getting sued if I try and head off another Columbine? This country is doomed!" my husband said as he stormed out the door to begin the new academic year.

It's hard for teachers -- or anybody else -- to keep a positive attitude in the face of antagonism and threats. Nobody wants to constantly be looking over their shoulder. Following Columbine, the nation agreed: "Never again!" There was no consensus about how to prevent another school shooting, but all experts said teachers must be alert for early warning signs and, when they spot them, be proactive.

"We really don't know what these two had in mind but we had some warning signs and we had to do something," said a spokesman for the Putnam County Sheriff's office in Palatka. "We couldn't let it go."

No. That teacher couldn't let it go. But what happens if the parents of one of these teens sues? What if the teacher ultimately loses his job because of this incident? Here's the message such action might send:

"Let's see now," teachers would say, "the last time one of us sounded an alarm we got laughed at, sued, fired and run out of town. No thanks. I'll just sit here and keep my mouth shut and hope it all goes away."

Teachers are role models. We count on them to set a good example, to do what's right. In less than 10 years, America will need at least two million new teachers. If all they have to look forward to is intimidation, violence, low pay and the rest of it, why would our kids want to grow up to be one?

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