Failing Miserably by: Sam Fremin

Sometimes it takes failing miserably to come up with the best (or most obvious) fixes for problems. The technicians in my school’s drama department had to learn that the hard way recently. I am one of my school’s two Student Technical Directors for drama. Essentially, that means that my partner and I are the ones to go to if there are events going on during/after school requiring sound and lights. My partner’s job schedules him constantly and with my array of extracurricular activities, we were finding it hard to honor every commitment. We had to jump through hoops to make sure even just one of us could be there.


This led us to start delegating jobs to other people among our tech teams. As the head of lights, my partner reached out to the kids he worked with and since I lean more to the sound side, I reached out to them. Using a group message, we asked for assistance anytime neither of us were able to make an event. This lightened the load on us because we were able to go on with our other activities without a sense of dread regarding impending events. It also gave our teammates more exposure to performance scenarios that they typically only got during the fall play and spring musical. Everybody won. Our team went from two to nine and everything was more manageable.


Communication through a group chat though is nothing all that revolutionary. The fact that this idea hadn’t been put into use years ago is pretty spectacularly disappointing. Our biggest lesson was yet to come.


Earlier this year, a band concert was scheduled for a weekday and needed someone to run lights. My partner was called for work and I had #BowTieBoys work to attend to (work that you can
check out using that very same hashtag on any device that supports Twitter!), so it was necessary for us to find a cover. The day before, we pinpointed who it would be. They spent their study hall setting lights, cueing them, and writing out how they corresponded with each of the different songs that were to be played. This person ended up not showing up. Twenty or so minutes before the band concert was supposed to start, our band director went on a search. Already stressed out I’m sure, he scoured the fine arts hallway for anyone who might know how to even remotely run the board. Luckily our stage manager was there. Although his knowledge of the board was near zero (it has grown substantially since then, just in case), he managed to power through and give the band some light.


As I came into school the next day, I was confronted about it by the band and choir directors. Our conversation was the first I had heard of the incident and I was mortified, as was the rest of our tech team. A miscommunication like that should never been able to happen. We decided to hold a meeting amongst the kids so we could figure out what went wrong and how we could potentially fix it in the future. While in that meeting, we came up with the idea to have a schedule and sign up spreadsheet easily accessible (it’s amazing this also had not been implemented before), that was not the major takeaway.


Communication is key. Every successful relationship is built on it, whether it be social, romantic, business, or any other form. We were faced with a problem and rather than dismissing it as a fluke and carrying on, our team met and discussed the issue. I would be very surprised if we were ever again faced with a situation like that poorly executed band concert coverage. The root of the problem was found and we cut it out of the ground.


That thought process can be easily applied to the classroom too. If a student is acting out in class, potentially disrupting other students, having a simple conversation is the right approach. Harsh punishment just hurts rapport and ultimately it doesn’t solve the problem. Having a conversation where both sides are free to express everything allows the real cause of the problem to come out along with ways to mitigate it. If a student is falling behind in class, it doesn’t make any sense to blow right past them without a second thought. Leaving them behind or pretending they’re on the same pace as everyone else is just flat out irresponsible. Sitting down with a student and discussing avenues they can take to get back on track is more likely to help than inaction. Disagreements occurring in class can be solved by talking through them. When students feel as though something isn’t as engaging as it could be, they should be able to speak up. Creating a forum where students can voice their opinions and concerns is the best way to ensure student voice is incorporated into the class while still keeping the classroom manageable. Teachers can seem hard to approach just because of the fact that they’re an authority figure. Try to make it widely known that communication is valued in your classroom. Rapport will remain high, issues will be solved with more ease, and everyone will be empowered and invited to work more efficiently as a result.