Stupidity on Parade

What separates the sheep from the goats?

One phrase:  Attention to detail.

As a contractor, not an independent employee, I am required to follow the company's curriculum.  Last spring, the company hired a curriculum writer to rewrite their program.  To follow the letter of federal and state labor law, the company posted a job vacancy.  But it was a total inside job.  I inquired about the position and was flatly rejected (despite having created curricula from scratch for two different schools) because they promised the job to one of the senior teachers.

Now I like this senior teacher, she is a very nice lady.  But she is not now and never will be the brightest bulb in the chandelier of humanity.  She is not a credentialed teacher. (Although, I don't know, that may be a plus.)  It is obvious she has never spent a minute reading about how kids learn music.  Or how to design an effective curriculum.

What she wrote for the company, and what all us teachers is forced to use, is a complete and utter mess.  On every level.  (Which will be expounded upon in later posts.)

I hate it.  I hate using it.  But worse, I hate what it is doing to me.  It is slowly, inexorably turning me into a liar and a dissident.  I certainly cannot reveal to anyone that I have abandoned the lesson plans.  Constantly I have to pretend that I am using them, and I earnestly care about the training the company provides.  I loathe drop-in visits by my boss, because the minute she walks in the door, I have to switch from the productive lesson I was teaching to the company-approved drivel.  It must confuse the students horribly.

How can regular teachers stand it?  Having to teach dreck they know doesn't work and is riddled with errors.  And why can't curriculum be written by actual experts - not failed classroom teachers?