Chapter 7

When Caitie and Bill returned to her apartment, they found Kate's message on the answering machine. A gas grill had appeared during the day and was now on the balcony outside Caitie's living room. Bill grilled steaks while Caitie prepared a salad. Their conversation focused on the events of the day and particularly on the mysterious phone message. The female caller had not identified herself.

They cleaned up and were sitting in front of the new television set at nine o'clock. At the break, an announcer's voice was heard saying, "NBC's Monday Night at the Movies will not be seen tonight. Instead, WNBC is proud to present a Kate Cornwall news special on the New York City schools. The station apologizes for the lack of notice to our viewers, but for reasons that will soon be apparent we believe it was necessary for us to act immediately to prevent a gross miscarriage of justice."

The show opened with Kate Cornwall sitting in a director's folding chair facing the camera. But because the studio was lighted from behind, it was impossible to make out her features; all that could be seen was the woman in silhouette. "Good evening, ladies and gentlemen," she began.

"Before beginning our show tonight I would like to publically apologize to Caitlin Collins for intruding on her classroom in PS-61 in Queens today. Miss Collins, I was in your class under false pretenses, and for this I apologize. After you see the show, though, I hope you will be able to forgive me."

Still appearing in silhouette, she outlined the background of the story: how one grade in a school in Queens was outperforming every other fourth grade in the city.

"What I found out, though, was it was not one grade. Rather, it was a single class taught by Caitlin Collins." Then she explained how her single classroom had more than half the students in the grade. The show opened with the Pledge of Allegiance. The pictures were very crisp and clear showing how proudly the students were standing beside their desks, each one wearing the class uniform. Then there was a brief bit showing the children singing a part of the fourth verse of the National Anthem. Following was the scene with Caitie calling for a moment of reflection.

To the amazement of both Caitie and Bill the tape showed the golden glow over the heads of the students and the brighter glow over Caitie's. "For those of you who might be upset by these things," Kate Cornwall said, "please note that Miss Collins called on the students for a moment of reflection. I have checked with our general counsel. The firm told me that there is absolutely nothing in case law or regulation which in any way restricts a moment of reflection. If it appears that the students are praying, that's their business."

She paused and then added, "I must point out that you are viewing an absolutely untouched video tape. It has not been altered, edited or modified in any way. The golden glow you see is exactly what I saw and the camera saw, too. If it reminds some of you of the Holy Spirit descending on the apostles at Pentecost, so be it."

The tape ended and again the camera was on Kate's silhouette. She continued, "How about performance? I did some checking. With only three exceptions among her 42 students, every one finished the third grade last year reading at a first-grade level. I said 'a first-grade level.' What did I mean? What I mean is that reading achievement is measured in grades and months. So a level of 1-2 means reading at the level of the second month of first grade. Therefore, some of Miss Collins' students were reading as low as 1-1, while others were reading at 1-9; but there were only three students who were better than that, and all of them were reading at a second-grade level. Please keep in mind that all the students had successfully completed third grade. At least it was 'successful' as defined by the New York City Board of Education. Frankly, after my experience today, I'm not at all sure what that means.

"But what about Miss Collins? Today, with the cooperation of the Board of Education and the principal of PS-61, Martha Scott, special achievement tests were administered to all the students in this school that includes grades kindergarten through sixth grade. A short time ago I received the results of the testing. It was administered and scored by Education Testing, Inc., of New York, a highly-respected private testing organization.

"The results? Even though Miss Collins has a fourth-grade class, her students outscored every other class in the entire school! Her fourth graders know far more than any sixth grader. Furthermore, their achievement scores are substantially better than the average for the city's ninth grade.

"Is there more?" she asked. "There certainly is. Her lowest-scoring pupil was two full grades higher than the highest-scoring fourth-grade student in any of the other three classrooms." Kate paused of a moment and then added, "There's another matter that I didn't make clear earlier. In PS-61, there are four fourth-grade classes. The total enrollment in the fourth grade is 80 students, which produces an average class size of twenty students."

Again she paused and continued, "Miss Collins' achievement is all the more remarkable when you learn that she has 42 students in her class! Even though there are four classes, she has more than half the total number of students. There are two other classes of thirteen students each, and one with twelve. Yet she produces academic performance with her 42 students that far surpasses the achievement of classes with twelve and thirteen students. But we all know the importance of small class sizes, don't we?"

Even in silhouette they could see her shake her head and continue, "Will Rogers had a favorite saying: 'It ain't the things we don't know what hurts us, it's what we know what ain't so.' Might the importance of small classes be one of those things 'we know what ain't so'? I wonder."

After the first commercial break, there was a long segment showing Caitie leading the discussion of the Declaration of Independence. It clearly showed Caitie's enthusiasm, and that of her students. Every single student was drawn into the discussion. All were prepared. All participated.

At the conclusion of the segment, Kate Cornwall commented, "A big thing in education today is building self-esteem. Well, I think you just saw self-esteem being built. But this self-esteem comes from real achievement. You can just see these young children blossoming in the smiles and approval of their teacher."

She paused a moment and then showed a very brief clip of Bill's talk with Bobby Smith, Jr. It showed Bobby reacting to Bill's question whether he liked Miss Collins. The boy was indignant as he said, "Are you nuts? 'Like' Miss Collins? Good grief, Dr. Corcoran, don't be stupid. There's not a kid in this class who likes Miss Collins ... We love her! She is the greatest."

Hearing his words, Bill gave Caitie's hand a warm squeeze. They were sitting together on the sofa with Caitie resting her head on his shoulder. At that point the show had another commercial break.

"Is she serious?" Caitie asked softly. "I don't understand, darling. This whole show was produced today. But why? What's going on?"

"I have no idea, honey," Bill replied. "But I think we're about to find out." Then he slowly shook his head and added, "It's got to be something very big, though. Monday Night at the Movies is one of the network's biggest shows. And NBC doesn't have many big shows this season. Furthermore, taking two full hours for a news show usually only occurs when we're at war or something. And then it's the network that does it. To take two hours in prime time for a local news show is unheard of."

At that point the station returned to its show. This time there were a series of cuts back and forth between Caitie's class and the room across the hall. The contrast was stark, and Caitie was shaking her head in amazement. Because of her many students and the way in which she involved herself in her teaching, she had never even looked across the hall. But what she now saw left her utterly appalled.

Turning to Bill she whispered, "Bill, I don't understand. From what I just saw, I don't see how those kids can learn anything."

"Honey, from the numbers Kate recited a few minutes ago, the short answer is that they don't learn anything."

Then he reminded her of the Hispanic mother who had been crying on her shoulder that afternoon. "Caitie, she wasn't talking just to hear the sound of her own voice. She was genuinely concerned about her daughter's education, and from what we're seeing, she has damned good reason for her concern, too."

Kate Cornwall had learned something, too. Although she had put the show together herself, it had all happened so fast, she really had not had time to pay much attention. Now she had the time and noticed how the camera's lens and ultra-sophisticated sound system captured so much detail in the room across the hall. The children all appeared very bored and listless. It was not clear at any time what, exactly, the teacher was doing. It required very little commentary from Kate.

The message was crystal clear: Caitie's class full of children were excited, involved, and truly learning. The other children were just largely wasting time. And it wasn't their fault. They were carrying out their assignments such as they were.

"Does the teacher across the hall assign homework?" Bill asked softly.

Caitie just slowly shook her head. "I don't think so," she replied. "I guess I'm the only teacher in the school who does it on a regular basis."

"Folks," Kate Cornwall said, "I think you've seen all you need to see. We have seen from the test results that these children outperform every other class in this entire school. From the contrast between the two classrooms, I hope you agree with me that, first, the superior performance is real; and second, the reasons for it are obvious." She paused and then said, "We'll be right back after a short commercial break."

Bill took the opportunity to go to the refrigerator for a couple of Sam Adams beers. He had learned that Caitie had never had Sam Adams before but found she loved it. As a matter of fact, he thought, we have yet to find anything of significance that we disagree on. Returning to the TV, he found that there was more than an hour left to run. He wondered what they were going to learn next.

The next scene opened with Caitie and the mothers after school. "Folks," Kate said, "I spent a year on assignment in Madrid, and I'm here to tell you that you will not find purer Spanish spoken in Madrid than you've just heard from Miss Collins. You can see the Hispanic mothers just beaming with joy."

She showed a scene of the women sitting in a small circle, taking turns reading aloud. Caitie's prompting was very quiet and helpful; each time the woman who had just completed her reading was beaming with pride.

Next were a small series of interviews with parents after school. Included was one with Bobby Smith who went into raptures talking about what Caitie had done for his son. Then he told what she had done for Bobby's mother. "I bailed out on my son because I didn't think Sandy — Bobby's mother — was good enough for me. But now, after working with Miss Collins, I'm sure I'm not good enough for her. But I vowed to change starting right now. I want to get my son back, and I want his mother to be my wife. I've got a big job ahead, but by God, I'm going to get it done!"

"I'll bet he will, too," Bill added.

"I'm sure he will," Caitie responded. "I happen to know that Sandy is madly in love with Bobby Smith and always has been. I sure hope she's watching right now." Then she grinned and added, "She probably is, too. Monday is one of her nights off."

"Is there anything about your students or their families you don't know?" Bill asked with a warm smile.

Recognizing that he was gently teasing her, Caitie cocked her head, appeared to think for a moment, and then vigorously shook it. "No," she finally said in a flat tone of voice that triggered Bill's burst of laughter.

After another commercial break, Kate opened with her meeting at Livingston Street. When Caitie heard that her contract would not be renewed, she began to cry with hopeless-sounding sobs. Bill took her in his arms and held her close, just letting her cry her eyes out. He realized that she had just been hurt far worse than she had been on Friday night.