I loved my teaching career. It was mostly delightful but almost always stressful. Attempting to reach one hundred fifty souls each school year was a daunting task. There were times when I carried my concerns about them home with me even as I pretended to be engaged with my family and friends. All of those young souls were rarely far from my thoughts. Sometimes they even interrupted my sleep. I had learned the value of focusing on the positive aspects of each school day, but as with most educators I often found myself brooding over the moments when I might have done better. I felt the weight of my responsibility full force and so did my professional colleagues.
Over time I rose to leadership roles like team leader or department chair. Eventually my job was to mentor and guide the teachers. I had differing titles but my duties were essentially the same. In one school I was known as a Peer Facilitator. I liked that designation because it fittingly described what I had been tasked to do. My whole focus was on helping the teachers to be the best versions of themselves. I was there to help them, not to grade or judge them.
At another school I was the Magnet School Coordinator. That title confused everyone because there had never before been a person dedicated to supporting the teachers. I spent much of my time attempting to demonstrate that I was not there to critique but to provide them with ideas for enhancing the level of learning in their classrooms. It took time for them to trust that ours would be a collaborative effort, not a competitive one.
I spent my last years as a full time educator with the title of Dean of Faculty. It made me sound more important than I felt that I was. I saw myself as a voice for the teachers. I was a coach, not a boss. Title notwithstanding, I felt that I was on an equal footing with them. I was there to make their lives at school as successful as possible. Sometimes that meant just listening to them voice their concerns. Sometimes it was a matter of procuring funding and supplies that they needed for a special project or lesson. Always it involved coaching and interaction with them.
I came to understand what happens in schools both from my own experiences in the classroom and from the many observations of teachers at work. I learned that the vast majority of men and women who choose to teach are highly educated, dedicated and hard working. Like me, they take their jobs so seriously that their students are never far from their minds even when they are away from work. There are things about teachers that most people do not know and I wish that there were some way to convey just how hard they work and how much they love their very difficult jobs.
A teacher’s day does not begin at nine and end at three in the afternoon. In fact most teachers set their alarms to begin their days before the sun rises in the morning. Many of them are already on duty by seven in the morning, preparing their classrooms for the day’s lessons, attending grade level meetings, monitoring the cafeteria and hallways as students arrive at school. When the bell rings for classes to begin they begin a long assignment of vigilance which keeps them on their feet, ever alert, striving to make lessons exciting and fulfilling for students while also watching for trouble spots in the classroom. Teachers end up with bad feet and aching backs from rarely sitting down. They have to control their bladders until they have a few minutes to race to the bathroom. There is no time for daydreaming or taking an unscheduled break. Every minute of every single day is focused on their work. Even lunch time can be divided between eating and monitoring students in the cafeteria. Thirty minute lunches are the general rule, so there is no time to get away to a restaurant and just chill for a time.
After school teachers monitor students as they get on buses, ride or walk home. Sometimes they have duties like watching the kids assigned to detention. Other times they sponsor clubs or coach athletic teams. There are department meetings and inservice presentations. Most teachers hold tutoring sessions in the morning and afternoon. While the students may leave at three, teachers will still be at work until five in the evening and sometimes even later on special occasions. Most days they carry home bags of papers to grade and lessons to plan. It will be late in the evening before they finally crawl into bed exhausted and sometimes worried about their students’ progress or behavior. Even sleep is not always restful for them.
The end of the school year may free the students for the summer but teachers remain on duty to tie up loose ends, tidy their classrooms, turn in final grades. Many will return within days to teach summer school, others will be taking mandatory classes to keep their certifications or to learn the latest pedagogical methods. It will be the end of June before they finally have vacation time and even then the best among them begin planning for the coming year while at home. Some even take vacations to places where they will be able to gather information and items for use in their future lessons.
When August comes they are back on the job, preparing for the new students to arrive. There is no such thing as a three month vacation for teachers. They myths of how little they actually work are totally false. In fact, I have calculated that they work more hours per calendar year than people in most any other profession than perhaps doctors and nurses and some zealous souls who are passionate about their work. For all of their efforts they have almost always been underpaid and under appreciated and yet they return again and again because they truly believe in the importance of what they are doing.
There was a time when teachers from other countries came to visit the school where I served as the Dean of Faculty. These individuals were from nations often praised for their schools. When I asked them how we might rise to the level of excellence that they had achieved they told me that we already had. The difference that they saw was in how our nation appreciates the teachers. They told me that in their countries teachers are revered and compensated fairly for the amount of work that they do. They noted with a bit of sadness that Americans don’t seem to realize what wonderful things are happening in our schools. Many Americans seem to take for granted that teaching is a job for people unable to do anything else.
I don’t know how we might convince our citizens that our teachers are the very backbone of society. They are the foundation of our progress. They fuel our industries and businesses with educated workers. They improve our economy by preparing the innovators of the future. Somehow only our universities get the credit for doing all the good work when they are only the endpoint. It is a travesty that from preschool through high school teachers are not lauded as much as they should be. Perhaps one day we will finally figure out that they are the foundation of society.
All It Takes Is A Little Love 