I just don’t know what to make of this year’s bunch. At first, they were looking good, mainly because they were NOT the ones from last year. Oh baby, I’m glad that crowd has moved on (well most of them anyway), and now the crabby eighth grade teachers actually have something to be crabby about. Hey wait a minute! I’m one of those eighth grade teachers this year. (I keep forgetting that, eighth grade or no, they are still very much in junior high. But they try to remind me almost daily that they can be just as out to lunch and gluey as seventh graders. But with attitude.) The seventh grade noobs were still looking good as I was checking out our new subscription to DataDirector, and their state test scores. Less than 20% below proficient, as defined by the state. The year before, that number was closer to 30%. Ok so far. They all had a planner on opening day. Oh yeah. We gave those out on that first day this year. Well, all but two of them still have it now. The sit and stare phase lasted much longer than usual, which is usually a sign of

