When incoming assistant principal Gary Morris targets Wendy's teaching as undesirable, there's nothing she can do to refute his claims, thanks to a new state law that gives him the ultimate authority to decide who is a good teacher and who is not.
But why? What does Morris have to gain by sabotaging a teacher who had previously known nothing but success?
Find out as Wendy tries to stay one step ahead of her nemesis in this intriguing story of bureaucracy run amok.
From page 324
At the Bowling Alley:
​
It’s not hard to find Mary and Ian. Ian and Jim are giving whoops of joy as Mary jumps up and down, celebrating a strike. When she sees me, she grins even wider.
“Hey, Wendy!” she says. “So glad you came.” She and Martha approach me and to my surprise, Martha gives me a hug.
“How are things going at school?” she asks, her voice kind with concern. “Mary told us how bad it’s getting for you.”
“About as you’d expect,” I tell her. And then to Mary, “I think I know what’s going on.”
Mary’s eyes widen and then she says, “Give us a chance to finish this game and then I’ll tell Ian and Jim to bowl the next one without us.” I nod and walk away toward the bar to order a Chardonnay. As I reach into my purse for my wallet, my hand protectively pats the envelope holding the precious photographs.
After paying for my wine, I return to the table nearest Mary and Ian and their friends. As I sip my wine, I realize that it didn’t even occur to me to examine Mary’s row of information on Morris’ grid. Taking out the photos, I look closely at the one containing the grid, straining to see where Mary Ehrlich might be.
“What’s that?” Mary asks, taking a seat across from me.
“Damning evidence,” I tell her, managing a slight smile as I sip from my glass again.
Her eyes widen. “Evidence of what?” she asks.
Martha soon joins us and sits next to Mary. “What’s going on?” she asks.
I smile without mirth at both of them. “I think I know why Morris is here,” I say, and Martha looks around.
“Here?” she repeats, confused.
“She means, here at Bennie J. Goodman,” Mary clarifies for her friend. Turning back to me, she says, “Why is he here?”
“I think he’s on probation,” I say, enjoying for a moment the look on her face.
“No!” she says. “How do you know?”
“Just a hunch,” I tell her, “based on these.” I spread the photos out on the table and turn them around so Mary can read the information on them. As she does, her eyes widen again.
“Oh, my God!” she says. “Where did you get these?”
“I took them,” I tell her, and she raises her eyebrows at me. “This afternoon, in Morris’ office.”
“You’re kidding.” Mary is shaking her head. “How on earth did you do that?”
I share the story of the bus driver and the aborted meeting and my decision to snoop in Morris’ binder.
“You actually had the balls to look through his notebook?” I grin involuntarily at Martha’s choice of words, nodding.
“Yep,” I say. “Look at his goals.” Mary bends her head again, reading from the photo. Measurable growth of selected faculty?” she says. “That’s you!”
Nodding, I say, “Now look at the baseline he documented for me."
Mary inhales dramatically. "No wonder he's come down so hard on you this year! Now he can show growth for his goals!
I think about that, and Martha's earlier question about who authenticates what Morris reports. I'm suddenly certain that the ramifications of this new world controlled by documentation are veering toward the calamitous.
Mary, who has continued to study the grid, suddenly exclaims, "Kelsey and Stacey, too?"
Nodding, I point to the row of criteria at the top of the photo. "Look how we were chosen."
After examining the photo, Martha is the first to speak. “Why, that’s outrageous,” she says. “It’s none of his business who is married and who is not!”
I am amused that that’s the item she finds the most objectionable.
“Ian was right,” Mary says softly. “Part of me thought he was being ridiculous. No one could possibly behave that way in their job.”
I remember her telling me not to be naive, and I have to bite my tongue to keep from saying Who’s being naive now?
“I almost can’t believe it myself,” I say, “but part of me feels... vindicated.” Mary looks at me with compassion and I think she understands. “I knew there had to be something wacky going on. Either that or I was losing my mind.”
“What are you going to do now?” Martha asks, and I shake my head.
“I don’t know,” I tell her. “But how can I take anything he says seriously from now on? I feel like I have to tell him I know what he’s doing, but I also wonder if there’s some way I could…”
“Could what?” Mary asks, and I see the slow smile playing around her lips. “Use the information against him?”
“Oh, no,” Martha says vehemently. “You don’t know what you’re messing with if you try that.” She’s shaking her head and the sane part of me knows she’s right.
“But it’s just so….wrong!” I tell her.
“You have no idea the legal resources available in a district this size,” she says. “They’d chew you up and spit you out just for fun.”
Mary gives a humorless laugh. “Come on, Martha, what’s Wendy supposed to do? Lay down and let them walk all over her?”
Martha appears to be considering just what my choices are. “How likely is it that he knows you snooped in his binder?” she asks me.
“Totally unlikely,” I say, “unless he just happened to look inside his office from the school bus where he was having fisticuffs with a bus driver.” I smile for a moment at that thought.
“Which he could have done,” Martha says. “Anything’s possible.”
I supposed it was. “Then what do you suggest?” I ask her.
Mary jumps in with, “I say we run a sting on him!”
A big smile spreads across my features. When Mary’s been drinking, she comes up with the best ideas.
“Play his game back at him,” Mary says, and Martha snorts.
“I think you’ve been watching too many James Bond movies,” she says dryly, but winks at me.
“I think it’s the wine talking,” I say to Martha, my eyes on Mary’s nearly empty wine glass. “Tell me more.”
“Okay,” says Mary. “Here’s what we do.”
I lean forward so I can hear this top-secret, super-sneaky plan.
“We align strategies in the classroom,” she says. “You and me. Everything the same.”
I wait.
“He’s been giving me kudos all year,” she prods helpfully.
Still, I wait. She's starting to make impatient noises. "Come on, Wendy!"
Realization finally dawns.
“Oh!” I say. “When we collect the evidence of his different evaluations on the very same teaching styles,” I pause for dramatic effect, “we’ll have him!”
Martha stares at us as if in disbelief. “Have him how?” she finally asks.
Mary and I stare at each other and then burst into laughter. “I don’t know yet,” I admit.
