Dyer’s Revenge

What to do on the last day of school?

The first year I taught middle school in Aurora, we had an activity day—outside. It featured a softball game between the 8th grade boys and the faculty. I played third. And a lot of the kids were surprised when I gobbled up a grounder and fired the ball to first. I was only a few years away from thinking I’d have a baseball career. That dream was over, but some fragments of dream-clouds remained, enough to impress some of the kids.

Other years we did other things—wish I could remember.

But my last, oh, decade at Harmon School, I would put on my syllabus for the final marking period the words Dyer’s Revenge for the last day. Kids would ask me what that was (those kids who looked at the syllabus!), and I would reply, ominously, “Just wait and see!”

So—especially that first year—there was some concern about what was going to happen.

There needn’t have been.

After some end-of-the-year wrap-up occurred (returning textbooks, etc.), I would announce that it was time for Dyer’s Revenge. And the room would go silent.

And this is what I did: I would go around the room—in no particular order—and say some things about each eighth grader. Good things. Things I remembered from the year, encouraging things I had to say about every kid.

All praise—no negative criticism.

I thought of things kids had said, what they had written, how they had behaved, what their presence in my room had meant to me, etc. At times I had a hard time preventing my voice from breaking, shattering with emotion. 

You see, by the end of the year I was very close to those kids. A lot of them had been in our 8th Grade Farewell-to-Harmon Show, performed only days before, a show that featured skits, singing, dancing (choreographed by my great colleague, the late Andy Kmetz). Each show ended with the entire cast singing “Bye, Bye, Harmon!” (The tune was “Bye, Bye, Birdie!”)

I wrote the skits and the lyrics, and various musical talents I knew at the school played the piano—including the great band director Gary Brookhart.

Most of us were weeping when the finale ended.

So, anyway, “Dyer’s Revenge” ended up being, really, “Dyer’s Affection for You,” and I never once had any trouble thinking of what to say about every single kid.

That’s the kind of place Harmon School was ...