"did you fire me?"

time: thursday at 4:30pm.  location: the faculty workroom.

me: "what are you still doing here so late?"

coworker: "china [her daughter] gets tutored by andrew o'neill after school."

[note: andrew o'neill is the kind of kid where you have to say his full name.  he's not andrew.  he's andrew o'neill.  he also is the most socially awkward kid EVER.  not even socially awkward - socially uninterested.]

me: "how cool!  is andrew o'neill good at math?"

coworker: "andrew is so good at math.  i pay him minimum wage - $7.50 an hour - for an hour every day after school, and i give him a $5 bonus if china gets an A on a quiz and a $10 bonus if she gets an A on a test.  tutors are so expensive in this city, so this is the only way i can afford to get her some extra help.  i decided to ask him to help tutor china after i found him last year walking through the halls mumbling to himself, 'i can't believe i have a 101 average in algebra II.'"

[note: i am not surprised to learn that andrew o'neill was walking the halls mumbling to himself.  or that he had a 101 average in algebra II.]

me: "does andrew like tutoring?"

coworker: "he likes the money! you should have seen his face when i gave him the $10 bonus when china made an A on her last test."

me: "i bet that's really good for him - to have to explain the concepts to someone else and help them understand it."

coworker: "the librarians tell me that he drills her with problems for the whole hour - he takes it so seriously.  'you have to practice more of these if you want to do well on the next test.'"

me: [laughing]

coworker: "oh, and you'll get a kick out of this story - i gave china two days off from tutoring during homecoming week and she was supposed to tell andrew, but she didn't.  on the second day andrew walked right into a meeting i was having without knocking and said 'i haven't seen india for a couple days - did you fire me?'  i couldn't even bear to tell him that he got her name wrong after nine straight weeks of working together ever day - i just reassured him that he wasn't fired."


this, THIS, is why i love teaching.  you take a socially awkward kid who is good at math and you put him in a new situation and he steps up to the plate and out of his comfort zone.  i just want to give him a high five.  but acknowledging that i know all of this would probably be crossing some sort of unacceptable invisible line.  so i am just going to smile to myself every time i see him from now on.