Being a teacher during the pandemic was mostly painful. I was trying to explain to my brother why teaching from home was more than not fun this school year. I told him that I never wanted to have a desk job and teaching from home was a desk job. I didn’t get into the profession so I could sit at a desk for six plus hours a day looking at my laptop screen. His mind was blown. He had never thought about that. Some people really liked working from home and I’d be lying if I didn’t say there were some perks. The biggest one was being able to use the restroom when I needed to and not having to hold my pee in for extended amounts of time like I would normally need to do if I was on campus. But for the most part, it was the worst teaching year of my life.
There was a point in early March where I started looking at other jobs. I was completely burnt out and going crazy teaching from home. It wasn’t the isolation because I’m a natural homebody, it was the amount of pressure, added stress, and extra needs that made me wonder if it was worth it. I started Googling jobs I would be qualified for because I was ready to throw in the towel and transition into something different. This is really difficult to admit because it makes me feel like I was giving up on my students and on myself after working so hard to find a full time teaching position in a career that I enjoy. To think of leaving that behind made me feel like a shitty person and a quitter, but I was getting to the point of wanting to walk away.
The school district that I work for did not require students to turn their cameras on and I essentially taught to 95% black screens all year. This is the first year that I ended the school year feeling like I got to know maybe 25% of my students on a more personal basis and this is because of the lack of interaction and face-to-face time I would normally have. Adapting my material to an online format was time consuming and tedious. The amount of emails sent to students and parents about grades and lack of work/effort was upped by a large percentage as compared to previous years. I had students that contracted COVID, students that had to take care of their siblings or other duties during class time, students that were going through the trauma of losing loved ones, students that felt overwhelmed and unmotivated, and students that had mental health crises. Trying to support and also be understanding about all of these problems really took an emotional toll. All of these issues were squarely placed on the shoulders of teachers, administrators, and school counselors nationwide. Subsequently, many people have decided to move on to other careers.
I somehow made it through the school year and have had a month off to process and recharge. I have another month off to continue doing that, although I’m already starting to get things together for the next school year. I don’t know what this new school year will bring, but I have a feeling it’s going to be another trying year because we will need to figure out how to get students caught up to where they need to be. It’s going to be a big readjustment for students and school staff because we’ll be back in person 100% when August rolls around. I’m pretty sure there will be health mandates that we will need to follow and enforce, and my school has decided to change from a traditional schedule to block scheduling which will mean I will need to adjust my lesson plans for the extended class times. These changes will all impact the new school year and I’m nervous about how this will affect my life. Selfish, I know, but it worries me.
In all honesty, I’m not particularly looking forward to restarting in August. I hate to say this and go into the year with a negative attitude, but it’s been a terrible roller coaster ride for the past year and a half. There are some things I’m looking forward to like collaborating with colleagues and interacting in person with my students, so I’m choosing to focus on that. Maybe I’m wrong and everything will be great and back to how it used to feel. I have to keep telling myself over and over again that this will eventually get better. I’m hoping for the best, but as with a lot of things, I’m expecting it to be rocky and tiring. All I know is that I want the best for my students, but I also want the best for myself, which can be a delicate balancing act under normal circumstances.
