As the school year starts and everyone sees who their new teachers are, disappointment sets in. In this scenario, not because we don’t like the teacher of the class, but because we know we’ll just have one sub after another.  It’s the same thing that happened last year.  The African American culturally relevant viewpoint class for Social Studies is missing a teacher for its second year. Last year, Mr. Snead’s history classes were all struck with news halfway through the year that they would be having a long term substitute teacher. This led to weeks and days of all of the classes getting different teachers, and now, it’s happening again. Some students were surprised to find out yet again Mr. Snead was gone and they were going to be having substitute teachers. Students are confused about the whereabouts of Snead, if he is healthy enough to return, if he will ever return, and if not, when they’re getting a permanent teacher and learning what the class is supposed to teach.

With the consistent damper this has been on teachers (who are called to sub during their planning period), students need answers. Assistant Principal Mr. Lundstrom was able to answer these questions. “Teachers have the right to take what’s called an F.M.L.A leave (Family Medical Leave Act). What that does is hold their position while dealing with whatever they’re dealing with.” Mr. Lundstrom also followed his statement up with “until that time is up, and Coach Snead says what he wants to do, we can’t fill his position.” Lundstrom is not worried about how we are going to meet what we’re going to learn because the head of the Culturally Relevant department at TUSD is sending over what we are supposed to do, and there are teachers here who are helping throughout the classes.

A few students who had him last year were concerned about what was going on. After finding out that Snead might not come back, they had a few things to say. Kira Montgomery, a Senior at Sahuaro, had a few things to say, “I’m annoyed that we don’t have a teacher. I would like to actually learn things from this class. Not having a permanent teacher allows the kids to get away with not getting their work in on time and no one pays attention when you keep getting different teachers at a time.” I think it would be hard for anyone to focus when you don’t know how you’re going to learn what’s required. Although yes, there are teachers here who are trying to help, it’s not the same thing as having a permanent teacher who knows what they’re doing, not a sub who most likely doesn’t even know anything about the class.

Senior Jamal Bernhardt also had some concerns about what’s going on. “I’m worried, not having a teacher means having our grades done by another teacher and that’s affecting sports players and other students.” The work is being graded by another teacher who doesn’t know us personally like our actual teacher would, affecting students because we can’t get the help we may need or be able to speak about our grades because a substitute is only there for a short time. As I asked both students will they be staying in this class they are both unsure but are more than likely staying in the class because they both hope that there will be a teacher soon.

For now, all we all can do is sit and wait and see what happens. I know all the classes hope that Snead is getting better and doing what he needs to do to have a speedy recovery.