Masterman Is Still Mrs. Cohen’s “Happy Place”

When asked what she enjoys about substitute teaching, Mrs. Cohen explains that teachers have a certain pressure on them that substitutes do not. “If you are really dedicated to teaching you never stop working. It is always on your mind; you wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it, different ways to teach something because the class didn’t get it.” On the other hand, substitute teachers don’t have all the responsibilities that come with being a full-time teacher, just the joy of working with students. At this point in her life, she believes it’s good that she doesn’t hold the same level of responsibility as full-time teachers.

However, just like full-time teachers and most other professions, Mrs. Cohen’s job went online due to coronavirus. During last school year, which was almost entirely virtual, she had to navigate substituting online. She took over Mrs. Hoskins’ English class for the first few months of school, and then a math class - all online. When assessing the 2020-2021 school year, Mrs. Cohen says, “it was a very different experience. I find it very challenging to get to know students in the same way virtually as I get to know them in person.” Although the School District has finally returned to in-person schooling, substituting has not gone back to its pre-pandemic ways. Mask provisions and social distancing continue to strain student-teacher relationships. Mrs. Cohen adds, “Most of the time the assignments are online, so I’m not even interacting with [students] during the lesson. I’ve lost all that, and I miss it.”

Another pandemic-related adaptation is the opening of a new position at Masterman: the permanent building substitute teacher. “In my three years prior to this, we didn’t have a building sub,” explains Mr. Gilken, dean of the high school. As the building substitute, Mrs. Cohen's job is to come to school everyday and take any assignment, whether it’s a week of filling in for a sixth-grade teacher or a single period of covering high-school chemistry. “To have Mrs. Cohen here, in that space, I don’t know how we would have functioned without her with all of the vacancies,” Mr. Gilken recognizes. This year, Masterman, along with most other Philadelphia schools, has struggled with staffing vacancies. In addition to the already existing vacancies from the beginning of the year that were never filled, teachers have retired and taken extended leaves for various reasons. Mrs. Cohen and the other substitutes have had to step up to fill those absences. Although the job of permanent building substitute certainly sounds daunting, Mrs. Cohen focuses on the positives. “I get to meet kids from all over the building.”

A unique characteristic of substitute teaching is having to constantly switch subjects. Mrs. Cohen’s favorite subject to cover is English. “It’s second nature to me,” she adds with a smile. When asked if it’s hard to go from subject to subject, she raises an interesting point. “Not so much because the lessons are online… if I were really teaching in person or executing a teacher's plan I would be more involved in the teaching rather than the monitoring.” Most teachers leave a lesson on Google Classroom for their students to complete rather than have the substitute enact a lesson plan. Although this makes Mrs. Cohen's job easier, it results in less student-teacher interaction. However, it’s a huge step forward from virtual school, and Mrs. Cohen values the interactions that do occur.

“I’ve always felt that any work with young people is important because they really are the future,” Mrs. Cohen reflects. “I feel as though any positive impact I can have on anybody… gives me the opportunity to impact the next generation, and that’s a great feeling.” Mrs. Cohen certainly has had exactly this kind of positive impact. When half of the sophomore class faced the consequences of a significant math department vacancy, Mrs. Cohen was assigned the majority of coverage throughout this time. Eleena John (10-4) notes, “At times of uncertainty [Mrs. Cohen] stepped up. She came to school every day and made sure there was someone present in our class.”

“I learned so much from her and am beyond lucky to have her as a mentor,” says Mrs. Waber, who spends time with Mrs. Cohen in and out of school. “Mrs. Cohen is wonderful. She became a person I can ask questions of,” says Mr. Gilken. “I think about how I'm going to be when I’m retired, and I look at what she's doing. That’s not a bad model for me in fifteen to twenty years.” Mrs. Cohen is widely valued by the students and staff at Masterman, and she feels the same way about the school. “I love being here. I’ve always loved being here, it's my happy place.”