In what might have been the toughest year to be a teacher in WSFCS (including the pandemic), a few days away from the classroom can offer some time to reflect and try and understand what made this school year so hard.

Yes, the budget debacle is still front and center and the county commsion’s refusal to help fund the public schools here in WSFCS while the state continues to do nothing will put pressure on those who remain in the classrooms for 2026-2027. However, there are some actions that can be taken and/or investigated to enpower those who educate our students.

The first suggestion is to revisit the Code of Conduct. Why? Because the intention and the implementation have not collided in the same area code since it was introduced. As Samuel Johnson stated in 1775, “The road to hell is paved with good intentions” (at least according to James Boswell).

In short, our discipline protocol has the bite of a toothless sloth that falls asleep at first contact.

Ask those who have left teaching from our system before full retirement (to another career or school system), and if they truly gave an honest assessment of their reasons for leaving, many would rank student behavior and lack of consequences at the top.

Go ahead an ask your own students or students that you know, “Do kids truly receive consequences for infractions at our schools?” The tardies, the skipping, the verbal disrespect, the vaping, the fighting, the classroom disruptions, the academic dishonesty, and the blatant disregard for procedures that do not necessarily equate to having a weapon or causing physical harm. It’s rampant.

And they build on each other and create an environment where those who really want to learn (which is a vast majority of our students) cannot fully focus because others are draining time and energy from the classroom and school. Those freshmen who walk in and see that skipping, backtalking, and congregating in the bathroom result in nothing more than a “restorative” discussion that allows the student to repeat the behavior without any real consequence will see it as acceptable behavior themselves.

The implementation of our current Code of Conduct happened in one fell swoop (yes, that’s Shakespeare). All of a sudden every elementary school, middle school, and high school was using a set of loosely interpreted standardss on how to handle student discipline. There was not much training and just like with other programs we implemented it then learned about it.

We didn’t test it or introduce it in a way that allowed people to learn about it. We didn’t begin with just the elementary schools. We didn’t involve teachers in the discussion.

It was just expected that it would all work out.

It didn’t.

And who learned the most about the limits of the Code of Conduct? Students.

And who learned first how badly it had been implemented? Students.

And who understood how it was not being supported by central administration and not getting the desired results? The students AND the educators in site-based schools.

Whether this school system wants to admit it or not, we have a “beyond the existential crisis” occurring in staffing our schools. From watching RIFs take away good teachers and administrators to a BOE that acts like a toxically dysfunctional family on the holidays to not being fully-funded to not having a new state budget since 2023, the people who have chosen to stay in WSFCS are probably entertaining options in their careers.

Being able to know as a teacher or administrator that a student who willingly breaks a steadfast rule will be dealt with in a way that allows for others to continue learning without disruption might be a first step in starting to move this school system in the right direction.

It definitely can be done before we have elections that might put people in power who will begin to make sure that resources and funding start coming back in adequate amounts.