Once word got around at school that I was working at McDonald’s, I got made fun of even more. Most of my classmates didn’t have to work, so getting a job at McDonald’s was the last thing they would ever do. I was often told, “People who work at McDonald’s are the stupidest people on earth.”
Toward the end of my sophomore year, I told my mother that I wasn’t going back to Saint John’s. The school did nothing for me. I wasn’t one of those kids who had to be yelled at by a teacher an inch away from my face to do my homework. I didn’t fit in, hated the culture of arrogance, and thought that it was just a waste of time and money. At first, my mom was a little disappointed, but she agreed that paying the tuition at Saint John’s was just throwing money down the drain.
In tenth grade, I had to take three state Regents exams. In the late 1990s, the state began a push to have 100 percent of high school graduates earn Regents diplomas. One of the largest criticisms about these exams was that teachers only taught the material that was on the tests, and not broader subject matter.
From March to the end of the school year, most of my classes would just study and use the Barron’s Regents Exam Prep review books that we had to purchase at Barnes & Noble. At the end of the school year, I really didn’t care about my grades. I hated geometry, the math class I was required to take, and I started to get seventies. About six weeks before the Regents exam, we had to take a full-length practice exam. Mr. Robertson, the math teacher I had as a freshman, decided to announce all the grades in class, regardless whether the student wanted twenty-five of his classmates to hear his grade or not. I got a sixty on the practice test, and I was worried that I might fail the Regents; I had usually gotten nineties in math before geometry. I went to Mr. Robertson, and he gave me the opportunity to do extra credit by grading other students’ tests. I remember the morning of the Regents exam, Mr. Robertson went up to a large group of students who were hanging out in the guidance office. One by one, getting right in our faces, he asked in a very obnoxious way if we were going to pass. I was no exception. Usually I was very timid, and my face would turn bright red if anybody yelled at me or brought negative attention to me in front of a group. However, this time I was very calm and simply said to him, “Yes, I am going to pass and get an eighty-five.” Mr. Robertson was surprised and said, “Really?” Actually, I got an eighty-six.
I was so happy to leave Saint John’s. I am Catholic, and I love Jesus. Saint John’s in the 1990s was not about teaching the values of Jesus Christ or Saint John Baptist de La Salle. It was about people spending twenty-five to thirty thousand dollars (over 4 years) for a high school education that they felt their public school district couldn’t provide. Some came for discipline, others for athletics. One common thread was that everybody thought that Saint John’s was the best. In reality, the school didn’t even have qualified teachers to teach the same high school curriculum that every other high school in New York State was providing.
In college, I heard a guest speaker who talked about health care as a multidisciplinary approach. The speaker pointed out that you could have the best physicians and nurses, but if the room wasn’t clean, where was the patient going to stay? Basically, in any work environment, every person from the CEO to the custodian has an important role to play. If somebody thinks that he or he is too good to be a part of the team, that team will not be able to function. When I was at private school for two years, I was constantly being told that I was the best for attending Saint John’s and that public school students were disobedient, drug users, and juvenile delinquents. Every job I’ve had, I’ve had to work with people who went to public school. If I adopted the philosophy that was taught at Saint John’s, I probably wouldn’t have been a good employee.
After I left Saint John’s, I was curious to see what happened or what changes the school made. After the class of 2001 graduated, there was a sizeable increase from four hundred to over five hundred thirty students in 2005. Enrollment had decreased to approximately 381 students for 2011–12. 3
In 2005, the school made national news when an English teacher and mother of one of the students slept with several of her students. The teacher and a student, who was only sixteen, were found committing a sexual act in a parked car.
The teacher was separated but was still married to a successful businessman and had a history of abusing alcohol.4
The school now has, according to its website, Advanced Placement courses in English, Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Computer Science, etc and even offers college credit courses from the University at Albany and Hudson Valley Community College. All of the surrounding school districts by St. John’s (Albany, North Colonie, South Colonie), also offer these types of courses. According to the current Director of Admissions, teachers now have to be certified to work at the school. This means that up until 2011, some teachers were teaching multiple subjects that they were not certified to teach. In 2010, on a flier for an open house, the school continued to boast that it had 100-percent pass rates on five Regents exams. However, some of these Regents exams were required for graduation in
