CBEST, CWORST, CAVERAGE by Klaus Varley

Wrote this back in 2002 after taking the CBEST - the test you must take in California to become a teacher. And I became one, for a very brief time. No, I did not get fired (but perhaps I should have been, for referring to myself as White Destiny in pieces like this one. Good god.) -KV

CBEST, CWORST, CAVERAGE (Caverage! Yum!)
by Klaus Varley

The CBEST - the test to become a licensed school-teacher in California - stands for the California Basic Educational Skills Test. "Skills?" The SAT, taken to get into college has a fancy smancy name (Scholastic Aptitude Test). But the test to become the adult handing out that test on a Saturday morning? The teacher test is the "skills" test.

And so I didn't study, nor fret, and slept well the night before. So well in fact that I woke up ten minutes after I was supposed to leave.

"Shit," I said, with disdain for my unconscious behavior.

But because of my phenomenal driving skills I negotiated the freeway and made it to the valley, right on time, taking a seat next to those whose punctuality skills were obviously a grade above mine, but how will they fare when 2x + 5 = 7? Will they have the skills to solve for little "x"? I looked at their faces and new the answer was questionable, at best.

I sat behind a fair-haired maiden; her paper said her name was Rebecca Smith and her sweatshirt said she went to Pepperdine.

"You got skills, Becca?" I whispered in her ear with a sneer (and got ready for the rhyming section).

"Did you say something?" she asked, polite as a deer, turning to face my body, or like some refer to it as, The Temple of the White Destiny.

"Um, good luck?" I suddenly became nervous, transfixed in her steady gaze and large, green, and unblinking eyes. The temple was crumbling.

"Thanks, you too," said Rebecca, turning around and being bored once more. "Why can't guys ever say anything interesting?" she thought, twiddling her hair and popping her early morning Bubble Yum. Okay, no Bubble Yum, but she did twirl her hair--and think those thoughts.

It's nine AM. Let's begin.

The answer booklet is slapped on my desk by a disgruntled Calculus teacher working overtime on Saturday to facilitate a test for prospective members of her profession. She's pissed; I can tell. But is she frustrated with the long hours, little pay, and lack of respect she gets from her Brown colleagues at the reunion: the cost of being a dedicated educator of America's youth? (Typical reunion conversation: "Goddamnit I'm SAVING these kids, these, these lost little fuckers. They'd be on drugs without me, DON'T LAUGH THOMAS, I'M SERIOUS! Oh okay, laugh it up TOM…(She takes a long swig of the martini in her hand, finishing it off and setting her glass unsteadily down on a table nearby) but that's why your daughter is on coke and your wife gets more pleasure from the lawnmower than she does from you and your limp noodle. And when I say noodle, I mean you have a tiny dick, motherfucka!!")

Or does Disgruntled Debby (Mrs. Durbey) see us as the competition-the eager recruits waiting in the wings, watching for any error, any sign of weakness? (Look at these eager faces. They're waiting, oh yes, you'd better believe it: that clear complexion hides a wicked, warted, double crossing demon waiting to pounce. Waiting to pounce on me! POUNCE ON DEBBY? When the chips are down don't look to the young owl to help you out; he'll just eat you! It's no accident that teachers are depicted as owls in Tootsie Roll commercials-scavengers, I tell you, every last on of 'em!)

I sign the honesty agreement, or insurance plan, or contract with the devil, or whatever the hell it is, and me and my first #2 pencil (I christened him "One of Two" just before the start of the test) go to work.

The first paragraph looks something like this (the real test may not be replicated in any way, thus the excerpt below is some fake-ass shite).

1. Jim Johnson cured cancer. Throughout his life he had many _____ going for him. Never before had such a world seen such a man such as Jim Johnson. Jim had a wife and three kids, but they were killed by a hungry, hungry tractor while he was in Munich receiving one of his three Nobel Prizes for literature.

Question 1: The excerpt above most likely came from a work entitled:

A) Big Jim and the Twins
B) Jim Johnson: The Man, the Myth, the Smarty Pants
C) Blank Things
D) Hungry Hungry Tractors
E) The American Revolution

"Hmmm, this test might be trickier than I thought," I thought, correctly, and moved on to the next question, which, to my dismay, covered the same badly written paragraph.

Question 2: In the excerpt above, which word would best fit in the _____?

A) whores
B) therefore; however
C) Rocketman
D) good-things

I didn't ask why this question only had four answers and the other five--nor did I care. What did bother me was the fact that some answers had two words, most were sexual in nature, and I'd never seen the words "good" and "things" put together in hyphenated form. That's when I knew it was going to be a long morning.

I moved on to the writing section, because the CBEST also tests your "skills" in managing your time (on the test at least, not in your personal life), thus allowing you to go from section to section at your leisure. I wrote the two required essays and moved on. Don't want to say too much about them, but I'll say this: tears will shower my test, pouring from the eyes of all those blessed enough to have been chosen (by the lord almighty!) to grade my pieces. The dramatic account of the troubled early years of Timmy O'Toole is told with such pinpoint accuracy through the eyes of one Klaus Varley, that only one conclusion can be drawn: he uses a pseudonym. This "friend called Timmy," must be none other than Klaus Varley! in the flesh! Dry your tears readers, for it was a fictitious account, but don't forget the passing grade, eh? No, "A."

I went back and finished the Reading portion, leaving only the Math.

Average Math Question: If three less than one hundred is divided by seven, and the remainder is multiplied by 97 (you may laugh at this), how many Nobel Prizes did Jim Johnson win?

A) 97 X 97
B) µ
C) 7 of 9
D) µ2: The Sequel
E) Three People Who Have Never Been in My House.

The parentheses are my own, but I could just hear the composers of the test chuckling at their own cleverness: everything seemed like one big inside joke and a reference to Cheers. Though the math was easy, I felt like I was missing out on something-maybe a laugh?

But at 10:30 AM on a Saturday, I felt none two amused, yet oddly thankful that the correct answer was always one of the choices. I felt a security in that, and like all things secure, I felt safe--safe enough to hand my test to Mrs. Angry-Eyes when I smoked through the math section and leave in peace.

In the above paragraph, the word "two" is used in which sense:
A) The misspelled sense.
B) The sorry-attempt-at-a-joke-relating-to-numbers sense.
C) The sense like in the sentence: "Two gerbils for the price of one"
D) Sense-less.
E) All of the above, along with the sense of using it as an excuse to create a supposedly 'clever' question and answer session that has little or no relevance to the rest of the piece, and is the author's lazy way of avoiding any sort of moral or literary conclusion.

Well then, time's up. Put your pencils down and get out of my classroom you freaking brats. Mama needs a smoke.

-KV

Addendum: You'll be happy/frightened to know that Klaus passed the CBEST with flying colors and will soon be an official edumacater of America's youth.