1 month anniversary. School and students

Alright, i know I've been teasing this and i hope not to disappoint but here goes. The Langley Academy. I'll try and give you a brief rundown of how the UK education system works. So the school system is split up into primary school which goes through year 6 and secondary school which goes from year 7 to year 11. After year 11 they can apply to the 6th form which is essentially their upperclassmen high school years and choose their specialty (science, art, history, etc) and earn their A-levels. They need to have a certain amount of A-levels to even think about applying to a University. They earn the A-levels either through coursework or taking standardized tests at the end of the courses. The other option is to choose to go to a technical school after year 11 to learn a trade (hair dressing, masonry, etc.) or apply for an apprenticeship, or go directly into the work force. Also in year 2 the children are assessed and if they are qualified talented enough they are skimmed off to go to grammar schools which are for high achieving students and are very posh and they also go through year 11. This kind of sucks because the best and the brightest are taken away leaving the rest to go to Public schools and Academies. Academies are privately funded but dont get any delusions of grandeur, they are almost always built in the absolute worst areas to try and bring stability to the students in these types of areas.
The Langley Academy has replaced the Langleywood school from what i can tell was a pretty rough place. The school has a Principal who runs the day to day business side of things and has final word on any major student related issues like exclusions. He would be almost like a one school superintendent. They also have a head teacher who is more in the classic American version of a principal role. From there on you have some vice principals, all of the heads of dept., and we have 8 behavior managers and then one school police officer. I will tell you one thing, this job would be impossible without all of the support they have in place from all of these people.
Now as for the students, well i cant really get into any specifics due to the fact that my name is attached to this and the students have found out about google.com so i have to keep things to overall impressions. The school does have an effective discipline system which is based on warnings. If a student gets one warning it is their name on the board, 2 warnings is a seat change and a note to their carers in their planner, 3 warnings is a 15 min detention, and 4 warnings is removal from class by a behavior officer and a 1 hour detention, and a letter automatically generated and sent home that same day. There is also a Gross Misconduct (GM) equal to an automatic 4th warning and can result in an exclusion. You can only give GM's out for a student swearing directly at you, fighting, drugs, or any other major offenses. If a student gets excluded (suspended) they are actually not sent home, they are sent to an inclusion center on campus and given work to do from classes in silence, so it serves as a pretty good deterrent.
Now as for the students themselves. Disclaimer!! This is not indicative of all students, far from it. 60-70 percent of the students are amazing. But thats boring to talk about so i'll focus on the minority of bad students, but also know, this isn't one or two bad kids per class. I have one class with over 10 kids like this. I have a class that every student is like this, literally. Its really hard to describe but they are not necessarily any worse than american students, its just that the offenses are different. For example in CA we probably kicked out 30-40 kids for drugs each year. In 3 years Langley has only kicked out 1. The kids just don't bring drugs to school, not to say they don't do them, but they leave it at home. Also the kids don't fight. At Portola Middle School we had fights all the time, but here its rare, probably 1 or 2 per year, whereas in the states we had 1 or 2 or more per week it seemed like sometimes. What the kids do here though is backtalk, like for real, they backtalk and are defiant in ways i cant even begin to portray to you. I have never, ever, had a kid refuse to give me a mobile phone in class when i asked for it. I had 5 refusals the first day, straight up, "No i am not giving you my phone, so go away and stop bugging me" and they go back to texting. Then i have to shell out warnings and get behavior managers involved. They don't care though. If you ask them to do something they say no or just straight up ignore you even if you are yelling their name 1 foot away from them, they continue with what ever it is they are doing. An absolute show of disrespect.
Now I've had loads of kids like this, but when you combine it with this next bad trait it makes for more than a challenge, it can be "crying at night" "want to quit" bad. IMMATURITY. No joke, i have never met or seen so many whiny 5 year olds in teenagers bodies. For example, if i was to employ the waring system we have in place in the states 90% of the students would behave badly, get a warning, and accept their punishment. Here, oh no... no way.
(Disclaimer: This next thing is hypothetical, but it comprises exactly a normal thing, this is not literal but something similar did happen)
I have told a student "do not throw that, or you will get a warning", he/she then looked at me and threw it and when they got a warning, acted as if i was the most unfair, unjust, tyrant around and threw a stomping feet honest to God temper tantrum in class. This is a high achieving 14 year old mind you with good test scores. I was hanging my jaw at the end of the first day. I have had activities planned that should have taken 5 minutes take 1 hour and 40 minutes because the students will not stop talking. I have taken over a half an hour to say a sentence getting no more than 2 words out at a time before the talking would start. Two weeks ago i was going to quit, it was so bad. But i was comforted by some of my colleagues (all male by the way) who said they went home crying on multiple occasions in their first years.
But apparently its all part of a test with the kids. The teacher turnover rate has been so great since the swithc to an Academy school system that they are left feeling constantly abandoned. My most challenging class (which i am determined to get in line and learning, and they are slowly coming around) had 6...SIX teachers last year. Crazy, and they have had no discipline in over a year, so yeah, it can get bad. But apparently its all a test according to Tom my British teacher friend. I told him, that i felt like i was failing that test. He said "No! Everyday that you show up, you pass. They are saying, Do you have the balls to stick with us through all of our bullshit and teach us? And after you stick around for a year or 6 months, they respect you. Apparently my other friend Roger from Canada had a nightmare year last year and this year he has even rougher classes, but now they instantly respect him just because he stuck it out and came back instead of leaving. Needless to say, these types of conversations with Tom and Roger, and all of my other colleagues have kept me from walking out, and each week is getting slightly better.
Also, the greatest thing about Langley is that all Fridays are half days and there is a Pub across the street. Now we don't all go out and get pissed drunk (seriously we don't), but there are probably 40-50 teachers there after school lets out and that pint of cider, that "friday and work was hell but its the weekend" pint of cider is the most delicious thing i have ever tasted. Everyone is there, Everyone, and we all trade war stories and laugh ourselves silly at our choice in profession. It makes everything worthwhile. Then i go home with Pete and we have a hot meal on the table prepared by our lovely wives, and everything seems like it might be okay. At least for 2 days.
Thanks for reading, and leave a comment (even if its just "Hi"or subscribe if you read this, because i would be curious as to who is) and keep coming back. Hope you enjoyed. The next blog is will be dedicated to Jon Shin who really wants to know what i think about UK culture. So next time, i'll let you all know what i think, The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly Teeth. Later. Love you all.