Before

From the very start of my teaching career, I have always been passionate about encouraging my students to read, explore new ideas, and think critically. But one day, that passion mixed with youthful indiscretion and ended up costing me my job.

When I first started teaching, my brother told me that I’d never want for a story to tell at parties. This is one story I don’t particularly love telling, but it’s time I shared it more publicly. It’s about what can happen when you think you can do it all and end up pushing the boundaries of what is considered acceptable in a school setting. In this blog post, I’ll share the story of when I got fired for assigning a novel that my school administration found objectionable.

My first teaching job was at a private religious school where I filled a vacancy while I finished my alternative certification requirements to teach. I had just finished college with a degree in English and did my student teaching for their summer school. They hired me on, and I began teaching freshman and junior English classes. When I asked the AP of Instruction if there was any curriculum they wanted followed, I was handed a new text book for each course, and told to do a novel study or two.

I had no idea what I was doing, but with that youthful stupidity and arrogance of one fresh out of college, I pretended I knew exactly what I was doing. I showed up early and stayed late. (I wasn’t married yet, so I had little in the way of home responsibilities). It wasn’t long before I had a consistent group of students hanging out in my room at the end of the day while they waited for their rides or just delayed driving home for the day. We talked about all sorts of things, whether it was a continuation of the class discussion, religion and philosophy, or music and poetry. They started calling themselves “5^th Period,” but the AP of Instruction called it “Mr. Mungall’s Fan Club.” I never liked the latter name, because it wasn’t all about me. I was just the facilitator.

The school year continued, and I had a few minor run-ins with the administration, but nothing that required a reprimand, just explanations. Then for my eleven juniors in English III Honors, I told them I was going to assign them Moby-Dick. I’d already assigned them Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, which wasn’t an easy read. They groaned… they moaned… they begged and pleaded to read something else, ANYthing else. I thought about it. They were my best performing students. For our novel studies, I conducted the class much like a college literature course: assigned the readings, and we’d sit in a circle and discuss the works as a class. It was great fun, everyone got to share, everyone found it rewarding. I mean, I genuinely liked the kids, and I figured there was something else we could read that would be fun. I thought about some different books I read in college and remembered only vaguely having sped through John Green’s award-winning Looking for Alaska. I didn’t remember all the details of the book at the time, but I remembered it being a great thought-provoking read with fun unique characters and really engaging dialogue. So the next class, I relented and told them we’d be reading the much more enjoyable Looking for Alaska, and that they should pick up their copies soon. (I should probably add that this was in 2009, well-before the story had been adapted for the television screen.)

The novel tells the story of Miles Halter, a high school student who transfers to Culver Creek, a boarding school in Alabama, where he meets his roommate, Chip “The Colonel” Martin, and Alaska Young, a beautiful and enigmatic girl who quickly becomes the object of Miles’ affection.

The book is divided into two parts, “Before” and “After,” with the latter section dealing with the aftermath of a tragic event that occurs in the middle of the book. The story explores themes of friendship, love, loss, and the search for meaning and understanding in life.

It also deals with some heavy topics such as mental health, suicide, and substance abuse, and Green handles these topics with sensitivity and honesty. He does not shy away from the difficult questions and does not offer easy or explicit answers, which I personally appreciated as it really lends a lot to the open discussion model I used in the classroom.

One of the criticisms of the book is that it romanticizes self-destructive behavior, particularly in the character of Alaska. Some readers argue that her actions are glamorized, and that the book fails to adequately address the consequences of her behavior. I don’t personally agree with that criticism, but again, it’s worth discussing!

The criticisms wouldn’t stop there, of course. As I reread the novel just barely ahead of my students, my then fiancée and now ex-wife said on the phone: “Um… weren’t there some pretty racy scenes in that book?” That evening, I came to a few of those troublesome sections—particularly a really awkward oral sex scene. The scene itself wasn’t written to titillate, actually seemed particularly crafted to emphasize the awkwardness and the foolishness of loveless intimacy. I flushed red, angry with myself. The kids would be reading this part soon enough. It wasn’t anything these juniors hadn’t heard before, but not in my classroom. We talked about all manner of things, but there are some things that should not be discussed in the classroom.

The day came to discuss the reading section that contained the passage. “We’re not going to discuss that part,” I said. “I’d forgotten that was even in the book.” And we just moved past it. I was proud of the maturity of my students, and happy to have moved past my blunder.

I think it was the next week while I was covering for the Chemistry teacher that I got called to the principal’s office. Always having been a pretty decent kid in school (if a bit lazy), being called in to the office wasn’t something I was ever comfortable with. The principal had always been a nice-enough man, though I didn’t much care for how he expressed matters of faith. He kind of struck me as having a time-bombesque quality. I thought he mildly resembled a paunchy John Malcovich, whose roles have occasioned to have an intensity I find both enthralling and terrifying. Well, it seems that my impressions were truer than an uncanny celebrity resemblance. He was pissed and wasn’t afraid to show it at that point. He demanded an explanation as to why I’d assigned Looking for Alaska as it was a book “against everything we stand for.” That it “lacked any literary value whatsoever,” and “It was just as if you screened a pornographic film in your class.” I did what I had learned to do since childhood—plead mea culpa. Don’t make excuses, just own it. I explained what had happened, feeling every bit like a child in front of an angry principal. That I’d read the book in college had enjoyed it then, had forgotten about the scene. “Enjoyed it?” Knock-off John Malkovich was incredulous. It was then I realized that it wasn’t just the one sexually explicit scene that was the issue. It was the dialogue, the coarse language, the pranks, the students vs. teachers tropes, the references to other faiths alongside Christianity—literally everything. He didn’t fire me. He told me I would write an apology to every parent and reimburse them the cost of the novels, which they’d be collecting from the students. He said, “This is your job on the line.”

I was, unsurprisingly, reeling. “This is your job on the line,” meant I wasn’t fired—at least not yet. I had hope. I was getting married in about two months’ time. And while in retrospect, the $28k I was pulling in as a full-time teacher in 2009 wasn’t any great shakes, it was the only job I had. Further, I needed to complete the year and get my principal’s signature to finish out my certification process. I didn’t know I had an anxiety problem at the time, but I spent the rest of the day in a bit of an anxious haze. In my off-period, I wrote the apology letter I would be sending to the eleven sets of parents. I began packing all my books from my personal classroom library. I assumed the worst, and I wanted to get a jump on things. I couldn’t speak with my other students about the matter of course, but they knew something was up. I honestly don’t remember what we did in class that day. Then the final class period came—English III Honors. The knock-off John Malcovich and the AP of Instruction came in… They collected those copies of Looking for Alaska from those students who’d brought them that day. I remember one of my favorite students looked in horror after they took her note-ridden copy, because when they started in on me, she knew she wasn’t getting it back. I don’t remember exactly what they said anymore. I have long used the phrase: “They reamed me in front of my class.” They denounced the book, they denounced me and my lack of judgment for assigning the book. They said some of the same things that had been said in the private meeting, but I can’t remember exactly how they were phrased. They promised that I’d be reimbursing them for the cost of the books that they were going to destroy. They asked if I had anything to say to my class. All I could manage was, “I’m really sorry, guys,” while I held back tears.

Class was silent until they left. Then there was various outpourings of support for me, outrage at them, pretty much the gamut, save for one student who was strangely quiet. I thought nothing of it at the time, but that was the student, I’d later learn, who snitched. I don’t bear the student any ill-will, of course. This isn’t just long over, it’s also that I don’t do things in my classroom that can’t be told to parents. This experience helped me better formulate that policy in my own teaching philosophy. I barely remember that class period though. I do remember tears from some students—them asking if I was getting fired (seeing how I’d packed my books already). I told them I wasn’t sure but I’d be finding out in about an hour, after class was over. Some of them stayed behind and waited as I went, again, to the principal’s office.

Tomorrow… we discuss After.