Book Summary
Jessica is tired of working this way. All she does is work. She has no life. Two years ago, Jessica was close to leaving teaching profession for Columbia University’s journalism school, but she could not because she was emotionally attached to Seward Park High School. However, now she has to leave in order to survive. Jessica freely donates her time. She does so to educate intellectually insecure students and repeatedly push them to succeed Yet the donor of time, unlike the donor of blood, cannot regenerate what is given. Jessica must finally save something for herself before there is nothing left worth saving. If she cannot revive herself with whatever elixir her teacher idols have discovered, then what is her choice?
There is only one choice: to walk away. She feels laden with bitterness in her sunless apartment on a sunny afternoon. When her anger cools, Jessica knows that even if the principal relieves her of a class in exchange for advising an award winning Seward World school newspaper it would not make much a difference. A decision to stop teaching would be the product not of anything temporary. It would be due to working conditions that are largely beyond a principal’s control – five classes a day times thirty-four pupils a class times nine years, all without money for enough guidance counselors or social workers or new textbooks or photocopier machines, all for a pittance in salary and respect.