Letters from the Inside: A Great Young Teacher Decides to Leave the
Profession
(Reprinted by permission of the author)
Josh Waldron,
a veteran teacher of only 6 years and recipient of teaching awards, has made
the agonizing choice to leave a profession that he once loved. His explanation(s), observations, and
recommendations reflect a sobering review of what is happening in the classroom
across the nation. For his entire post
on his site, click below:
“As the title of this post
suggests, I have made the tough decision to leave the classroom for good at the
end of this school year.
The decision is a painful one
— both personally and professionally. It is also a public one, as I’ve been
honored as recently as last month by the Waynesboro Rotary Club as its 2014
High School Teacher of the Year, my fourth such honor in six years.
In that respect, I feel an
explanation is in order, as well as a prescription for what we — as a community
— can do to right the ship.
Every workplace has its
imperfections and challenges. I accept that. But public education is painted as
a career where you make a difference in the lives of students. When a system
becomes so deeply flawed that students suffer and good teachers leave (or
become jaded), we must examine how and why we do things.
Waynesboro is small enough
that we can tackle some of the larger problems that other school systems can’t.
I want this piece, in part, to force a needed, collective conversation.
In doing so, I don’t want to
come across as prideful or arrogant. I simply want my neighbors and friends to
understand the frustrations at issue and what’s at stake for the next round of
teachers and students.
When I came to this
area in 2008, I believed I would be a teacher for life. My wife and I
signed a lease on an apartment we had never seen and arrived only a few days
before school started. Words can’t really express how excited I was to land a
teaching job, work with high school students, and invest in teenagers the way
one teacher invested in me.
That first year coincided with
the first round of school budget cuts. Salaries were frozen and spending was
slashed. This basic storyline has repeated itself for the five years that
followed.
Over this time, I’ve lost my
optimism and question a mission I once felt wholly committed to.
I still care deeply about
students. I’ve worked hard to brighten their day while giving them an enjoyable
and rigorous environment in which to learn. If this job was just about working
with students, I couldn’t ask for a better or more meaningful career.
The job, though, is about much
more. And I have very real concerns about the sustainability of public
education in Waynesboro (and as a whole).
To make a real difference in
the lives of students, raise the quality of life in greater Waynesboro, and
attract and keep life-changing teachers, we must address five key areas:
1. Tear Down the Hoops
Our
teachers spend far too much time jumping through hoops.
Every year, our district
invents new goals (such as “21st Century Skills”), measuring sticks (most
recently a “Growth Calculator”), time-consuming documentation (see “SMART
goals”), modified schedules (think block scheduling and an extended school
day), and evaluations (look in our seventy-two page “Teacher Performance
Plan”).
As a district, we pretend
these are strategic adjustments. They are not. The growth calculator was
essentially brought forward out of thin air, SMART goals are a weak attempt to
prove we’re actually doing something in the classroom, etc. Bad teachers can
game any system; good teachers can lose their focus trying to take new
requirements seriously.
These hoops have distracted me
from our priority (students). I’ve concluded it’s no longer possible to do all
things well. We need to tear down these hoops and succeed clearly on simple
metrics that matter.
Over the past six years, I
can’t remember a time where something was taken off my plate. Expectations
continue to increase and we play along until we invent new hoops.
On a personal level, with 100+
students a year, a growing family, and two side jobs, I can no longer be a good
teacher and do all the system expects of me.
2. Have a Plan for the
Future
I stepped into the classroom around the time of a major worldwide
recession. As the
individuals and institutions responsible for this recession escaped
accountability for their actions, school districts like ours went
into survival mode.
Six years later, we’re still
there. We have no plan for the future.
Earlier this year, the school
board held its annual budget meeting. I left my second job early to attend and
asked board members one simple question: “Is there any cause for optimism?”
Each school board member, searching for a silver lining, effectively answered
“no” by the time their reasoning caught up with them.
These basic mantras seem to
govern what we do:
Just do the best you can.
We
need to do more with less.
There’s no money in the budget for that.
We’re
hoping things look better next year.
I don’t fault our district for
a worldwide economic downturn. I do fault it for how it’s handled it. For six
years in a row, we’ve cut, cut, cut. And for six years in a row, students and
teachers have paid the biggest price.
When times are tough, human
beings and institutions have the rare opportunity to reflect and refocus, to
think differently and creatively. But instead of seizing the opportunity and
gathering stakeholders for collective conversations and solution building,
we’ve wandered around aimlessly hoping to make ends meet.
We should have a clear plan
for sustainability. Instead, we’re really just worried about balancing the
budget.
When we have a desperate need
like football bleachers that have to be replaced, or turfgrass that isn’t up to
par, we somehow find the money. We — through public or private avenues — meet
those needs. Why can’t we find funds to address the areas that seem more
pertinent to our primary mission?
3. Scrap Obsession with Flawed
Assessments
I’ve seen teachers cry over Standards of Learning scores. I’ve seen
students cry over SOL scores. I’ve seen newspaper and TV reports sensationalize
SOL scores. These are all indications of an unhealthy obsession with flawed
standardized tests.
SOL tests are inherently
unfair, but we continue to invest countless hours and resources in our quest
for our school to score well. This leads me to the following questions:
• Do we care more about student progress or our appearance?
• Why can’t we start a movement to walk away from these tests?
• Why can’t we shift our focus to critical thinking and relevant
educational experiences?
It’s tough to acknowledge that
people in Washington, D.C., and Richmond (and sometimes decision makers in
Waynesboro) develop systems and policies that affect my students and me
negatively. But as they retire and sail off into the sunset, we’re the ones
left with the consequences of ineffective measurements and strategies.
Our new teacher evaluations
focus heavily on test scores. But while teachers are continually under pressure
to be held accountable, there seems to be very little accountability for
parents, the community, or district offices.
It’s only going to get worse,
and it seems that we have no intention of taking a stand or advocating against
flawed assessments. Instead, we have submitted ourselves to these tools that
misrepresent student growth. It is a game, and it is a game I no longer wish to
play.
4. Build a Community That
Supports Education
Stop by the high school for a sporting event (and I love
sports) and you’ll be impressed with the attendance and enthusiasm. Stop by the
high school on a parent-teacher night and you’ll see tumbleweed blowing through
the halls.
If parents and local
decision-makers really value education (and there is a small portion of the
community that does), student and teacher morale would be much different.
Our school and political
leaders must help build a community that truly supports education. A real
investment from residents across all neighborhoods and groups would change the
climate immensely and allow us to truly tackle the challenges that lie ahead.
Unfortunately, the community
seems disengaged with such struggles and more concerned with whether or not
we’ll ever land an Olive Garden.
Until the community boosts its
value of education…
• How can we provide high quality to all students?
• How can we build strong academic programs that meet student
needs?
• How can we prepare students to be productive citizens?
• How can we successfully partner with parents and others?
If we can’t reflect the values
of our mission statement, then we need to change our mission statement.
We simply can’t move forward
when there is such little community connection to our educational goals. And if
we can’t move forward together, I don’t want to tread water alone.
5. Fairly Compensate
Educators
Compensation alone has not pushed me away from education. At the same
time, the years of salary and step freezes have taken a toll.
If educators are as valuable
as we claim they are (our district website says we “strive to hire and retain
quality employees”), then we would make sure we take care of employees and
their families. We must fairly compensate educators.
Keeping a sixth year teacher
on a first year salary is not looking out for someone who looks out for
students. For those like me, there’s only a $100 difference in our December
2009 and January 2014 monthly paychecks.
My wife and I live on a very
strict budget. We are thankful for the quality of life we enjoy compared to
other people in the world and try to keep things in their proper perspective.
But the only financial reason I can afford to keep teaching is because of two
side businesses and the generosity of family and friends. I’m not the only
educator who manages extra work to make ends meet. Here are some efforts we’ve
made to make this job sustainable:
• We lived with one car (a car that was given to us) for 4 ½
years. During that time, I walked or rode my bike to school to save on gas. We
recently bought a second car with money I saved from my web design business.
• We rarely eat out and maintain our own garden to cut down on
food costs.
• We bought a $114,000 house that needed lots of work. This kept
our mortgage payments in the $700 range, which is about what it would cost to
rent a decent apartment.
• We haven’t taken a vacation since I started teaching six years
ago.
I love Waynesboro. I’m rooting
for Waynesboro’s success. But there needs to be real, quantifiable change if
we’re going to create a bright future for everyone.
A love for students and
teaching drove me for the past six years. Now I’m watching my own kids grow up
and am starting to think more and more about my own family.
What will I have to show for
myself 10 years from now when I’ve missed crucial time with my own kids to
barely break even and exist in a place where educators aren’t really valued?
What happens when I dedicate my life to a place only to discover I’m part of
their 10th round of budget cuts?
We need answers. I hope this
can move us one step closer to asking the questions that will get us there."
Josh Waldron
CATEGORIES
Everything he said is true for teachers in many parts of the country. Here in Illinois we have pension theft on top of everything else. I feel outrage that a great teacher like Josh Waldron, and thousands like him are being forced into such situations. I will never again recommend young people go into teaching.
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