Standardized testing is a top priority in schools, with conversations around teaching and learning reduced to raising student test scores. Often any other conversations about how schools should serve students are eliminated or pushed to the periphery. The central questions raised here are the following: how are student-teacher relationships constructed in the classroom and how important are those relationships to those students and teachers? My focal teacher enacted a curriculum that was critical and relevant to students' lives. He considered the curriculum as his primary way of building relationships with students.