Who Is Accountable?

I left work today distinctly dissatisfied and generally depressed. It was after 6PM, and I'd been at work for a good 11 hours, with only a few minutes looking at my email and Facebook via my phone. For the third time in the past two weeks, I'd been harassed about how many students are currently failing my biology class. And, for the third time in the past two weeks, I'd pointed out that a significant number of those failures were students who were significant attendance issues -- that is, they were absent more often than they were present.

Each time I mentioned the attendance issue, it was essentially ignored, both by my resource teacher and again by the assistant principal who oversees the science department at my school.

"What are you doing to support these students?" I was asked.

My mind raced. Are you serious? is what I wanted to vocalized, but instead I pointed out the attendance issue. I was then confronted with that very question -- what am I doing to support these students?

Are you fucking serious?

I'm not even sure how to approach this. Keep in mind that Montgomery County (Maryland) doesn't "believe" in students earning a score less than a 50%; no, if a student earns a score lower than a 50%, we are expected to enter "50" into our gradebooks. On the same note, we are "not allowed to give extra credit," where the truth is that a student who can't earn at least a 50% gets extra credit to boost them up to that 50% minimum.

In Montgomery County, we also have this "reassessment" policy that essentially says that a "formative" assessment may be retaken if a) the teacher announces ahead of time that it is retake-able, and b) students come in for reteaching before the retake. Again, we are giving the students every opportunity to pass a class, and still, I have students who refuse to come for reteaching, much less for the retake.

Even with these ridiculously low standards, I evidently have too many students failing my "10th" grade biology classes. As typical of my school's administration, they don't look at the whole picture, and they ignore the fact that of just one class, half of them have been absent at least 10% of the days so far this quarter, and almost a third of them have been absent 20% or more of the class days.

In fact, of my four non-"honors" biology classes, almost 50% of the students in each class have a greater than 20% absence rate, and those students are all failing miserably. That means that of 34 class meetings so far, almost 50% of my "regular" students have missed at least the equivalent of 7 class periods.

This is somehow "my fault," despite repeated attempts to contact the parents and to get the students in for makeups. There are two students that I have not seen since October, and multiple students who show up once every two weeks (or whenever they fancy). Yet, it's still my fault that these students are failing.

This doesn't even mention that the two students from other schools who've joined my classes in the past week have both transferred failing grades to me, while we have less than two weeks until the end of the quarter. Oh, it's totally my fault those two are failing.

I've been teaching at this school for 18 years now. I have seen some misplacements of students into honors classes, and the occasional misplacement of a student into a non-honors biology class. But over the last few years, I have seen such a misplacement of students and so many students ill-prepared for the courses they are signed up for, that it should be criminal. I am serious. These students have absolutely no preparation for lab report writing, personal accountability to do homework or prepare for an upcoming class.

But in the end, I know what's driving the push by my RT and my administrator to "figure out some way for these students to pass." It's the new national/state evaluation system, which MoCo suddenly has to adhere to. So, if a significant number of students aren't passing biology (which is needed to graduate), it makes our principal look bad.

Guess what? I don't fucking care any more. Maybe if he gets a poor evaluation score, he'll actually care about what the rest of us have to deal with day-to-day. I've actually come to dread walking in the halls during 5th or 6th periods because I know I'll see many of my students just wandering around, and I'll feel compelled to report them to their teachers. Worse yet, I know there will be absolutely no consequences for their behaviors, which makes my enforcement of plagiarism and other alleged rules seem whimsical and trivial.

When I left work today, I felt like a rat trapped in a corner by the circumstances I've been put into. There is a reason I got my chemistry certification last summer. I will be out of this disaster of a school this summer, or I will just quit. I can not put up with this any more. I've been through three antidepressant medications and a forced hospital stay because of my depression, and it's more clear than ever that the depression is linked to the feelings of helplessness generated by the administration at my school.

I've started bringing in toys and such that are science related, and guess who plays with them and asks questions about them? Not the students who don't give a damn, but those who are doing well already and those on the cusp. Those who've been on the cusp have improved since I've started bringing the toys in, but those who are the serious attendance problems continue to decline.

Yet.... What am I going to do to help those who refuse to help themselves? I can only hope to shed light on a situation perpetuated by Montgomery County's misguided "grading policy" and pray I don't have to get into the fact that my school refuses to hold all "professional" employees to the same standard.

Install : B&M Shifter

Well, since I didn't get it as a holiday present, I broke down and bought myself a B&M short shifter (thanks, FBC!) to put in the black Camaro. Yeah, first Strano springs, now a short shifter... maybe I will start tracking this car after all.

So, I decided to do this tonight just because I knew I'd be committed to driving this car for the next two weeks while the WRX is at the Washington Auto Show. I thought I remembered it being pretty easy from when I did it with the green car. Well, there are a few console differences with the '97 that make it kind of a PITA.

STEP ONE

Get the ball off! Seriously, for me, this is one of the most difficult parts. It took some effort, but it finally came loose.

STEP TWO

Take the shifter boot off. This is easy, unless you've had someone break into your car and somehow manage to break the plastic retaining ring, which you've subsequently fixed with SuperGlue, so you're afraid that it's going to break again. Anyway, I managed to take it off without breaking it.

STEP THREE

Remove the console. The directions tell you that there are two bolts up front and two in the rear. This is only true for the '93-'96 cars. The '97 has a different console, and so let me tell you how to remove it. You need to take out the coin holder that's in the armrest area, and you'll see two bolts. They are 7mm. Remove them, and then you can pop out the part of the console that's around the shifter. Be careful, as the extra power outlet is still connected, though it's easy enough to pop the connector off. You can now remove this center piece. You might also want to remove the 10mm bolts that are inside the armrest area (2 of them), the one bolt that is underneath the ashtray (also 10mm) and the two 10mm bolts on either side of the front of the console. You don't have to actually take the entire thing off after removing those bolts, but it's helpful to be able to shift it around.

Note that the instructions that are included also tell you to remove the parking brake lever. You don't really need to do this.

STEP FOUR

There are seven 7mm bolts that hold the rubber boot down, and you'll need to take them out and hang on to them, and the boot, since you'll be reusing them all. Before you attack the little bolts, you might want to take the actual shifter off. It has two 13mm bolts holding it on. If you don't remove it now, you'll have to remove it later to get the rubber boot off the shifter, and it's easier to do it now while you have more leverage. It also makes it easier to reach the four 13mm bolts to the shifter itself, since you can pull the rubber boot off.

STEP FIVE

Remove the four 13mm bolts that hold the shifter on. Supposedly, the stock RTV is supposed to make it difficult to get the shifter off. Now, the black Camaro has 208K on it and the green Camaro had nearly 400K on it when I did this, and both of them, the shifter came right off. If you are doing this with a lower mileage car, maybe it's still pretty adhered. Anyway, once you have the shifter off, make sure the plastic bushing didn't come off with it (both of mine stayed put), then put it aside. It's now time for the new shifter.

STEP SIX

Make sure you've removed any remnants of the old RTV and applied new RTV to the transmission where the shifter is going. Put the new shifter on and line up the holes.

Choose which washers you want to use. I have the "A" washers here, as I'm putting it in the stock position. The "B" washers angle it towards the rear. Then slide the new bolts in. They are hex, and use the number 6 allen wrench key.

After tightening the bolts down, try the shifter out to make sure you like the washers you've chosen.

STEP SEVEN

Slide the rubber boot thing over the shifter, then squeeze the retaining ring so that it goes over the rubber and down around the bottom of it. You won't need pliers to squeeze it, fingers work just fine.

STEP EIGHT

Put the stock rubber boot and the 7mm bolts back into place then put the console back together.

Put your shift knob of choice on (I just stayed with the stock shift knob), and you're done!

Locked Out

Last night, the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NHL and the NHLPA was allowed to expire after they, in the words of NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly, "determined that there was no point in convening a formal bargaining session in light of the fact that neither side is in a position to move off of its last proposal."

Sounds a lot like the US Congress and their bipartisan bickering.

And like Congressional stalemates over budgets, tax breaks and entitlement programs, those who are hurt the most by the lockout are the ones that are overlooked, who don't have a voice in the matter. In the lockout, those who are arguably hurt the most are the businesses around the arenas and practice facilities of the teams.

I know that Pat and I easily spend $100 or more in food, drink and the occasional souvenir the night of every home game that we attend. There are games where we spend less, and there are games where we spend more, especially if we are spending the night in DC. We spend some of that money "pregaming" at local bars and restaurants in the area of Verizon Center, especially RFD, the Irish Channel and Nando's Peri-Peri. Sometimes, we just grab a drink or two at Rocket Bar or the Iron Horse Taproom. We'll have a drink or two, and maybe a pretzel or peanuts at Verizon Center, and depending on the night of the week, sometimes we'll head over to the District Chophouse with our friends from 421 for a drink afterwards.

We ride Metro down via the Green Line, and pay for parking in Greenbelt. I take the ICC to get to Greenbelt from work on a weeknight. We stay overnight in the Convention Center area several times a season.

And we're not the only ones. There are plenty of people who don't even have tickets to the game who come downtown to watch the game at one of the aforementioned bars and soak in the atmosphere in the area.

We can't forget the practices either. Hundreds of people will come out to Kettler Capitals Iceplex any day the Caps are practicing, and they spend money at Kettler for t-shirts, jerseys, pucks and other trinkets for autographing. Those people then go to the food court at Ballston Mall, or to one of the establishments very close by, like Union Jacks, Rock Bottom or Front Page.

It's these businesses that are the ones who will suffer the most during this lockout. Fans will be disappointed, and maybe go to an AHL or ECHL affiliate to get their "hockey fix." As expensive as NHL tickets have become, it's even possible those minor league teams and the businesses surrounding their arenas will find permanent places in the hearts and wallets of those people. I know a lower bowl ticket at the Hershey Bears' Giant Center is a fraction of the cost of a ticket for a Caps game (less than $30 versus well over $100), and it's barely a further trip for me to see a game that is of comparable quality.

If $100 of my money, times the 40 some games I can attend (preseason, home and playoff) seems paltry, imagine that amount times 19,000+. There is easily a quarter of a million dollars per home game that won't be flowing into the hands of local businesses because the owners and the players can't even be bothered to consider a compromise.

In the meantime, at least I can use the money I'm not spending at Caps games to get my WRX back on the road sooner. So, I'm still helping local business, just not the ones I usually frequent in the fall and winter.

Failure

So, yeah, I went to the SCCA Solo Nationals last week. In fact, last Sunday at this time, I was in northeastern Ohio, contemplating how far I wanted to drive before grabbing a hotel room (or stopping at a rest area). I was in my black Camaro Z28 -- not the car of choice -- so, a rest area was a viable option since there were no tires in the back seat, and the Camaro seats are pretty comfy to sleep in.

It was weird, driving a Camaro to Nationals. I haven't done it in over five years, and even then, it was the green car, not the black one. It also made packing very odd. As most autocrossers will tell you, there is a routine to packing, and when you disrupt that routine -- such as driving a car you hadn't planned on driving -- that's when things get forgotten. It probably took me longer to pack the Camaro with less stuff than the WRX because I kept standing in the garage and mentally thinking about what else I needed from there.

Ready to roll

I ended up staying the night in Elkhart, Indiana, at a hotel I'd hit on the way out to Packwood last year. With the SCCA discount, it was a reasonable enough rate, and I got a backup alarm in the form of a wakeup call for Monday morning. I wanted to be on site early enough to register on Monday, and I figured Elkhart was the halfway point so there was another nine or so hours of driving to go.

I arrived not too long after Drew did, and hit registration on the way through the gate. He'd already told Tracy Lewis about the change in my registration, so things were pretty easy there. It was just a matter of finding him in paddock and getting the car teched at that point.

Ready for tech!

The car passed tech easily, though they were definitely a bit more anal about stickers and numbers this year. We were fine, but I saw some other people actually get turned away because their numbers didn't contrast or they didn't have their helmets with the current sticker.

We walked the Karen Babb designed West course a few times, then Drew went up to the practice course where Christy Carlson told him that she could get him into the practice. He rode his bike back to paddock to grab the car and took three of his four runs, just to see if the car needed anything serious. His first run was all over the place, but we didn't touch anything, and the next run was better.

Around then I realized it was after 7PM, so I headed over to the hotel to check in, get cleaned up a little bit, then head to Lazlo's downtown for Holly's birthday bash. When I arrived, all the seats near her were already taken, so I was relegated to the back, where Jason and Heather Burns were sitting by themselves. Sean came up and tried to harass me, but I was having none of it, and a few more people showed up later. I hadn't eaten anything all day, so the two Vanilla Porters I drank went down way too easily, and the sandwich I had was nearly inhaled, I was so hungry. This no-appetite-until-food-is-in-front-of-me bullshit is getting old. We sang happy birthday to Holly as Crissy Weaver brought around cake, and then it was back to the hotel for a few hours of sleep.

ESP had the good fortune to run third heat, and since my work assignment somehow fell through the cracks, if I wanted to, I could have slept in. I wanted to walk the course and help change tires (Drew doesn't like driving on the competition tires to-and-from the hotel), so I made sure I was there around 6:30. We walked the course twice again, then he checked in for work while I just watched first heat and talked with people. We got one more walk after the second heat was done, and I did my walk with Lane Borg (who was leading AS by a scant 0.02 seconds) while Drew walked with Paul Brown. AS and ESP have extremely close PAX indices, so it made sense for us to walk with the Corvette guys.

I'm not used to running towards the end of the group...

I still hadn't driven the car at all when it came time to take my first run. Seriously, I hadn't even driven it over to tech or to the grid. So, I carefully let the stock clutch out to get a feel for the engagement point, then pulled up to the line for my first run. My launch wasn't very good; I didn't want to do a ProSolo style launch, but I hadn't planned on bogging so badly. The very first turn resulted in me pushing out and hanging the tail out, enough that I was wondering how loose this car was going to handle. It did it again in the next turn, then calmed down for the remainder of the run. Drew has BFGoodrich tires, and they evidently don't do so well when stone cold.

You can see me in the marbles here. Photo by Perry Bennett

I wasn't sure what to think of the car at that point. My time was horrible, but I knew there was a lot out there. Drew went out and coned his run, and there wasn't a whole lot to say at that point. We weren't blaming the car for our standings, and I went out on my second run and pushed harder, dropping over a second. It still was way off the pace, but I knew I wasn't driving particularly well either. I wasn't visualizing where I needed to go, and I wasn't really looking ahead (even though the video makes it look like I was). I just kept thinking about how I would have been doing in my own car, and so I pretty much was just going through the motions.

photo by Tom Reynolds

One more chance for me to start off the week in my "usual spot," one out of trophies.

Another 0.8s improvement, but still terrible compared to trophy positions, and Drew would be another 0.5s behind me. But before Drew could take his last run, there was a bit of drama in the ESP grid.

It seems that Charles Moss's Eagle Talon had a blown turbo seal, causing it to smoke heavily all weekend. After Charles's second run on the West course, enough oil had made its way onto the exhaust that there was actually a small fire as the car came into grid. This resulted in a few fire extinguishers being used (much to Eric Thompson's dismay, since he was gridded next to, and downwind from, the Talon), and Charles not getting his last run. Sam Krauss, on the other hand, jumped into Brad Owen's WRX in order to try to get a clean run, as neither of his runs in the Talon were coneless. It didn't work. Despite his being semi-familiar with the '06 WRX from driving my car, he struggled with Brad's setup and managed to tag a cone on the run.

I wasn't happy with where I was standing -- 17th of 32 -- but there wasn't much to be done. At least the car hadn't caught on fire. So, we went back to paddock, changed tires, and walked Roger Johnson's East course -- since they had finished well ahead of us -- before going our separate ways for the evening.

For the second day in a row, I managed to not eat anything all day, and while I tried to make sure I was staying hydrated, I soon realized I hadn't hit the portajohn all day either. This was not a good sign, and surely had an effect on my driving, but it most definitely played a role in the splitting headache that was developing. I wandered over to the Atlanta Region tent and Tom Shuman encouraged me to grab a bite there. Scott Fraser and Tom Kubo came by and took me over to the CP party, where Tony Espinosa gave me a bowl of heavenly beans that he'd made. I talked with Katie Kelly and Mary Espinosa a bit, then headed back to ATL to chat with a few people before heading off to the hotel and some blessed ibuprofen. I must have had a gallon of water when I got back, and my head was just throbbing. I honestly was starting to wonder if I was just going to die, it hurt so bad. Finally, the ibuprofen kicked in, and I was able to fall asleep, just in time for the alarm to go off.

Speedy was evicted from the car during Drew's runs.

We had an 8AM start for Wednesday, so I was back on site at 6:45, with four gallons of E85 in tow. We'd gone through the fuel Drew had brought with him, and so I went to pick some more up on my way to the site in the morning. Two more course walks, and we were as ready as we were going to be.

Again, I wandered around during the first two heats, watching and talking to STX drivers and then STU drivers before getting one last course walk in between heats 2 and 3. I didn't walk with anyone on the last course walk this time, and I don't know if that hurt me. I just know that I was kind of despondent about driving; I wanted to do well, but I was so far back, that it just didn't matter. I actually did visualize the course between runs, and I knew exactly where I was screwing up, but in the end, I didn't do very well. I wasn't as dehydrated so couldn't blame that, and Drew was a second faster than me (0.5 if you count my raw time on my second run, where I coned early and so pushed the car), so I can't blame the car either.

In the end, my head and my heart just weren't in it, as I knew would be the case. I was oddly at peace with it, however. I was very disappointed, but as Drew pointed out, the car didn't need to go home on a trailer. It also did not catch on fire, and we both finished on the first page of results. I had fallen to 22nd, and he had leapfrogged me to finish 20th, but it was not a good showing for either of us. It wasn't a good showing for Subarus in general, as Brad nabbed the last trophy spot -- 9th, which was down a few spots from last year for him -- and Drew was the second fastest WRX in class. Jimmy Perrin, driving Christian Nissen's 2006, was 21st. Christian and Matt Rosazza were behind me.

It came back for day two, but was quarantined to its own area of grid.

I hung out with a couple of the NWOR guys, and managed to grab a small bite to eat with them, then eventually went back to the hotel and stared at the ceiling. I should have left for home, but figured I could do the trip on Thursday if I left around 6AM. Reality was that I left closer to 6:30AM, got hung up in the backup from an accident in Omaha, and got home around 2:30AM. It was a long ride home, and work certainly sucked on Friday, especially when people asked how things went.

I talked to JJ before I left work, and planned to pick my WRX up from IAG on Saturday so that I could have it around for some of the locals before getting the off-season makeover done. Pat and I rolled up just after noon to get the car, and he took off before I'd even gotten the keys. I started the car up, let it warm up, then rolled out onto MD140 and realized that, yes, my car does have a decent amount of "go" to it, even if it's quieter than the other WRXes that were at Nationals.

Then, I smelled it again.... coolant. I glance down at the temperature gauge and see it 2/3rds of the way up. I'm less than 10 miles away, and there isn't a shoulder on the road at this point. I watch miserably as the gauge continues to climb as I try to get to an area I can pull off.

I pop the hood, and it's immediately obvious what has happened.

Not cool. Literally.

The brand new radiator hose has come off the radiator. I've got nothing with me -- no extra coolant, no tools to use on the spring clamp -- so, I call the shop and explain what happened. They send Ian out, but somehow neglect to tell him to bring something for the spring clamp, so we end up going back to the shop for tools and a "regular" screw-type hose clamp. Once back at the car, the hose is back on and coolant in the system withing minutes. So, now it's just a matter of "burping" the air out.

I sit in the car and rev it or let it idle at Ian's direction. After 5-10 minutes, the coolant seems to be done burbling, and I try to start back to the shop with Ian in his Kia in tow. I don't make it 10 feet before the temperature gauge climbs back to the danger zone. We ditch the WRX on the side of MD 140 and head back to the shop while I call Pat to tell him to meet me there.

So, it appears at least one head gasket is definitely shot. Now, it's just a matter of figuring out what else to do while the heads are off. The car only has 120K on the odometer, so I'm not sure valve springs and all need to be refreshed. The heads can be milled to Subaru specs or 0.010", and some port matching can be done, but really, there isn't a whole lot that is Street Prepared legal. Of course, I just want the car to run properly again, so that's my primary goal.

I don't know how long it will take to fix. In the meantime, I'm desperately trying to catch up on some suspension maintenance with the Camaros.

Control arm bushings and ball joints, unite!

Looks like my season is over early.

Recovery

I'm almost recovered from the trip to Lincoln. I did drive Drew's car, and I didn't drive it particularly well. I'll elaborate on the trip later, but for now I'll say what we were both saying after we were done on Wednesday : "No matter what, at least the car is going home under its own power and it didn't catch fire."