The P word

          I think about my students and how to better teach them while I jog, eat dinner, dream, and floss my teeth.  Funny, then, how I find myself actively avoiding conversations about my classroom and my life as a teacher. I, on occasion, tell a silly classroom story. I confide my worries to those close. But, to describe my classroom to others, even other educators, always leaves me feeling dissatisfied and uneasy.
             To talk about my classroom is to take on a dialogue about poverty. 98% of the children I teach live with incomes below the poverty line. This statistic is a start in understanding where I teach, but is insufficient. The "Title I" descriptor of my school often elicits pity, judgment, or scenes from Mr. Holland's Opus. None are accurate.  The students I teach are at-risk, but they are more than that.
           To talk about "at-risk" students seems a betrayal. I never address my class with 'Good morning "at-risk" students. I address my students as kids with serious smarts, potential, and purpose. As people who deserve the best and can achieve greatness. As people who can change the world.
             However, I also talk to my students about the many challenges the world will throw at them. I teach resilience and efficacy. It is no secret to my students, many of whom often can't scrounge up the money for lunch much less a field trip, that they are at-risk of many hardships. The label "at-risk" defines students  by  deficits and ignores strengths. The label is how the world sees my students, how the education system views my students: as statistics.
             How then, do we, as  teachers of students who are "at-risk," have meaningful, frank discussions about poverty, acknowledging the issues our students face? It is crucial that we as educators answer this question. We hear much about charter schools, teacher quality, and engaged learning, but very little about what best practices look like for students "at-risk".  The voices lacking in the debate on education reform are those of teachers working to close the gap, and the voices of our students. Conversations about what works for struggling students are crucial. Discussing what needs our students have, and how to meet these needs is a necessary first step to closing the achievement gap. 
           Discussing poverty is uncomfortable. An honest discussion requires talking about our failure as educators; the discussion of what doesn't work. In a climate of stressful accountability and fear mongering, admitting struggles is far from the norm. Additionally, talking about poverty elicits guilt. I have to confront the irony that I decry poverty while sipping $6 a bag hazelnut coffee.I do not know what it means to be poor. I advocate for marginalized students whom I will always be somewhat irrelevant to because I am white, grew up in a two-story house, money for college, and a stay at home mom. Speaking of poverty is sad. What if the issues my student's face are too daunting to tackle? What if no matter what I do, they won't make it to college?
         I am afraid that my conversation will be trite, elitist, and hypocritical.All are likely. But silence is inexcusable.