The Faculty Lounge by Jennifer Matthieu

The Faculty Lounge by Jennifer Matthieu coming out July 23 provides a look into the lives of teachers, administrators, and staff who work at Baldwin High School in Houston, Texas. Basically a series of short stories told over a school year, this contemporary fiction illustrates the problems in public schools today: from book banning to high stakes, poorly written standardized tests to practice lockdowns to lack of administrative support from the Central Office to helicopter parents to overworked and underpaid teachers.

The school year starts with the story of a beloved retired teacher who has returned to Baldwin to substitute teach only to pass away while stretched out on the couch in the faculty lounge. When Principal Kendricks complies with Mr. Lehrer’s request to have his ashes spread in the courtyard of the school per his will, he comes under fire when the impromptu scattering is witnessed by some busybody parents, one of whom gets covered with ash when the wind blows. The staff taking part in the ceremony soon find themselves in mandated trauma counseling. The principal will be fighting to keep his job before the year is over.

The youngest teacher on campus starts her year by finding Mr. Lehrer’s body. An English teacher recalls it was Mr. Lehrer who offered her encouragement in her first year of teaching, always said to be the hardest year. She tells the younger teacher, “There are some days when all you can do is just make it until the last bell.” 

A veteran English teacher misfires an email response to a parent challenging his use of a book that she accuses of being an example of Critical Race Theory, with the end result that the book is pulled from all the English classes, and the teacher has a reprimand added to his permanent record. The school nurse deals with all sorts of maladies but her heart goes out to those who suspect pregnancy, and to that end, she buys test kits with her own money for them. 

A biology teacher questions his career choice, especially when he is trapped in the book room when an unscheduled lockdown is issued. An assistant principal finds herself coping with the death of her spouse by self-medicating to deal with all the problems that pop up in each school day. These are just a few of the stories in the course of a school year at Baldwin High School.

Jennifer Matthieu is  a high school English teacher and writer. Her young adult novel Moxie was adapted into a Netflix film directed by Amy Poehler. The Faculty Lounge is her first adult novel. She lives in Texas with her family.