A Disgrace to the Profession

Becoming a Voice: Genesis of Our Novel, the Newsletter

“Yesterday I watched people read your essay. Frank Nolden amen-ed every paragraph. Alice Cain’s ready to drag the school system kicking and squealing backward into the age of the little red schoolhouse. And George Moore ran off a copy for every teacher on his wife’s faculty. I think we’ve got something here. We should go public. A newsletter—district-wide, sent to every teacher and administrator.”

“Have you been drinking?”

“No. I want to publish a newsletter. Will you help me?”

“Wait. Wait. I don’t want my name connected to anything.”

“Why? Don’t you want anyone to know what you believe?”

“Yes, of course. But I’ve seen people ruined in this system for speaking out. Look at you! You hardly get comfortable in your chair before they send you packing.”

“OK. We’ll go underground.”

“Underground! Like The Free Press?”

“Sure.”

“I can’t do that, Nick. I don’t have time, and I don’t have that much to say.”

“Then we’ll get more people.”

“Who?”

“David.”

       “David! Come on, Nick.” Karen pushed her back against the headboard and flicked on the light. “That weasel would never take any chances.”

       “No. He wouldn’t. Not in public anyway. But David’s clever. He could fire shots from the shadows. And Alice Cain is disgusted with this system. You know she’s worried about education. You could just mention this to them tomorrow. Plant the seed. Teachers have never had a real voice in this town, Karen. Don’t you think they deserve one?”

This short passage from our novel, A Disgrace to the Profession, illustrates both a need among teachers to be heard and a fear of administrative reprisal if they speak. That situation led to The Emperor’s New Clothes, our real underground newsletter, in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1989.

Positive response to the little paper, some of it anonymous, was like a bursting dam relieving pent-up torrents of frustrations, complaints, emotions, and recommendations for improving the schools. Readers thanked us for saying what they had never had the opportunity—or courage—to say themselves. The newsletter also created a dialogue, some of it sub-rosa and not all of it just among educators, in Des Moines about the state of education. The result was a revamped focus in district publications and press releases and more awareness of teacher discontent.

Encouraged by the power of our pens, we decided to paint a picture of teachers struggling in a pressure-laden work environment. A Disgrace to the Profession dramatizes one year at a fictional Midwestern high school through two teachers, Nicholas Staal and Karen Merchant, and what happens to them personally and in their careers when they speak out.

Watch for our next posting: Becoming a Voice, the Novel.

About Our Book

Karen Merchant meets Nicholas Staal when both are assigned to work in a large midwestern public high school. Bancroft High is an oppressive institution, with Principal Robert Aneyh as the self-serving leader. Nick immediately butts heads with Aneyh--he simply cannot abide the administrator's attempts to masquerade as a person of integrity. Soon it is revealed that Nick has a pattern of challenging autocratic managers. In fact, he has been transferred seven times by weak administrators whose games he would not play.  

At first, the other teachers marvel at how oblivious Nick is to the unwritten rules that dictate "proper" faculty behavior at Bancroft. But eventually an inspired few begin to follow him in resisting the system. It takes great courage. Principals have the power to dictate what goes into teachers' "permanent files," to what schools they are assigned, and what class loads they carry. Administrators can make life easy or they can utterly destroy a teacher's career. Teachers' fates depend on currying the administrators' favor. It is this intimidation that Nick and his followers defy.

As the story unfolds, Nick becomes drawn to Karen's keen mind and aloof manner. Gradually, he penetrates her defenses and helps her take more risks, both in her professional life and in her relationship with him. He eventually helps her free herself not only from those who cripple her in her teaching, but also from the stifling limits she has put on herself as a woman.

A Message from the Authors

The volume of response to A Disgrace to the Profession since it was first published has been tremendous! With over 16,000 copies sold by the beginning of 2005, our book has given its readers validation of their own feelings about school--the joys, the disappointments, the frustrations, whatever it is they've felt. More important, however, is that the book has given them permission to express their own thoughts, often for the first time outside their own groups.

This applies to teacher-readers and non-teacher-readers alike. The realization of readers that their thoughts are truly universal, not the unique product of their particular environment, is also important, but not as important as the revelation that it's okay to feel as they do.

We want A Disgrace to the Profession to be provocative. And if discussion of the positives and negatives of public education leads to change, then we're all winners.

--The Authors