Thursdays: the best/worst day of the week

Somewhere, somehow, the rumor got started that Japanese kids are intensely studious and well behaved. I am here to tell you that this is mere myth. While the few top tier schools might have those stereotypical students, I've discovered that the rest of the schools consist of students attempting to avoid drawing any sort of attention to themselves. It turns out that in Japan a passing grade is 30%, something you can pull off just by showing up. There's not even a need to stay conscious. On Thursday I have what is by far my worst class. There're some really wild kids in it and I'm technically not allowed to discipline them so it's completely out of control. I leave exhausted and hating my job and certain I can't do this for more than a year.

But then I go to Sogo Yogo Gakko. It's the special needs high school I teach at on Thursday afternoons. The school is split into two groups: physical and mental disabilities. At first I was a little alarmed that kids who are perfectly capable mentally have to go to a separate school just because they're in a wheelchair, but the school is so wonderful that I'm pretty sure I would have preferred it over a "regular" high school. It's enormous, (it serves the entire prefecture), beautifully designed building just erected a few years ago. There are more than 150 teachers there, and they're all young, friendly, and care deeply about all of the students. The teacher to student ratio is something like 1:3. My largest class has five people and the smallest has just one student. I adore them. They actually talk to me. They want to talk to me. The first year students exceed the level of many of the third year students at my base school. It's so dramatically different from the class I have in the morning that I don't want to leave when the day is up, and I imagine I could do this job forever.