Not chess. Poker.

The school has raised the stakes. Mike asked about his test, and they gave him a bunch of crap about how he had to teach from the book, and implied that they expect us three to snap out of it and do things the standardized way.

That is to say, the expect us to spend the next last weeks of class teaching a test they wont give us, then wait for an undeterminable amount of time to grade said test, so they can change the grades of the failing students to make sure everyone passes.

Now, over the past few weeks i've made a lot of big promises. I promised my folks that I'd come home for 2 weeks. I promised Nick and Doug a night blessed with my presence, gracing their rock band drum kit and helping them with that overabundance of gin i hear is a big problem on college campuses. I told Lexi I'd be in georgia for a full month. I said i'd do all these things because I really want to.

Furthermore, I've been telling my students EXACTLY what to expect on the final. I've taught them everything i actually know about the culture of England, Ireland, Scotland, and Australia. Also, wales. Granted, that isn't much, but i've done my bit. I've finished the damn book. I'm going to review it all for them. I honestly think that they will benefit from my class.

So, what. Now i'm supposed to tell everyone "no"? Because the school made some passive-agressive trickle down threat?

That's bullshit.

This is why.

First of all, it's just ethically wrong to screw over my students this way. They've worked hard. I'm not going to punish them for this. Second of all, ten years from now, am i gonna look back and say "yeah, i really wish i had fallen in line and gotten to work another semester at that bullshit micky-mouse operation"? I could go on, but hte fact is, it doesn't even matter. The plan has not changed. I'm gonna go in on monday january 7th, i'm going to give the final, i'm going to take it back, i'm gonna grade it, and i'm gonna give the school the final grades.

This is where a flowchart will be handy.

Odds are they're gonna just take the damn grades and not realize my students shouldn't have taken their final yet, and i ride off into the sunset. But, hey, lets say they refuse to take the grades. I've got 10 miles of plausible deniability on my side. Nobody has said ANYTHING to me. The school knows my travel plans. The students know my test plans. Nobody has come up to me and said "we don't like the test you gave us". And you know what? This school needs me more than I need it. Frankly, I don't think they have the stones to fire me over this. And if they do, well, fuck 'em if they can't take a joke.

It's weird. I've never cared this much about anything in my entire life. But I am NOT going to let them do this to my students, and i'm NOT going to let them do it to me. They're good students, I'm a good teacher, and I'm not gonna let them take the fall because I don't have the cajones. At the end of the day, I just couldn't see myself letting the school do this to my students and then going back to work next semester knowing, every day, that i couldn't teach them anything that wasn't in the book without wasting their time. I'm young, god dammit. I've got my whole damn life ahead of me. And I'm mad as hell. There will be time to concede to the big awful machine and let them do the wrong thing, but right now, the only thing that would come of that would be me feeling ashamed.

Conclusion: they aren't going to fire me over this, and if they do I wouldn't want to work for them anyways. There are plenty of schools out here that want foreign teachers. Maybe I should save some time and ask if Shaanxi Normal University has an opening for me.