His teeth. Or lack thereof, was the first thing I noticed about Jacolby. My mother-in-law always says, "No one likes having no teeth". But I wasn't so sure about Jacolby. He did like attention, though. The first thing Jacolby said when he came into my class was, "I just got outta EMC (East Mississippi Correctional), I got shot in the leg." I stared at him dumbfounded and then directed him where to sit. My mind started racing a mind a minute. I cannot let this toothless child mess up my class. How do I get him out of here? Was he really shot in the leg? Did he really just get out of prison? How old is he? Does he have parents? Good parents don't let their children have no front teeth. If Jacolby had not already set his self up for failure, I surely was. I had known the child but 30 seconds and I was convinced he was un-teachable.
The second day Jacolby was in my class he threw some object at some other student somewhere across the room. My opportunity had come sooner than I had even hoped. I immediately buzzed for security and had Jacolby whisked away to the principal's office.
When Jacolby returned three days later from ISS, he was just as loud as ever. Harassing female students with sexual innuendos talking down to male students with derogatory names. I documented it all. Making sure my arsenal was fully packed for the day when I would make sure Jacolby was gone from my class for good.
Before Thanksgiving Break attendance was low. I was praying Jacolby would be absent, too. Over half the class had started their break early, but not Jacolby. I half smiled at him as he walked through the door. There were not as many students around Jacolby that he could pick with this day, so he was unusually quiet. This is my chance I thought. While I am not dealing with a room of 28 children, I can talk to Jacolby a little bit. Maybe see if I can reason with him. I started out by asking him about the assignment. He told me he couldn't do it, and I said of course you can it is easy, read me number one. And that's when I realized Jacolby could not read. And I do not mean functionally literate where someone can read, but not comprehend, I mean he could not read. He was stumbling over "sight words" like choose and with. For the millionth time I looked at Jacolby dumbfounded. But this with not so much contempt, but pity. This dark skinned, toothless boy from Mississippi cannot read. He has no chance. I am looking at a statistic. For the rest of the period I worked with Jacolby. As I read to him he laid sprawled out on a table and tugged on my hand when I needed to slow down or define a term. When he would get distracted I would tug on his earlobes. The first time I did this I asked him if it was okay, and he said yes. I wondered if he had a mom who ever rubbed his belly when he was sick. I wondered if a teacher rubbing his ears was the most maternal affection he had gotten lately.
As time went on, whenever classes were small I would let Jacolby come sit with me at my desk. I would read to him and tug on his ears. I enjoyed working with Jacolby one-on-one. It felt good to see his respond to positive attention and to see his reading improve. Whenever classes were not small, I could not give Jacolby the attention he needed. He would always end up picking with another student, it would escalate and soon Jacolby would end back up in ISS.
As time went on, the powers at be kept adding student after student to this particular class to the point that there were never any low attendance days anymore. Jacolby fell by the way side so I could concentrate on the class as a whole.
Eventually, I could not give Jacolby the attention he needed and he was placed in self containment.
I still see Jacolby in the afternoon sometimes when I go to check my mailbox. He says, "Hello" and I say "Hello" back and as I walk away I feel my become hot. I feel shame. Shame in myself for giving up on him, shame in the public school system which thought I could ever give that child what he needed, shame for his parents who have not taken responsibility for raising their child, shame for society which will ultimately judge him.
***Jacolby Randle was removed from my roll and had left school when I tried to find him for an interview. The special education teacher who he was working with gave me no information about Jacolby's current whereabouts. Only that he stopped coming a couple of weeks ago, and last week he was dropped from the roll.