Sometimes You Can't Say No

Our Happy Little Portable is rapidly becoming "the" place to get caught up on your work and boost your grades, especially among the 8th grade kids.

True, it usually is pretty quiet in there as my typical number of kids is about eight, but I've been as low as one and then had a lot of new additions to boost my numbers to 18.  (That is NOT fun).  Today I started out with one kid and after lunch seven more arrived.  But honestly, if the numbers are fairly low, it really is a good place to get caught up.  

And apparently the word is out.  

Fourth period arrived today and with it came Baseball Boy who is my student aide for fourth period, along with another kid I had last year.  Last year Lazy Boy was beyond lazy, but he was also rude and got into trouble almost constantly.  He ended up the year with something like 250 discipline points and was on the verge of being expelled.  But for some reason the kid liked me.  Anyhow I hadn't seen him this year, which is huge, because it means he hasn't been in trouble much (I looked.  Here we are halfway through the year and he has 15 points.  He got that much in a DAY last year.)

"Lazy Boy needs to talk to you," said Baseball Boy.

"Yeah, I want to know if I can come to ISS for the rest of the week and next week until I get my grades up," he said.  

I about fell over.  

"Really?"  I replied.  

"Yeah, I go in front of a judge in January and I need to have C grades in all my classes or I go to Juvie," says Lazy Boy.  "I really need your help.  Baseball Boy says it's quiet here and you help kids."

"Well it can be," I said.  "And other times it can be crazy."

"I promise I'll be good," he said.  

"You can only come out during your related arts," I told him.  "You need to be in your academic classes."

"So I can come out third and fourth period?" he asked.  "Oh my gosh, Mrs. Bluebird, that would be amazing.

Oh jeez.  Really.  How can I say no?  So I pulled up his grades and missing work and he does have his work cut out for him.  Sent him and Baseball Boy into the building to get work from his teachers, and then emailed The Principal, and his teachers and the guidance counselor he talks to all the time and said if it was okay with them, I'd like to keep him for his related arts and help him get his grades up.  Seemed to make everyone happy, so I put him at the work table with Baseball Boy (who's really bright and a good student) and they worked on math the rest of the period.

I may have opened a Pandora's box and now all the kids will want to be out here to "catch up", but honestly I couldn't say no.  We'll see how it goes.

And the good thing is with Baseball Boy helping him, he won't be driving me insane.

UPDATE:

Update on Lazy Boy - every day he came in, got to work, I didn't have to get after him One Single Time.  I was having trouble believing this was the same kid I had last year that had racked up nearly 300 discipline points in seventh grade.  He got his grades up.  Not sure if they're high enough for the Judge, but he did pull them up.  We'll see how the court date goes in January.